Inconsistent Conditional Formatting result

Greetings,
I have a simple data log in txt format that I load into excel 2010 for analysis. One column is the mass per reading and I want to highlight cells that exceed certain accumulation rates.
I used a simple formula to subtract the previous reading from the current reading and then conditionally format to highlight certain rate thresholds.

The problem is that the formatting does not appear to work consistenly to the extent that two cells can have identical values yet be formatted differently. In other cases value a meets the criterion and is formatted correctly, value b is larger but in the same range but is not formatted.

I have expanded resolution to maximum and added a rule that ANY value greater than 0 (zero) should be formatted and still get odd results. Checked workbook options and did not see any issue.

I have attached a small snippet of a data file for an example.

Thank you for your input.
Regards,
JohnWS

Ok I see a couple issues alrdy, first you have 2 colors using the same conditional of > 0.00000001, secondly, its its > 0.00000005 its also > 0.00000001 So try using a Range rules if its > 0.00000001 or <= 00000002 its so and so color. also I didn't look to closely but you have the first light blue one referencing B2 and the rest referencing b3? I didn't look at it to much since im a work. If you need more help let me know and ill give it a shot.

33CDonnelly,

Thanks for looking briefly. The $B2 $B3 reference difference really has no effect. It is an artifact from some of my efforts to figure out what is going on. Changing it made no difference.

I also changed the number format in troubleshooting to see if the decimal resolution had any effect. Shouldn't have, since it is a display parameter rather than a calculation parameter. And it did not.

There is only one reference to .00000001 (1E-8) and one .000000001 (1E-9). Zeros are hard to count and I originally had it scientific notation prior to TS.
The order of the tests would leave the last quantity for which the condition was true formatted appropriately, using the KISS principle, I went for the simplest rules.

When the first test is; "Is it greater than ZERO" and it fails to format every nonzero value, I am mystified.
Regards,

John

newdoverman,
Thank you. In the rules dialog there is a checkbox for "Stop if True". My understanding was that if left blank the rules would continue to be tested to the last. Is this not the case? I did try this and it did not resolve the original issue though it did make a difference. So it appears that rule processing does stop even if the check box is left unchecked. What then is the purpose of the check box?

Again, thank you.
John

Problem resolved. This may be a bug. Changing the Cell reference from $B3 to $B1 caused the Conditional Formatting to work as expected. This is repeatable.