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When my mom passed away, my dad gave me her Dell laptop. It was almost new back in May, and I've come to really like it. Problem is, it has Windows 7 and this weird, neutered version of Microsoft Office. I want to start writing on this computer, so my question to the Microsoft experts out there is, is this just the way Word and Excel are now, or did my parents get some cheap version that comes with the computer, and the "real" versions are still out there somewhere?

Thanks.

How so are they neutered? The current versions of Word and Excel in 2007 and 2010 versions of Office are great and very full featured. It's possible you have Office Starter Edition: http://www.microsoft.com/oem/en/product ... arter.aspx

Does your wife get access to a Microsoft partner program through her work? We can get very cheap access to home versions of MS software through my company, it may be something for you to look into.

OpenOffice.org is also pretty good, very full featured and free. There can be minor compatibility issues when moving betwen DOC format and it's own formats, but it's 99% perfect - and if you're only writing for yourself and not doing a ton of exchange of highly-graphicsy-documents, it probably meets all your needs.

DukeUsul wrote:OpenOffice.org is also pretty good, very full featured and free. There can be minor compatibility issues when moving betwen DOC format and it's own formats, but it's 99% perfect - and if you're only writing for yourself and not doing a ton of exchange of highly-graphicsy-documents, it probably meets all your needs.

Plus, you can set it the preferences under "save/load" to load all Office docs, and save them as Office docs, so you don't have to remember to keep doing it with each file. I install Open Office a lot on clients' computers.

CameronBornAndBred wrote:

DukeUsul wrote:OpenOffice.org is also pretty good, very full featured and free. There can be minor compatibility issues when moving betwen DOC format and it's own formats, but it's 99% perfect - and if you're only writing for yourself and not doing a ton of exchange of highly-graphicsy-documents, it probably meets all your needs.

Plus, you can set it the preferences under "save/load" to load all Office docs, and save them as Office docs, so you don't have to remember to keep doing it with each file. I install Open Office a lot on clients' computers.

I've still run into some minor conflict issues, for example opening a .doc file created on a real Office install and seeing table formatting change or disappear, even when having OO.o save it as a .doc. Usually nothing major, but some little things.

Google Docs is pretty freaking sweet too.

Thanks for the advice. My wife is constantly yelling insults at my copy of Excel, especially when it tries to get intuitive and fill things in for her. It's wrong 99% of the time.