Office 2016 Rolls Out On September 22

Megalith

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The newest version of Office will be available at the end of the month and include features such as real-time collaboration and a unified UI. I have a 365 subscription, so I will be upgrading right away—though I don’t think I have a choice, as it is reported that Office upgrades and updates will be more aggressive and forced this time around.

You may have heard the rumors, but today I’m happy to confirm that Office 2016 will be broadly available starting on September 22nd. If you have a volume licensing agreement in place, you can download Office 2016 from the Volume Licensing Service Center starting October 1st.
 
Is it going to be nearly impossible to install and activate this on Windows without using a Microsoft account?
 
Is it going to be nearly impossible to install and activate this on Windows without using a Microsoft account?

If you are talking about the Office 365 version, then obviously you will need an Office 365 account - which is not a Microsoft Account.

What the Standalone version of Office 2016 requires I do not yet know (there does not seem to be very much detail about it yet), but since Windows 10 does not require a Microsoft Account, I doubt that Office 2016 would.
 
So is this the stripped-down Metro/Universal APP version or the real deal Win32 version? Does this require Windows 10?
 
So is this the stripped-down Metro/Universal APP version or the real deal Win32 version? Does this require Windows 10?

This is the Win32 version. Been using the standalone preview since May as my main personal version and it's been very stable. It is compatible with Windows 7 and up. The standalone version, non-Office 365 version doesn't require a Microsoft account. The UI is almost the same as Office 2013 with notable changes to "too light" UI with a colored and a dark theme. Big changes to the extensions API with JavaScript cross platform support when using the cloud.
 
Did they fix the huge text entry latency problem in Office 2013 that makes you feel like you're typing at 0.2 FPS yet? That stupid smooth scroll-y cursor motion and crap makes it impossible to use Office on an otherwise perfectly good Atom netbook and makes stuff like 2007 and 2010 much better products for someone who's actually planning to write something with their word processor. I dunno what they were smoking when they came up with that, but if Office is their new flagship product, they prolly should work on getting it right in the next iteration.
 
This is the Win32 version. Been using the standalone preview since May as my main personal version and it's been very stable. It is compatible with Windows 7 and up. The standalone version, non-Office 365 version doesn't require a Microsoft account. The UI is almost the same as Office 2013 with notable changes to "too light" UI with a colored and a dark theme. Big changes to the extensions API with JavaScript cross platform support when using the cloud.

Thank you. That doesn't sound bad. I remember an article back in January claiming it was going to be Windows 10 only, so they probably just didn't know what they were talking about.
 
I'll likely wait until next year and maybe rollout Windows 10/Office 2016 at the same time, after most the bugs have been fixed.
 

There's another way to this:

To turn off Office animations
1.Open the Ease of Access Center by pressing the Windows logo key + U.


2.Under Explore all settings, click Use the computer without a display.


3.Under Adjust time limits and flashing visuals, click Turn off all unnecessary animations (when possible).


4.Click OK.

Feels like the typing animation is smoother in 2016 and it's not been causing me any issues even on slower machines which it tended to do in 2013.
 
Thank you. That doesn't sound bad. I remember an article back in January claiming it was going to be Windows 10 only, so they probably just didn't know what they were talking about.

Pretty sure that there's going to be a Win32 version of Office for many years to come. The Win32 has considerably more features, which macro and desktop extension support that's used by a countless number of 3rd part tools. There is the new JavaScript extension model that cross platform but it's not nearly as power yet.

The universal app version is kind of necessary for Windows tablets, indeed not having a modern version for Windows 8.x all those years drew a lot of criticism from Windows tablet users that were wondering why there were versions of Office iOS and Android and none for Microsoft's own tablet OS.
 
Will Office 2016 have a keylogger? With the privacy invasion of Windows 10 I'd almost expect the "feature".
 
Will Office 2016 have a keylogger? With the privacy invasion of Windows 10 I'd almost expect the "feature".

Why would it need a keylogger when the OS already has that functionality? It'd be redundant...unless Office 2016 is supported on older versions of Windows that were made before Microsoft reimagined their new, synergistic approach to forward-thinking, stratified product branding and marketing.
 
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