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Although I was introduced many moons ago to computing via Mac, my first laptop was a macbook 610 if I remember rightly. Due to pressures of work etc windows edged into my life and has been there ever since. Many a sidelong glance at the Mac store has been given but now if I can get over some software issues I am going for a new MBP 15" will bells and whistles.

Main issues are that I use MS Word, Excel extensively, Outlook for email. PowerPoint less so.
I was confident all I had to do was purchase MS Office 2008 for a Mac and it was job done............until I read the reviews on Office 2008.
Now although I use Excel extensively I am not a space cadet so my applications are fairly light with little or no macros involved.

What is the general experience here, I already know about the excellent operating system and overall experience but I need to communicate with PC users via office formats so to speak, will I run into difficulties.

I already have discovered some small programs to transfer my email and address book etc from Outlook 2007 to Mail.

Comments please

Thanks in advance.
 
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It depends on what all you need those programs to do. I use word documents frequently, but find that the program Pages works wonderfully for what I need it to do. It exports to a .doc, .pdf, and .rtf formats so you should not run into any compatibility problems. I dont use spreadsheets much so i am not sure how good Numbers is compared to excel. I would suggest going to an apple store and opening up pages and numbers and see what you think.
 
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Pages sometimes has difficulty rendering forms created in Word. If you are using your Mac for business use, and you work with Word documents with forms, you will probably end up needing Office for Mac. If your Word documents do not contain forms, then you may find that Pages works perfectly. I use Mac Word daily and have no problems interacting with an office full of PCs.

I also use Excel for Mac, and it works perfectly. I've never had a PC vs. Mac issue with it.

Entourage also works well. If you need to transfer a substantial amount of emails and contacts from Outlook, I would strongly recommend 'Outlook 2 Mac'. It costs $10 and makes the transfer a breeze. There are some complicated ways to make the transfer for free, but it's just not worth the headache and the half a day of your life that you'll lose trying to save the $10.

You will find quite a few negative reviews of Office for Mac. Remember that many Apple users switched over to Mac after years of being frustrated by various issues involving Windows, and by extension Microsoft. Within the Apple community there tends to be a certain amount of anti-Microsoft bias with a few (but not all) Mac users--an 'if Microsoft makes it, it must be overly complicated and full of viruses' attitude. This sometimes carries over to the reviews of Office for Mac--not so much with Word, Excel, and Powerpoint, but mainly with Entourage.

The bottom line is that if you like PC Office, then you will probably like Mac Office. They are very similar. However, many Mac users have found that they prefer Apple's Mail, Pages, Numbers, etc. When they compare these products to the Microsoft offerings, the reviews tend to be negative--not because Microsift Office for Mac is bad, but just because they prefer the Apple applications.

Also, the folks who prefer the Microsoft Office applications, don't seem to ever bother to write negative reviews of their Apple counterparts. They just ignore them. This results in a higher percentage of negative Office reviews compared to negative Pages & Numbers reviews.
 
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Thanks

Thank you both for your replies. Basically this was what I needed to hear from people who use the software. Currently working overseas at the moment but I will be picking up a new MBP as soon as I return to Scotland.
 
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Office for Mac 2008 works just fine. I have many years of experience with excel, word, and powerpoint, and use excel sheets with lots of equations and funky things. Office for mac works well, although the way it sizes windows is a touch annoying at times, but this is very minor. I'm being picky there. And I strongly believe that MS doesn't work as hard getting a Mac version of office "right", just my opinion, so maybe that explains the very minor nitpicks I have.

If your uses of Office are very simple, then Neo Office will work fine (actually better IMHO), and it is free. If you use the more advanced features then you will want Office for Mac. It costs $350 I believe, and that is a good chunk of change. Of course I have heard that some choose to go onto the torrents and get it for free, but that is of course piracy, so everyone here will tell you that they purchase it legally (rolls eyes).
 

CrimsonRequiem


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And I strongly believe that MS doesn't work as hard getting a Mac version of office "right", just my opinion, so maybe that explains the very minor nitpicks I have...

Gee I wonder, why that is. >_>"
 
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Macros in Excel using Parallels or Fusion?

Does anyone know if there are any problems using macros programmed by visual basic in a PC version of Excel running on Mac via Parallels or Fusion?
 
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i have both office 2004 and 2008, and when it comes to excel, i always find myself opening 2004, i find it to be far more intuitive. and from what i can find, they have taken the chart wizard out of excel 2008, they made it VERY easy to manipulate HOW the chart looks visually, but i still don't know how to manipulate the content on the chart. also, with the new .docx, and .xlsx files as default 2004 seems to be a more competent and simpler suite than 2008.
 

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