MS Office 2004 upgrade or full version required?

[douglas]

1. My powermac G4 had MS office 98 installed when I purchased it several years ago. How can I find out if my copy of Office was originally licensed (I can't find the seller to ask)? I would like to purchase Office 2004 on Ebay but don't know if an upgrade will work or if I need to purchase a full version. Thanks

 

[MisterMe]

1. My powermac G4 had MS office 98 installed when I purchased it several years ago. How can I find out if my copy of Office was originally licensed (I can't find the seller to ask)? I would like to purchase Office 2004 on Ebay but don't know if an upgrade will work or if I need to purchase a full version. Thanks

Now get this. Office 98 was released in 1998. That was seven years ago. There is no upgrade path from Office 98 to Office 2004. You may want to try to buy Office 2004 Students and Teachers if price means that much to you. And buy it from a legitimate source.

 

[Macky-Mac]

Now get this. Office 98 was released in 1998. That was seven years ago. There is no upgrade path from Office 98 to Office 2004. You may want to try to buy Office 2004 Students and Teachers if price means that much to you. And buy it from a legitimate source.

the following is from Microsoft's website.....so it looks like one CAN upgrade from Office 98 to Office 2004;

"Licensed users of Office v. X, Office 2001, Office 98 or any of the individual applications in these product suites, including promotional bundles, are eligible to purchase the Office 2004 Standard Edition or Professional Edition Version Upgrade."

 

[mkrishnan]

How can I find out if my copy of Office was originally licensed (I can't find the seller to ask)?

I'm not 100% sure about this, but in my past experience, if the license key you have works for you (the software runs) on your computer, that should be sufficient to say that the upgrade will also work, because it will validate off of the installed copy on your computer...I don't think it's any more sophisticated than that.

 

[absolut_mac]

1. My powermac G4 had MS office 98 installed when I purchased it several years ago. How can I find out if my copy of Office was originally licensed (I can't find the seller to ask)? I would like to purchase Office 2004 on Ebay but don't know if an upgrade will work or if I need to purchase a full version. Thanks

It's probably a good idea to compare the price of the Students and Teachers version versus the the upgrade version. Usually the former can be had for a lot less than the latter and is a full version, not a "lite" version, but cannot be upgraded at a later date. Updated yes, upgraded no.

 

[CanadaRAM]

1. My powermac G4 had MS office 98 installed when I purchased it several years ago. How can I find out if my copy of Office was originally licensed (I can't find the seller to ask)? I would like to purchase Office 2004 on Ebay but don't know if an upgrade will work or if I need to purchase a full version. Thanks

Ummm - how are you going to know whether that Office on Ebay is real or not? If it is significantly lower than retail, it's going to be either academic version or stolen/pirated, that's just the way it is.

Did you get the original CD-ROM and serial number for the Office 98 when you bought the machine? If not, then it is not yours, you don't own a license. If you do have the CD and serial, then ideally you should have received a transfer of license statement from the previous owner. If you didn't you 'll have to play the odds that the P.O. didn't continue upgrading with the serial.

All of that said, I don't "think" that MS has implemented online authorization on Office Mac like they do on Windows (and like Adobe is just bringing in), so as long as there is a complete serialized Office 98 in place on the drive, the upgrade version will probably install fine.

 

[ftaok]

1. My powermac G4 had MS office 98 installed when I purchased it several years ago. How can I find out if my copy of Office was originally licensed (I can't find the seller to ask)? I would like to purchase Office 2004 on Ebay but don't know if an upgrade will work or if I need to purchase a full version. Thanks

The way that Office Upgrade CDs have worked in the past was that to install the new upgrade, you needed to have the original CD. So in your case, you would install Office 2004 and the first time you opened a 2004 application, it would ask for the serial number (which you have) and then the Office 98 CD (which I guess you don't have). However, if Office 98 is on your hard drive, you may be able to point the installer app to that location on the hard drive for it to confirm that and Upgrade is valid.

I don't know if they changed the way the upgrade installer works on Office 2004, though.

EDIT - oops, I didn't realize that mkrishnan said the same thing on his/her post.

 

[douglas]

Well, I have the serial number but not the CD. Sounds like purchasing a full version is the only way to be sure Office 2004 will work for me. Thanks for the info.