Excel 97-2003 cell content limitations

[Steve Rindsberg]

Some of my code automates Excel in very simple ways; it does little
more than open a file, pull the data from a specified worksheet into an
array and then close the file.

I heard from a customer who's noticed that my program doesn't deliver
ALL the data from some of his cells.

A few tests, a bit of googling and I learned that Excel 97-2003 will
store up to 32k characters per cell but will only display the first
1024.

I'm looking at e.g. oXLWorkBook.Sheets(x).Cells(y,z).Text to retrieve
the information I'm working with.

Is there a way to retrieve the cell contents rather than the cell
contents "as displayed by Excel"? Iow, ALL the data, not just what
Excel deigns to reveal?

Thanks. For either a "Here's how" or a "Save your forehead, save the
desktop, can't be done, don't bother"

OBTW, I do realize that this limitation's been lifted in 2007. Tested
my code there, works fine.