Excel 2007 : Excel 2007 crashes opening an .xls file

I'm having issues opening a relatively large (168,000 KB) .xls file in Excel 2007. It contains lots of formating, macros, linked data, and pivot tables. The file opens easily for users in Excel 2003, but crashes Excel 2007 for all users. This occurs with both Vista and XP.

It downloads fine, I'm prompted to choose read-only or not, and regardless of my choice, im prompted with the message "MS Excel has stopped working." I have noticed the progress bar on the bottom right stops every time at: "Calculating: (2 Processor(s)): 23%."

Try disabling macros in excel 2007 before opening the file. If it loads with macros disabled, at least you'll know it's some kind of compatibility issue with the macros/vba code.

In case you need help in disabling macros...

1 - Open Excel 2007 (not the file)
2 - Click on the "Developer" tab, then "Macro Security"
3 - Choose "Disable all macros with notification"
4 - Open the file