atw: Re: Which version of Office to use with WIndows XP
- From: Michael Edward Granat <megranat@xxxxxxxx>
- To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2005 18:13:16 +1100
Well Margaret (P)
From a Word user point of view (I only use the rest of the "suite" as
needed) my personal preference (apart from the last Word BASIC version, 7
for Windows 95) is Word 9 (AKA 2000).
It still has a way of working that makes some degree of sense (to a regular
Word user) without the interface and new file type selection horrors that
pervade later Office versions, minus the indescribably evil little link and
Internet Exploder resolution "optimization" bugs of Word 2002. Plus the
Word 2000 file type works with later versions and accepts their files.
(Am pretty sure that this is true for the other Office tools as well.)
The big advantages of Word 2000 over 97, for me, were the Web hyperlink
integration and the way that this works so well with the PDFMaker macros
that came with Adobe Acrobats 5 & 6.
But the upgrade path is never a smooth one from any version of Word to
another. Be prepared for those of your recorded macros based on using
menu options and dialogs to fall in a screaming heap when they "discover"
the changed menu structure, dialog options and item selection underscores.
If you have to upgrade, the 2000 suite retains the greatest compatibility,
functionality and usefulness, without much of the performance penalty and
infuriating user interface tweaks and highly suspect new features of the
later Office suite. (Apparently only PowerPoint significantly improves.)
Personally, I'm on hold until and hanging on to Office 2000 until the
version after Office 2006, when I hear that some of one of our more
outspoken atw colleague's genius might filter into Word and we might even
get some usefulness back, which has been whittled away in recent versions.
Otherwise, set up an MS-DOS partition and run good old Word 5.1 for DOS.
Boy, would that go like a rocket on a machine with a data-sucking CPU and
some serious RAM and hard disk resources.
Oh, and make sure that your new XP PC has a really high quality case.
Something that works as a Faraday Cage. The latest CPUs give off enough
microwave energy to cook crumpets through concrete. What a shame the MS
OS and its applications are now so hungry that nothing really goes any
faster, unless you are crunching files or compiling code.
HTH.
Cheers,
Michael Granat
Write Ideas
At 17:44 28/2/2005, you wrote:
>Can anyone offer any advice on which version of MS Office is best to use
>or
>avoid with Windows XP Professional?
>
>I am a Frame user who uses Word only under sufferance and still
>prefers Word 97 over the two later versions I have used (Word 2000 and
>Word 2002).
>
>I use Excel a bit, but I wouldn't call myself a power user.
>
>I am used to Outlook, but could be swayed to use another email client if
>necessary. ( Having learnt to cope with Notes at work, I figure I can
>master just about anything.)
>
>I'm not keen on more having to deal with more wierd stuff in Word
>than necessary though. Having seen recent threads about various
>horrible things happening with Word, I am just pondering which version
>I should buy to go on a new PC, so any advice would be welcome.
>
>
>Thanks
>
>Margaret
Michael E. Granat
Qualified Good Tech Writer Dude
Fellowship Of The Ring Of Tech Writers, Yeah Baby!
T/as Write Ideas
E-mail: mailto:writeideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Web: <http://home.pacific.net.au/~megranat/>
Without Prejudice.
E&OE.
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