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Windows Excel on MBA - Parallels/Bootcamp? Windows Keyboard?

S

Sinophile

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 7, 2011
20
0
What are your experiences with running the Windows version of Excel on the MBA? How much hard drive space do you allocate to running Windows 7 with Excel? Do you use a separate Windows keyboard?

I have an MBA i5 with 4gb RAM and a 128gb hard drive. Trying to decide between Parallels and Bootcamp.
 
I run both Bootcamp and Parallels. This is a great combination as Parallels uses your Bootcamp partition so it doesnt take up any extra space. I work on excel files all the time through Parallels without any hiccup. I use Bootcamp when I am in meetings or taking a class that is very Windows based for a slight extra bump in speed. Onlyone drawback to this setup is that you can only setup the Bootcamp partition as an NTFS drive, which has some file compatibility issues moving the files back and forth in Parallels. OF course emailing the file and using it in either environment works just fine. I went through a whole semester of finance with simulations using excel and windows native programs on just Parallels.
 
What's wrong with the Mac version? (serious question)

I run office in VirtualBox sometimes, works splendidly. Gave Windows 7 20GB to play with. MBA keyboard maps just fine, except keeping your mind straight on shortcuts can be tricky if you switch back and forth a lot :p
 
KylePowers said:
What's wrong with the Mac version? (serious question)

I run office in VirtualBox sometimes, works splendidly. Gave Windows 7 20GB to play with. MBA keyboard maps just fine, except keeping your mind straight on shortcuts can be tricky if you switch back and forth a lot :p
Click to expand...

Well, I run Office for Mac and Office in Windows via Bootcamp/VMWare fusion and initially I did not think there was anything wrong with the Excel Mac version. But I have now found an odd issue when it comes to data formatting in the Mac version. It simply messes it up or does not understand non-US date formats. The windows version does not have this problem.
 
theSeb said:
Well, I run Office for Mac and Office in Windows via Bootcamp/VMWare fusion and initially I did not think there was anything wrong with the Excel Mac version. But I have now found an odd issue when it comes to data formatting in the Mac version. It simply messes it up or does not understand non-US date formats. The windows version does not have this problem.
Click to expand...

Same experience here. Sucks. Anytime I have to print, I have to open up windows excel.
 
Big D 51 said:
Same experience here. Sucks. Anytime I have to print, I have to open up windows excel.
Click to expand...

I am glad it's not just me. I know Excel quite well since I've used it as a "power user" for well over a decade now and even write macros in VBA, but no amount of playing with the format helps this. I can get some dates to display in the US format and other dates just show up as a 6 digit number, even though the original document has them in a normal format (dd/mm/yyyy or yyyy/mm/dd) and displays perfectly fine in Windows.

My brain is not equipped to deal with mm/dd/yyyy . :mad:
 
theSeb said:
I am glad it's not just me. I know Excel quite well since I've used it as a "power user" for well over a decade now and even write macros in VBA, but no amount of playing with the format helps this. I can get some dates to display in the US format and other dates just show up as a 6 digit number, even though the original document has them in a normal format (dd/mm/yyyy or yyyy/mm/dd) and displays perfectly fine in Windows.

My brain is not equipped to deal with mm/dd/yyyy . :mad:
Click to expand...

You can highlight your date range, use the Format Cells panel, click on Custom format, then punch in dd/mm/yyyy to have your dates come out in that format.

If this doesn't work, try changing your system-wide date settings in System Preferences.
 
PBG4 Dude said:
You can highlight your date range, use the Format Cells panel, click on Custom format, then punch in dd/mm/yyyy to have your dates come out in that format.

If this doesn't work, try changing your system-wide date settings in System Preferences.
Click to expand...

I've actually tried exactly that and more and it does not fix the problem. It only fixes it partially. It's difficult to explain and I don't feel like recording my desktop. :)
 
I don't really like Office for Mac at all. Seems to be buggy and slow - especially the RDP client that it comes with, crashes all the time.

I ended up switching to Pages/Numbers and scrapping Office.
 
theSeb said:
I've actually tried exactly that and more and it does not fix the problem. It only fixes it partially. It's difficult to explain and I don't feel like recording my desktop. :)
Click to expand...

That's cool, I was only trying to be helpful. Only use Excel on my work-provided Windows laptop anyway since Its with me 24/7.
 
bogatyr said:
I don't really like Office for Mac at all. Seems to be buggy and slow - especially the RDP client that it comes with, crashes all the time. I ended up switching to Pages/Numbers and scrapping Office.
Click to expand...

I have never once crashed Office for Mac in 6 months on a 2011 maxed out 13" Air. Office for Mac is less capable than the Windows version but it's better than iPages and iMail.
 
PBG4 Dude said:
That's cool, I was only trying to be helpful. Only use Excel on my work-provided Windows laptop anyway since Its with me 24/7.
Click to expand...

No worries. Thanks anyway.

----------
Gator Bob said:
I have never once crashed Office for Mac in 6 months on a 2011 maxed out 13" Air. Office for Mac is less capable than the Windows version but it's better than iPages and iMail.
Click to expand...

I've never used the RDP client so can't comment on it, but the other applications are rock solid and stable. I have a couple of issues with some of the functionality, as I mentioned earlier, and the short cuts, but never with the stability of the applications.
 
Gator Bob said:
I have never once crashed Office for Mac in 6 months on a 2011 maxed out 13" Air. Office for Mac is less capable than the Windows version but it's better than iPages and iMail.
Click to expand...
I use Outlook the most, lots of issues keeping connection and keeping my password correct. No issue in Outlook 2010 so it is a 2011 problem.

Outlook 2011 is also very limited in features as you mentioned, so much so that it is very painful to use.
 
christophermdia said:
I run both Bootcamp and Parallels. This is a great combination as Parallels uses your Bootcamp partition so it doesnt take up any extra space. I work on excel files all the time through Parallels without any hiccup. I use Bootcamp when I am in meetings or taking a class that is very Windows based for a slight extra bump in speed. Onlyone drawback to this setup is that you can only setup the Bootcamp partition as an NTFS drive, which has some file compatibility issues moving the files back and forth in Parallels. OF course emailing the file and using it in either environment works just fine. I went through a whole semester of finance with simulations using excel and windows native programs on just Parallels.
Click to expand...

How much disk space does this use up? I only have the 128gb SSD.

mac-collector said:
Are you only running excel?
Click to expand...

Yes, I will only be running Excel.
 
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