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Timothy Maxwell · May 24, 2004, 05:11 AM

I just downloaded the Test Drive. I can't see much difference between Microsoft 2004 and Office X. Is this just a few interface tweeks, or is this a real upgrade? Is it worth the price?

Talk2Angus · May 24, 2004, 08:15 AM

Check out http://mactopia.com or back topic in macnn for the what is what and where with office 2004

typoon · May 24, 2004, 08:59 AM

Originally posted by Timothy Maxwell:
I just downloaded the Test Drive. I can't see much difference between Microsoft 2004 and Office X. Is this just a few interface tweeks, or is this a real upgrade? Is it worth the price?

It depends on if you need all the new features. If you use Powerpoint the upgrade is worth it. If you use Entourage the upgrade is worth it. Word also had some compelling new features as well. I do like the scrapbook feature so you can use clippings between all the Office Apps.

velocitychannel · May 24, 2004, 09:01 AM

Originally posted by Timothy Maxwell:
I just downloaded the Test Drive. I can't see much difference between Microsoft 2004 and Office X. Is this just a few interface tweeks, or is this a real upgrade? Is it worth the price?

I bought it last week and IMHO, it is light years better than the last version. The speed alone is worth the price.

-Q- · May 24, 2004, 09:22 AM

I'm only being slightly facetious, but the fact I can now save documents with names longer than 32 characters is worth it to me.

MartiNZ · May 24, 2004, 10:40 PM

I'm looking forward to the new graphics engine (or whatever) that they put in for unicode support. But not just for that - also so that I won't get documents that say they will print on one page from my mac but on 1 and a bit pages on a PC!

Excel v.X is the worst at this but the other way around. I could never understand why it would say only columns A-F would fit on the first page, when Excel XP would quite happily fit all the way to K! And yes, that was with the same page setup options

.

superblue · May 25, 2004, 02:34 AM

Originally posted by velocitychannel:
The speed alone is worth the price.

Can you elaborate a bit? How much faster, and in what areas? I don't use Office much, but I'll always take a speed boost if there's one going...

MartiNZ · May 25, 2004, 03:44 AM

I'm guessing / hoping that the speed-ups will be in scrolling - in general in Excel and with big documents in Word. Also hopefully the new graphics engine will get rid of the occasional stuff-ups in the display of text.

With any luck I'll find out soon - it is now shipping in NZ, I just have to wait to receive it from Microsoft!

typoon · May 25, 2004, 08:58 AM

Originally posted by superblue:
Can you elaborate a bit? How much faster, and in what areas? I don't use Office much, but I'll always take a speed boost if there's one going...

Just loading the Office App in general is faster. It doesn't take as long and you don't see the spinning beach ball as often if at all when loading Word or the other apps.

dancrane2 · May 25, 2004, 10:58 AM

It appears to be faster than Office X, it supports longer file names so you can use any files that your windows brothers and sisters use and not have to rename them, Entourage has exchange support, it appears to be more stable, the formatting toolbar goes translucent when not used after a short period of time. Overall, I would say, Yes...you should upgrade. I am glad that I did.

faragbre967 · May 26, 2004, 08:00 AM

Originally posted by dancrane2:
It appears to be faster than Office X, it supports longer file names so you can use any files that your windows brothers and sisters use and not have to rename them, Entourage has exchange support, it appears to be more stable, the formatting toolbar goes translucent when not used after a short period of time. Overall, I would say, Yes...you should upgrade. I am glad that I did.

Why does the toolbar go translucent? I noticed that, but it seems so useless.

MrNo · May 26, 2004, 08:29 AM

Unicode supprot is worth the upgrade

Horsepoo!!! · May 26, 2004, 09:04 AM

The real answer to "is it worth the price of the upgrade" is No.

The other answers are from people that are trying to not feel so ripped off.

typoon · May 26, 2004, 09:46 AM

Originally posted by Horsepoo!!!:
The real answer to "is it worth the price of the upgrade" is No.

The other answers are from people that are trying to not feel so ripped off.

If it does what you need then no. But then again everyone could still be using 10.1 or 10.2 because it still does what most people need.

MartiNZ · May 26, 2004, 05:02 PM

One other thing that I would have liked to make it more 'worth it' is docked toolbars in Word, Excel and Powerpoint. I mean this is how they are done in Windows by default, although that's kind of a different story given that they're not attached to a single document.... Okay, I've just realised why that probably won't happen - I mean it's not as if they're going to give us that horrible situation of having Word open, fill the screen and then open documents inside that

.

rickray1 · May 27, 2004, 12:25 AM

Looks like I lost some emails when I upgraded.
Hmmmmm

Anyone else have this problem?

wataru · May 27, 2004, 01:17 AM

It's definitely not worth it to me. Unicode support and long character names should have been there in v.X; I'm not shelling out more for that. There are plenty of other options available: NeoOffice/J, Mellel, Keynote, AppleWorks... There's nothing I really need Office for anymore.