Have a look at Debra Dalgleish's site on using a named range from another
workbook and see if you've done all the steps in the right order.

http://www.contextures.on.ca/xlDataVal05.html


Gord Dibben Excel MVP

On Wed, 14 Sep 2005 11:58:09 -0700, "justmetn"
wrote:

I'm using Excel 2003 and have setup a list of data and named it. When I try
to setup the drop-down list feature and select data validation and select
"List". The list is in a different workbook so I enter the name i have
defined preceded with an equal sign. I get an error message 'You may not use
references to other worksheets or workbooks for Data Validation criteria'. I
had the same drop-down list used with a prior version of Excel. Is there
something else I need to do?