Did anyone actually *buy* MS Office?

J

JimmiG

2[H]4U
Joined
Apr 3, 2008
Messages
2,429
Well, I think I got Office 2000 with a laptop, but the last version I actually bought retail was Office 97.

With OpenOffice and other free and cheaper alternatives, why would anyone pay hundreds upon hundreds for the latest version of MS Office? I'm not saying that MS Office isn't more capable and more advanced than OpenOffice, maybe it is? But I doubt more than 1% of Office users actually use more functionality than that which is available in OO. Heck, most would probably be satisfied with Wordpad for their document composing needs. With free alternatives offering all of the functionality most people need, how can Microsoft justify selling Office 2007 for almost $400?
 
I agree most do not need the power of true Office, but still many do. Most home users could get by just fine with OO and never do more than simple documents and such.

The retail price is way overpriced IMO, but OEM pricing is much much cheaper. Sadly they got rid of single license OEM copies now as so many would just buy OEM copies online since they were so much cheaper (and the same thing really) even though it broke the contract and was technically illegal.

I love Office though and like the additional features and better layout. OO and others just are not as nice to use IMO and I have given them good chances as well.
 
Grentz said:
I love Office though and like the additional features and better layout. OO and others just are not as nice to use IMO and I have given them good chances as well.
Click to expand...
That's my feeling as well, but then my company picked up the bill.

It's a hard sell for most private buyers, when OO offers you so much for free... yes, MS Office is nicer, but not *that* much nicer...
 
however nice OOo is it was (untill fairly recently) severly lacking in a few key areas

The chart wizard/modifier for calc (OOo equiv to excel) was just... CRAP!!!!! and upto OOo-2.2.# I would still push office (even via WINE on linux systems)

but 2.3 was a great improvement and 2.4 is soo much better then prev versions of OOo. With OOo-3 due out in a few months unless someone really likes/needs office2007 OOo is more then good enough
 
OpenOffice fills a small niche for those that just need the basics and might not need the compatibility with Office (and the rest of the world running it, meaning Office). OO isn't perfectly compatible, and never will be, so Microsoft can bank on that. People are still under the impression that Microsoft is where it is today because of Windows - and they couldn't be further from the truth.

Microsoft Office has always always been the "cash cow" for Microsoft, and will continue to be so for many years to come.

To be honest, I've never bought Microsoft Office, I've never had to. Either it was included on a machine I acquired, or I had an NFR copy around that I received by attending some seminar or conference put on by Microsoft. In fact, over the years, I've only actually gone into a retail store and purchased one single Microsoft software product: a Windows 98SE Upgrade for $90 back in 1999. Everything else I've received for free because of seminars, tradeshows, conferences, or training.

Microsoft does love giving stuff away, yanno. Remember the "Power Together" campaign near the end of 2006? They gave away 20,000 copies of Vista Business and Office 2007 - that was like $25 million in software or more sooo... incredible how much stuff they give away and still have so much to literally burn if they wanted. Amazing...
 
I bought office from theultimatesteal.com for $60. I've tried open office, but I prefer MS office.
 
Joe Average said:
OpenOffice fills a small niche for those that just need the basics and might not need the compatibility with Office (and the rest of the world running it, meaning Office). OO isn't perfectly compatible, and never will be, so Microsoft can bank on that.
Click to expand...

My last job some people still had office 97. Word 2003 was unable to propperly display most of the Word 97 documents. Open office opened these files without any issues. In this case Open Office has BETTER compatibility than microsoft's own program!!

I'd have to ask you, have you actually used Open Office recently - for more than a few seconds. Once you get used to the new names for the features, you can do pretty much anything with OOO. I use OOO excluseively and have created thousands of documents that I share with people with office - I have NEVER run into a compatibility issue, even with complicated, formatted .DOC files... like a resume and multi-column advertizement with pictures... looks the same in word as it does in office.

Can you site some specific incompatibilities, or are you just making stuff up?
 
I like OpenOffice for my personal needs, more than enough for me. I know quite a few people who switched to OpenOffice and they stuck with it.
 
I do not feel that MSFT Office offers any kind of incentive over OpenOffice in my business activities. The few times I have used Office I was mostly amazed at how non-intuitive the interface is (Office 2000 mostly). I haven't installed Office on any of my PCs since the late 90s when OpenOffice was still called StarOffice :)
 
I haven't seen anyone suggest that OpenOffice works well with SharePoint, but then again I haven't tried myself. Paying full retail for Office would be crazy, but I can definitely see wanting to use it. I was able to get it for $20 a user for my company, so there was no reason not to.
 
Ya, got it for $60 in the ultimate steal thing. I really like the tabbed UI.

Plus you can skin it black, which is a little aesthetic plus for me! (althought not really a selling point :p)
 
My wife and I bought Office 2003 Student & Teacher Edition a few years ago. With my next computer build I'll probably purchase Office 2007 Home & Student.

I have Open Office on my Linux box, and I always recommend it to others, who are looking for an Office Suite that is either free or cheap. I really like Open Office, and considering it's free, it's that much better. However, I've always found MS Office to be slightly better, with certain tasks being easier to find and perform.
 
I bought Office 2007 Enterprise since it was cheap. I can't see spending $600 for Outlook (pretty much the only program I use from Office).
 
Office has a *lot* of power built into it though. The more I learn, the more it just seems there are so many things you can do with Office that really makes the price seem more justifiable.

For the average home user though, Microsoft's $40 "Works" package would probably fit the bill.
 
Never. I got office 2000 free with a machine, and more recently office 2007 free from microsoft. (that one freebie thing they had a year or so ago where you had to watch some videos then got windows or office for free. good times.)
 
Grentz said:
I agree most do not need the power of true Office, but still many do. Most home users could get by just fine with OO and never do more than simple documents and such.

The retail price is way overpriced IMO, but OEM pricing is much much cheaper. Sadly they got rid of single license OEM copies now as so many would just buy OEM copies online since they were so much cheaper (and the same thing really) even though it broke the contract and was technically illegal.

I love Office though and like the additional features and better layout. OO and others just are not as nice to use IMO and I have given them good chances as well.
Click to expand...

You can still get single licenses of office oem. You just have to buy an MLK which is an office license without media. A media kit is 15 bucks and some vendors throw it in for free. Plus you only need one media kit anyway if you have more then one license.

Personaly I used star office for years on unix systems alongside MS office. It was a good product but never as good(star office is the sun office suite that they opened up and made into openoffice for the most part). Hell I have some boxed copies of star office sitting around.

Anyway I know a lot of home users that just pick up the student and teacher version. It isn't that expensive and is still the standard. I have a legit MLK of office 07 on my desktop right now. Needed it for work and although I have copies of 07 enterprise from my ms action pack it isn't licensed for what I needed it for(and keeping legit is important).
 
I also bought MS Office 2007 Ultimate for $60 (deal ends tomorrow night at 11:55PM (Pacific)). I love the software and I'm glad I made the purchase. I'm not a huge fan of OO.
 
swatbat said:
You can still get single licenses of office oem. You just have to buy an MLK which is an office license without media. A media kit is 15 bucks and some vendors throw it in for free. Plus you only need one media kit anyway if you have more then one license.

Personaly I used star office for years on unix systems alongside MS office. It was a good product but never as good(star office is the sun office suite that they opened up and made into openoffice for the most part). Hell I have some boxed copies of star office sitting around.

Anyway I know a lot of home users that just pick up the student and teacher version. It isn't that expensive and is still the standard. I have a legit MLK of office 07 on my desktop right now. Needed it for work and although I have copies of 07 enterprise from my ms action pack it isn't licensed for what I needed it for(and keeping legit is important).
Click to expand...

Ya, the MLK is getting hard to find...I dont know why but I searched a few months ago and could not get it ANYWHERE (everywhere said discountinued). The licenses were easy to come by, but not the media :rolleyes:
 
Grentz said:
Ya, the MLK is getting hard to find...I dont know why but I searched a few months ago and could not get it ANYWHERE (everywhere said discountinued). The licenses were easy to come by, but not the media :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Actually the media is easier to find than you might think ;) And according to the EULA it's legal too :D
 
Yea, about $150 for the basics is tooo much. I mean they don't give you things like Publisher, which you might or might not use, but for so much money...

If they reduced it to the reasonable price of $75 I'm sure they'll make more money because less people will pirate it.

Personally... my brothers are in college...
 
ethraax said:
Yea, about $150 for the basics is tooo much. I mean they don't give you things like Publisher, which you might or might not use, but for so much money...

If they reduced it to the reasonable price of $75 I'm sure they'll make more money because less people will pirate it.

Personally... my brothers are in college...
Click to expand...

From working in retail I can say price doesn't matter. I saw so many machines with pirate copies of 10 dollar card games, screen savers, etc. Same with 20 dollar bargin bin games, 30 dollar apps like av, spyware scanners, win zip, etc.

Sure it will effect some people but a lot will just take a pirate copy for free.
 
I paid full $$$ for Office 2000 back in the day. Well worth the money ($200 or $300 at the time).

Glad I saw this thread. $60 for the 2007 version, that will set me up nicely.

Excel is my favorite application, all time. (Except when Microsoft was keeping the inner workings of it secret and the Perl WriteExcel module didn't work as well as it does now.)

I haven't tried Open Office but I've seen enough open source to know that nearly all of it is incomplete or not well documented. Which it too bad because I like the idea in principle.
 
eggrock said:
I paid full $$$ for Office 2000 back in the day. Well worth the money ($200 or $300 at the time).

Glad I saw this thread. $60 for the 2007 version, that will set me up nicely.

Excel is my favorite application, all time. (Except when Microsoft was keeping the inner workings of it secret and the Perl WriteExcel module didn't work as well as it does now.)

I haven't tried Open Office but I've seen enough open source to know that nearly all of it is incomplete or not well documented. Which it too bad because I like the idea in principle.
Click to expand...

It is worth playing around with. In OpenOffices case it was a closed source app for most of its life. Sun Opened up it's star office suite(for the most part) and open office is what was made of it.

I still prefer MS office over it(and I used star office for years along side it)
 
I bought Office 97 for my first PC and have upgraded to every version since.

A very high number of people bought Office 2007. http://www.news.com/8301-13860_3-9861625-56.html
Sales of Office 2007 are doing even better, up 100 percent compared with sales of Office 2003 in its initial months. That led Office to account for 17 percent (by dollar volume) of all software sold at retail stores last year.
Click to expand...
 
Jerome36 said:
My wife and I bought Office 2003 Student & Teacher Edition a few years ago. With my next computer build I'll probably purchase Office 2007 Home & Student.

I have Open Office on my Linux box, and I always recommend it to others, who are looking for an Office Suite that is either free or cheap. I really like Open Office, and considering it's free, it's that much better. However, I've always found MS Office to be slightly better, with certain tasks being easier to find and perform.
Click to expand...

I got Office 2007 Ultimate for free from a Microsoft show recently. Before that, I used Office 2000 for ages. However, the 2007 Home & Student edition for around $170 on newegg is an excellent deal... it has PowerPoint, Word, and Excel, which is all most users need.

I disagree on liking Open Office, personally. Unless someone really needs it free, I don't recommend it to them. MS Office is just that much nicer.
 
swatbat said:
From working in retail I can say price doesn't matter. I saw so many machines with pirate copies of 10 dollar card games, screen savers, etc. Same with 20 dollar bargin bin games, 30 dollar apps like av, spyware scanners, win zip, etc.

Sure it will effect some people but a lot will just take a pirate copy for free.
Click to expand...

Yea, 10 dollar card games and screen savers. That's because they realize that they are not WORTH ten dollars. I mean come on... a screensaver? No functional use (that standard MS screensavers don't have). It's purely aesthetic. MS Office is a bit different.

The point is not the cost, it's the value. If you got $10 out of a screen saver then fine. You'll certainly get more than $10 worth out of MS Office. $150 for the basics... now come on... I don't think I'd get $150 out of that. See my point?

I'm not saying people won't pirate it. I'm just saying maybe MS Office will stop being one of the bigger things being pirated. I guess a near-monopoly is something Microsoft enjoys though.
 
ethraax said:
Yea, 10 dollar card games and screen savers. That's because they realize that they are not WORTH ten dollars. I mean come on... a screensaver? No functional use (that standard MS screensavers don't have). It's purely aesthetic. MS Office is a bit different.

The point is not the cost, it's the value. If you got $10 out of a screen saver then fine. You'll certainly get more than $10 worth out of MS Office. $150 for the basics... now come on... I don't think I'd get $150 out of that. See my point?

I'm not saying people won't pirate it. I'm just saying maybe MS Office will stop being one of the bigger things being pirated. I guess a near-monopoly is something Microsoft enjoys though.
Click to expand...

If it is not worth the price and has no functional use then why do people pirate them? Hell why don't you write a shit load of card games and sell them for less?

It is the same where I would see a shit load of machines loaded with pirate copies of xp pro when they had xp home stickers on them. The users in question didn't need pro either.

Example Office 2007 Home and Student is like 120 bucks. It comes with Word, Excel and powerpoint. With the execption of outlook it has everything most people would need. The kicker is that it is also licensed for 3 machines. Thats 40 bucks a machine. I would say office is worth that for home users. Hell even if users only have 1 machine that isn't that bad for a major peice of software that one will get a lot of use out of. Compair that to a 50 or 60 dollar game as far as how much one will use it.
 
Still using Office XP. I couldn't even tell you at this point where I got my copy, it's been a lot of years.
 
I bought my copy. I had a class that required it and I got it for $50. Nothing personal, but I cant stand open office.
 
I always get mine through Work at Home rights from work.

I am fully addicted to Outlook. I haven't found anything that comes even close to it. I'd probably use Open Office, but I get everything else with Outlook so I just use that.
 
GoldenTiger said:
However, the 2007 Home & Student edition for around $170 on newegg is an excellent deal... it has PowerPoint, Word, and Excel, which is all most users need.
Click to expand...

Yup, I think it's a great deal too. However, it's actually cheaper then $170. Hell, at Office Max it's about to go on sale for like 135 bucks, and you get a 20 dollar gift card with the purchase. I think on Newegg it's actually like $110 bucks, though the price tends to go up and down. Still, I don't think I've seen it over $150 anywhere.
 
Got Office Ultimate 2007 of off the WFP program that was a few months ago. I love it. And best of all, I got it for the low, low, low, low, low price of FREE! :)
 
OO is a good product, but I'd rather stick with Office, esp in a work environment...it just works and needs less "fucking" with to make it work the way you want it to work and then add in all the other crap you need to deal with with retraining people.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top