Buying Legal Microsoft Office Products...

[FISHborn]

Never thought I'd do this, but the time has come to go legal...

But how, where and is it really necessary to spend over R3000 per machine (total of 5) for Office 2007 Pro?

[Grofft]

It seems so. Pity you didn't do it a year ago, I got Office XP for R1500 (approx).

[ld13]

Office 2007 Pro at a nice R4160 @ PCMall. :eek:
Crazy.

[supersunbird]

Do you use Access and thats why to need Pro?

Else I can get you Small Business 2007 for just under R2000 each...

[Praeses]

You could always use OpenOffice. It's a tad slower and not as pretty but it works and it is totally free, with new versions coming out all the time :)
MS office is way overpriced IMO :/

[cryptic1]

You could always use OpenOffice. It's a tad slower and not as pretty but it works and it is totally free, with new versions coming out all the time :)
MS office is way overpriced IMO :/

I'm using OpenOffice on Kubuntu and I must say that I'm impressed - so ja give OpenOffice a try, it works on Windows.

[brevity]

Open office for sure. I bet you almost no one in your office will need the few functional advantages Microsoft provides in their office suite.

If your employees moan that they don't know how it works, tell them it will take them longer to figure out Office 2007 (coming off of 2003), that they would always have to save their files in 2003 format if they want to send it to any client (most people don't have 2007 yet) and you'll buy them lunch.

[Abe]

Never thought I'd do this, but the time has come to go legal...

But how, where and is it really necessary to spend over R3000 per machine (total of 5) for Office 2007 Pro?

A few questions:

1) Do you really need MS Office or will OO do?
2) What type of company are we talking about? Is it an IT company?
3) Do you need Pro?
4) Have you looked at replacing your PC's with new ones? This will give you office for a significant discount against the retail price. You may even be able to get this with major upgrades such as MB, CPU, RAM and HD.

[Abe]

You could always use OpenOffice. It's a tad slower and not as pretty but it works and it is totally free, with new versions coming out all the time :)

Lotus Symphony looks cool as well.

[Paul_S]

I've been using Open Office for a while and it's really good. I export my docs as PDFs or in native MS Office formats for other people using Office 2003 Pro and it works just fine.

Unless you have power users who need to write VB macros or stuff like it should be more than sufficient. I find the menu layout more logical in OO than in MS Office.

[killadoob]

i use open office

works just like micrsoft office in terms of word and excel

ITS ALSO FREEEEEEEEEEEE

[masticore]

Open office for sure. I bet you almost no one in your office will need the few functional advantages Microsoft provides in their office suite.

If your employees moan that they don't know how it works, tell them it will take them longer to figure out Office 2007 (coming off of 2003), that they would always have to save their files in 2003 format if they want to send it to any client (most people don't have 2007 yet) and you'll buy them lunch.

There's an Office 2007 compatibility pack for Office 2003 that (theoretically) alleviates the need to do this.

[Smiley_lauf]

downloading OOo (it is around 114MB (with jre)) just chows up my bandwidth for nothing...

Yes, OOo is a good alternative--problem is if you are writer who needs bibliographic support (referencing tools, like EndNote, etc), there is no good tool for this purpose. Bibus comes close but no cigar!

I am waiting for OOo v3 with a built in bibliographic tool (will work with extension manager, just like Firefox extensions), cool.

Till then, carry on using the MS Office

[ld13]

Everyone. Forget that stupid "compatibility" pack. I wasted 100MB+ on that thing some time back - It did not work :(

Then, for those going over from 2003 to 2007, you can skip the whole learning-of-the-new-interface troubles! There is a patch available that brings back the good old 2003 type 'classic' menus! I have it here on my PC somewhere. I'll upload it tonight. :D

[milomak]

For your bogstandard word and excel user, OOo should be the choice. Given I am not a power user of either word processors nor spreadsheets I can't speak for them.

[masticore]

Everyone. Forget that stupid "compatibility" pack. I wasted 100MB+ on that thing some time back - It did not work :(

Then, for those going over from 2003 to 2007, you can skip the whole learning-of-the-new-interface troubles! There is a patch available that brings back the good old 2003 type 'classic' menus! I have it here on my PC somewhere. I'll upload it tonight. :D

I've had varying success with the compatibility pack .. hence the "(theoretically)".

Dude, if you can give me something that removes that fscked up inteface from Office 2007, I'll ... I'lll ... hell I'll be grateful :D

[ld13]

I've had varying success with the compatibility pack .. hence the "(theoretically)".
Yep, I deleted that thing. I don't know why we need a new DOCX format anyways? Keep it as is M$! Why change?!

Dude, if you can give me something that removes that fscked up inteface from Office 2007, I'll ... I'lll ... hell I'll be grateful :D
:D

I'll upload it for everyone when I get home sometime tonight. :cool:
[Note to self: Remember to run the Remote Admin app for the next time when you're not at home, and need the PC]

[FISHborn]

A few questions:

1) Do you really need MS Office or will OO do?
2) What type of company are we talking about? Is it an IT company?
3) Do you need Pro?
4) Have you looked at replacing your PC's with new ones? This will give you office for a significant discount against the retail price. You may even be able to get this with major upgrades such as MB, CPU, RAM and HD.

I've used OO, and yes it's great but still not MS.

We have one PC and the rest are laptops.

Yes we need pro, for Access.


The only solution I found sofar might be a Open License but still I've hit a few dead ends.

Best price I've found was R3600 +- Eurobyte/shop


Tnx for the replies guys

[Abe]

Tnx for the replies guys

Is the company an IT company? If so, you can look at the Action Pack.

https://partner.microsoft.com/40016455

[Ekhaatvensters]

Not sure what the academic part of this implies, but it's cheaper. Comes with Access according to the "specs".

http://www.take2.co.za/product.php?id=3095879

[Abe]

Not sure what the academic part of this implies, but it's cheaper. Comes with Access according to the "specs".

http://www.take2.co.za/product.php?id=3095879

Academic = "you got to be a student and are not allowed to use it for commercial use" :(

[ld13]

Dude, if you can give me something that removes that fscked up inteface from Office 2007, I'll ... I'lll ... hell I'll be grateful :D

I Forgot to post the link yesterday night! :p

I've uploaded the File to my "website", under the MyADSL section @ www.wolfie.za.org. You should be able to find the file rather easily.
That website is currently being worked on, so don’t come crying when the code on there goes flakey and you suddenly get bombarded with 203864 different pop-up ads or something. :p

Enjoy! :cool:

[masticore]

Thank. You. Muchly.

Some form of sanity has been restored to Office 2007.

[ld13]

Thank. You. Muchly.

Some form of sanity has been restored to Office 2007.

No Problem at all! :D
Glad it worked - I do not have Office2007, so could not test it. Do note, I have a feeling that that patch could be a Beta. ;)

[killadoob]

just pirate it

come on now you know you dont wanna spend 4k per pc, its just a flippin ripoff :)

[masticore]

No Problem at all! :D
Glad it worked - I do not have Office2007, so could not test it. Do note, I have a feeling that that patch could be a Beta. ;)

A note to those who want to use this. If you have Office 2007 and Visio 2003 installed, this will stuff up you Visio menus (File, Edit, View, etc). To restore your Visio menus, see this (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/305060) article.

[PearlJam]

I got 2007 pro for R2 700 off ebay. +-R2 200 for the product and the rest for local cost

[Conspirator]

Damn monopolies are everywhere.

[JohnnyQ]

I tried the patch from Id13, and it works fine.