MBA student trying to decide between iWork, MS Office, or NeoOffice

[snafu4015]

Hi everyone,

I am an MBA student who just switched to Mac a few days ago. I already transferred everything from my PC and it would be nice to never have to use it again.

Now I am trying to figure out which office suite to load on my new MacBook Pro. For my MBA classes I need certain functionalities found in Excel such as add-ins (Sover, StatPro, etc). I also own an ecommerce business for which I use Quickbooks, and all of my product data was created in Excel. I am trying to decide if it would be better to run only Mac-based applications, or if i should also install windows and windows apps (Office and Quickbooks), or maybe some combination of both. Cost is a bit of an issue but i think functionality is most important.

So here is what I am trying to decide:

Office Suite:
- iWork (approx $70)
- NeoOffice (free)
- MS Office '04 or '08 for Mac (approx $110)
- MS Office on a Windows installation (free since I already have the software)

Then there is the question of whether I should get Quickbooks for Mac or run my Windows version (if I choose to install windows)

If I choose to install Windows on my Mac and then install MS Office and Quickbooks on Windows it would be totally free because i already have the software. However, again, I'm not sure I want to "corrupt" my new Mac by immediately putting Windows on it before considering other options, lol.

I've seen similar questions posted around but wanted to ask it myself for my situation.

Thanks in advance for any insight you might be able to provide.

 

[Floris1994]

I would put windows in since it will save quite a bit of money...
Installing windows on a mac does not corrupt it.
Since you have a license for office mabey just download it from a torrent, not sure if that is legal though.

 

[knowledge!]

I have mac: office 2008 and it's okay. I like it because it's the same word interface that I'm used to, but sometimes it lags a bit. Overall though, it's pretty good.

I'm sure iWork would work alot faster, and stuff. But people have told me that it's just as good as MS office, it basically has equivalents for everything, it's just a matter of getting used to it.

 

[snafu4015]

Installing windows on a mac does not corrupt it.

Well, by "corrupt" I mean "the Windows partition will be subject to the same threats as a regular Windows PC. Windows boot camp users can get viruses, spyware, and the like and protection is required in the same way that it is required on a PC." (Quote taken from the MacRumors guides). So basically I don't know if I want to deal with making my Mac susceptible to these things and I don't want to have to install antivirus/spyware programs on the windows partition if I would only be using it for Office/Quickbooks.

 

[alphaod]

Well, by "corrupt" I mean "the Windows partition will be subject to the same threats as a regular Windows PC. Windows boot camp users can get viruses, spyware, and the like and protection is required in the same way that it is required on a PC." (Quote taken from the MacRumors guides). So basically I don't know if I want to deal with making my Mac susceptible to these things and I don't want to have to install antivirus/spyware programs on the windows partition if I would only be using it for Office/Quickbooks.

If you're just using Office and Quickbooks, then just don't go online and you shouldn't have those issues.

 

[ravenvii]

Office '08 for Mac will suit your needs just fine.

However, there's no real replacement for QuickBooks for Mac. The Mac version is different, and sucks. If you rely on QuickBooks, then you'll have to keep Windows around. Use VMware or Boot Camp.

 

[snafu4015]

Office '08 for Mac will suit your needs just fine.

However, there's no real replacement for QuickBooks for Mac. The Mac version is different, and sucks. If you rely on QuickBooks, then you'll have to keep Windows around. Use VMware or Boot Camp.

Yes, unfortunately, that was kind of what i was thinking. I suppose for business software such as Quickbooks, Windows is still a "necessary evil". I could always just keep my old Dell laptop handy to use QB but it is so slow and it would be nice to have everything on one machine.

And if I'm gonna have to install Windows anyway, it might be worth it to just put my Office '03 on there since it won't cost me anything. I suppose if I wanted to also put an office suite on OS X as well I could always install NeoOffice or iWork on there later on down the road.

 

[lostinmysphere]

OpenOffice 3 is much better than NeoOffice (in my opinion).

http://www.openoffice.org/

 

[hacksaw-C87]

I've tried MS Office and iWork. By far prefer MS Office. Get MS Office (get a school friend or a student to buy it for you, it's far cheaper, or split the cost with a friend who also has a Mac) and update it straight away to 5.1.x (i think it's 6 or 7 now!) as it has a tendency to crash in version 5.0.1. Will do for all your office needs.

 

[snafu4015]

Seems like most people I talk to advise to go with MS Office '08 for Mac. Though it has its downsides, it seems to be the best solution and has the capabilities I need. Apparently some schools have accounts with Microsoft where students could get it for free...I'm going to check that out to see if my school offers anything like that.

For Quickbooks, I'm still not sure...I'd hate to have to install Windows just to use one program, maybe I'll run it on my Dell for a while and see how long I can manage it that way. There is always the possibility of getting Quickbooks for Mac 2009 but as stated here (and other places) it seems like it isn't so great. Though, even the Windows version got terrible reviews on Amazon....so maybe one really isn't much better than the other?

 

[raymondu999]

By the way, there's no VB in Office 08. Nor is there Solver

 

[snafu4015]

By the way, there's no VB in Office 08. Nor is there Solver

Actually, there is Solver (someone sent me this link in another forum):
http://www.solver.com/mac/

 

[exegete77]

By the way, there's no VB in Office 08. Nor is there Solver

Also, VBA in 2004 is based on VB 5 (same as Office 97 - Windows), whereas 2000/2002/2003 is based on VB 6.

And neither 2004 or 2008 supports ActiveX.