[PeteWK]

Well, I got a new MB Air with Lion on it. And of course, it killed all of my PowerPC software that's been happily running for the last umpteen years. Office X is dead.

So the question is, which of the remaining options is the least evil?

Office 2008?
Office 2011?

Pete

edit - yep, 8 it is. Was thinking PC there for a moment.

[Spheric Harlot]

You mean Office 2008.

They're both horrible.

Go LibreOffice. Looks like shit, too, but at least you're not PAYING for the privilege of fighting boneheaded design

[P]

2011 is far superior of those two. It is faster, it will have Lion compatibility for things like Versions eventually, and macros work. There's a trial available.

As for boneheaded... The downside to the design is that common tasks are not especially fast unless you learn the shortcuts. The upside is that it actually is discoverable, something previous versions weren't. The Mac version also has the menubar untouched, which certainly helps transitions.

[Chongo]

Open Office is also free.
OpenOffice.org for Mac OS X
I'm going to have the same problem when I load Lion on my iMac. Besides losing Office X, I will lose Quicken and a few other PPC apps;.

[mduell]

2011

[Brien]

I'm still on '08 and haven't had any issues with Lion. I'd upgrade to 2011, but I'll probably be lazy and wait for 2013.

[jmiddel]

2011 for sure, and do we know of a 2013 version? Even if, the OP needs a newer version now, so why not the latest

[ghporter]

If you have Office '08 or '11 on hand, they are probably the most effective and practical choices. While everything else may be superior in one way or another, no other software will make use of your experience with Office apps. Even OpenOffice, which is supposed to be very "Office-like," has a very different user paradigm, and it's not at all smooth to just sit down and use. In other words, factor in the learning curve when deciding to change to another office suite, especially if you have a copy of Office on hand.

If you are ready to switch, I'd go with OpenOffice first. It is free, open, and has a lot of options for how you work with files, including compatibility with Office's file formats built in. It doesn't work "like" Office, but the workflows aren't that different once you get started.

[P]

Originally Posted by jmiddel 

2011 for sure, and do we know of a 2013 version? Even if, the OP needs a newer version now, so why not the latest

There are some softies on Linked in and similar sites talking about "Office 2013", but that's likely the PC version. Mac version might come in 2013, but will probably be called 2014.

[steve626]

Office 2011 is preferable for several reasons:

* Each of the programs (e.g. Powerpoint, Excel, Word etc.) start up much faster than the 2008 versions.
* Powerpoint 2011 has a new feature called "reduce file size" that basically shrinks the file size when there are large graphics. I have used this and the quality of the graphics appears (to my eye) to be maintained, on the screen as well as printed. My daughter had a 500-MB powerpoint file that we reduced to 2-MB with this, an extreme example (x250 reduction), but I've used it a lot.
* Excel 2011 has visual basic again so macros can be used that the 2008 version cannot run.
* Compatibility with the PC version of Office is very good now, better than before. For Mac purists, this may not be something they care about, but for those of us who must work in a business environment where this is essential, it's a big improvement.
* I have seen virtually no freezes or force quits versus what we saw in 2004 and 2008 Office.
* If you happen to use Outlook (the email program built into Office), its compatibility with the PC world (something I need in my work place) is much improved over earlier Office email programs. For those of you using Apple Mail, you won't care about this, but some of us need to use Outlook in the work place for calendar and email. [By the way, iCal and Apple Mail work a lot better now in Snow Leopard in the MS-Exchange environment than they used to, but Outlook actually still works better as it is still more compatible.]

[PeteWK]

Well. I ended up getting Office 2011. Got the three license education version for 150 bucks. Let's see how long this one lasts before it doesn't work anymore.

Pete

[cgc]

I've got Office 2004, 2008, and 2011 and 2011 is MUCH faster than the others plus it's got VBA. BTW, I pay $10 for each version through work Is iWork an option?