"matelot" skrev i meddelandet
...
Is it true that Excel allows you to read a workbook without having it
open?

No, you have to open it

If so, I want to be able to write a macro that read a closed xls data
file,
open another xls and insert the data into a given worksheet and a given
cell
(like starting in B2 rather than A1). Last step is to save the file and
close
both files. The problem is that I don't know how big is the data file. It
could be 200K or 1MB. Is it best to use copy and paste special?

Copy and Paste Special should be a lot faster

Or should I
read line by line?

Thanks for the help
M

/Fredrik