Office 2008 vs. 2004 on MBA

[silverblack]

I am wondering if anyone has switched from Office 2004 to 2008 on a MBA. I want to know:

1) if it feels faster or slower (with the limited RAM of MBA); and
2) if it occupies significantly more HDD space?

I realize there are a number of reviews and benchmark out there, but there're mixed results. Many benchmarks claimed 2008 to be faster, but user feedback said otherwise.

I'd appreciate to hear what you think. Thanks in advance.

[kingcrowing]

Hey, i know that office '04 and '08 are roughly the same size once installed, but I can tell you how office '08 runs this weekend as i'll be loading it up on my air on saturday and i can test it out, but I imagine with 2GB of RAM office should run fine.

[dibara2003]

08 is a little slow on the initial opening of the program, but after that it's smooth sailing. i still have 04 installed though.

[silverblack]

08 is a little slow on the initial opening of the program, but after that it's smooth sailing. i still have 04 installed though.

Does this help?
"How To Speed up Microsoft Office 2008 For Mac"
http://bbold.com/blog/apple/speed-up-microsoft-office-2008-for-mac/

[kingcrowing]

Oh also, office '04 is a rosetta app (made for PPC macs as the intels didn't come out till 2006) so its not optimized to run on any of the current macs.

[Phil A.]

Not tried '04, but '08 runs like a dream on my 1.8 SSD MBA. Fast and smooth :)

[Caralvarez24]

Excel 2008 doesn't have the solver add in. If you don't know what this is you probably don't need it but when I found that out it was a huge blow for me cause I use it alot in my finance classes. Hopefully they update it soon.

[Caralvarez24]

Dbl post

[nyzballa12]

Well since 04 was created for Rosetta and it worked fine, 08 should work better.