Thinking of switching, but need excel and word

[mtnman2888]

Hello all, i'm thinking pretty seriously about getting either a macbook or a macbook pro, but i have some compatibility concerns about it. I have some online classes, one is a spreadsheet class that requires excel, and i need to be able to send my assignments via email. I know that there are a couple options, such as boot camp, parallels, and office for mac, but i was wondering which one is the best. I definitely don't need any non-compatibility issues. I would appreciate any advice, thanks.

 

[remain]

About Microsoft Office..

I believe Office 2008 will be coming out soon; it's due later this year.

That version will support Intel Macs natively; Office 2004 runs under Rosetta so it's slower.

If you want Microsoft Office, you might want to wait for Office 2008

 

[todd51]

Right now I'm just using Office 2004 on my Mac, and yea it runs a tad slower, but it doesn't bother me. I will be upgrading to 2008 once it is released.

 

[mtnman2888]

Does it work pretty well and have all the features of the normal office? I just don't want any problems with my professor for turning something in that he can't open.

 

[dtravis7]

Office on OSX works great. The Speed issue is nothing large at all. It will work and do the job and it's Microsoft Office, Works fine with the Windows version. Later when the new versions comes out you could always upgrade and have even more speed. Should be 100% compatible with your Professor's Windows version.

 

[digitalscrap]

Does it work pretty well and have all the features of the normal office? I just don't want any problems with my professor for turning something in that he can't open.

I use Office 2004 with Excel files from work created with various flavors of Excel on Windows and I haven't had any problems...

 

[brendan67]

office for mac

yeh no worries

office 2004 running well on all our macs

my daughter is studying law 4th yr at university

and uses it for her course seemlessly

regards

 

[djames42]

If your class involves Macros, then you might run into some compatibility problems. You will definitely run into Macro compatibility problems when Office 2008 comes out. Microsoft has chosen to discontinue VBA for the Macintosh version of Office, which means (I believe) that Office automation will have to be done from AppleScript (which in some ways is more powerful anyway because of its ability to integrate with not only the Finder, but with all scriptable applications).