Question about going from Office 97 Pro to 2003 Pro

[MBK]

I'm finally going to update my Office 97 Pro, probably to 2003 Pro, because, when I'm using Word, it sometimes freezes on me, and the only way I can close Word then is through the task manager. That tends to corrupt the file I was in, which is not OK with me.

My question is: what will it do to the numbers in my files. I'm retired and have many food/knitting/sewing files, all of which have the 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, etc. Will the upgrade do wonky things to the numbers?

I've stayed with it all these years because it has done everything I need, but the freeze problem has finally pushed me to thinking very hard about upgrading.

I also just stumbled across as extremely affordable Office 2000 Pro package. Would it be better to upgrade in stages, or just bite the bullet and install 2003 Pro?

Thanks for any help offered.

MBK

[jaclaz]

I'm finally going to update my Office 97 Pro, probably to 2003 Pro, because, when I'm using Word, it sometimes freezes on me, and the only way I can close Word then is through the task manager. That tends to corrupt the file I was in, which is not OK with me.

My question is: what will it do to the numbers in my files. I'm retired and have many food/knitting/sewing files, all of which have the 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, etc. Will the upgrade do wonky things to the numbers?

I've stayed with it all these years because it has done everything I need, but the freeze problem has finally pushed me to thinking very hard about upgrading.

I also just stumbled across as extremely affordable Office 2000 Pro package. Would it be better to upgrade in stages, or just bite the bullet and install 2003 Pro?

Thanks for any help offered.

MBK

MInd you this is my PERSONAL view on this (so take it as a simple comment) :

• Office 2000 is a bettered Office 97.
  
• Office XP (2002) is a bettered Office 2000, only more buggy.
  
• Office 2003 is a bettered office XP, only worse. (but you will get by default the new .docx and .xlslx formats without needing an add-on)
  
• Office 2007 is a bettered office 2003, only worse. (and you will get the nice ribbon interface with it, i.e. your pre-existing productivity will drop by at least 80%)
  
• Office 2010 is simply "senseless".
  

Also (and as a side note):

http://reboot.pro/8898/

http://www.oooninja.com/2008/05/openofficeorg-microsoft-office-moores.html

in my experience I have rarely seen bulky and bigger *whatever* move swiftly and faster than lean, smaller *whatever*.

Now you know what to do:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097216/quotes?qt=qt0362962

jaclaz

[MBK]

Well jaclaz, I took your advice and went with Office 2000, due to your comment about it being a bettered Office 97, and the fact of it being very affordable.

My current computer, bought almost 2 years ago, came with a trial version of Office 2007, Student and Home. I tried it out and decided, since this is for personal use and not for any office functions, I didn't need 2007 because I could foresee many trials, tribulations, headaches, and @&)!* words flying through the air. At 74, I won't do that to myself!

Thanks for your advice and the informative, hilarious summary of the differences between the various versions of Office.

Thanks again,

MBK

Edited July 23, 2012 by MBK

[jaclaz]

Thanks again,

You are welcome .

Remember that it is advised to update Office 2000, once installed, with the Service pack 3:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/276367/en-us

(you will need to update to SP1 before updating to SP3).

If you want a valid reason (apart my opinion on it ) about Office 2007, read this (and links there given) :

http://reboot.pro/3181/

only for fun, of course: chances that you actually need to multiply 77.1 by 850 - or any of the other bunch of values affected - and that the accuracy of the result being actually "important" could feed the Star of Gold Infinite Improbability Drive with enough matter to go across the Galaxy, twice, and the issue has been corrected:

but it is a very good argument if someone tells you that you should update to Office 2007 .

jaclaz

[bpalone]

You will have to get the SP1 from a source other than Microsoft. They had an accident and it is no longer available from them.

See this thread for information: SP1 thread

As far as I know, the situation hasn't changed. Hope this helps and enjoy the newer software, without all the bloat.

[jaclaz]

You will have to get the SP1 from a source other than Microsoft. They had an accident and it is no longer available from them.

See this thread for information: SP1 thread

As far as I know, the situation hasn't changed. Hope this helps and enjoy the newer software, without all the bloat.

Good catch .

Just for the record, the Wayback Machine comes to the rescue once again :

http://web.archive.org/web/20050217004501/http://download.microsoft.com/download/office2000prem/adminup2/SR-1a/WIN98/EN-US/O2KSR1aDL.EXE

jaclaz

[Ponch]

The Office Compatibility Pack might come handy as well for when clueless "friends" send you docx, xlsx or pptx documents. And it's only 37Megabytes !

Edited August 1, 2012 by Ponch

[jaclaz]

The Office Compatibility Pack might come handy as well for when clueless "friends" send you docx, xlsx or pptx documents. And it's only 37Megabytes !

Off topic , but not much , you can have view/print support for the stoopid docx and xlsx through a couple of nice proggies, each one only around 4 Mb:

http://www.officeviewers.com/

The good guys at Softmaker also provide for FREE BOTH a Linux and a Windows version of their (old) 2008 office-like suite /current is "2012"):

http://www.softmakeroffice.com/

jaclaz

[submix8c]

IF (I said IF!) you decide to go with Office Compatibility Pack you'll have several other Updates to it.

This is the full "set"

2009-08-21  08:01 PM        38,808,920 FileFormatConverters.exe
2011-09-20  07:46 PM        38,569,824 compatibilitypacksp3-kb2526297-fullfile-en-us.exe
2011-11-01  10:40 PM         1,771,400 msptls2007-kb2596785-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
2011-11-01  10:40 PM         1,974,960 pptconv2007-kb2596843-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
2012-04-05  12:45 PM         3,380,752 wordconv2007-kb2596880-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
2012-04-05  02:11 PM         2,321,872 ogl2007-kb2596672-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
2012-04-29  09:51 PM         9,012,824 xlconv2007-kb2597162-fullfile-x86-glb.exe

Install in above order by date.

edit - ARGH! The Viewers also have some "updates". Buried somewhere in my Hotfixes are the names... just be aware (they may be larger than Converter files).

Ummm... could be wrong about that. May just be the above list...

Edited August 1, 2012 by submix8c