A lurker here so thanks for various advice I've picked up on the forum.
I finally gave up on Office 2008 and re-installed 2004 and I'm so happy.
As a mac user working in finance/consulting I'm an Excel power-user and also use PowerPoint a great deal. I did try with the new version, I really di, but there isn't a workaround I can find to replace VBA and the related essential features in the add-ins which require VBA. I don't tend to write macros myself that often but I do have to be able to use spreadsheets that do.
Having changed back, I can't think of a single advance in the new version that I actually used and now miss. A few basic templates for beginners that take seconds to put together from scratch don't represent a major advance for me. On the other hand, it is a joy to be able to use again the features in 2004 that were deleted. Such as not having to spend hours constructing a toolbar that doesn't become hidden when running two spreadsheets side by side; the print preview button (yes, it can be worked around but why should this be required?); the useful tick box in the formula bar; the ability to cut and paste high quality meta files from Excel to Powerpoint, instead of lower quality pictures. Plus a number of other things.
Finally, the whole programme is much faster, especially when saving Powerpoint, which in 2008 brings up the spinning disc - something of a disappointment given it was supposed to be quicker for Intel machines (I mainly use a MacBookPro 2.4 with 4gb of memory)
Unfortunately, eventually it will become necessary to open xlsx files and that will be the end of well over a decade of working on macs for me. But until then, I'm a happy camper once more.
Cheers
Andy
I finally gave up on Office 2008 and re-installed 2004 and I'm so happy.
As a mac user working in finance/consulting I'm an Excel power-user and also use PowerPoint a great deal. I did try with the new version, I really di, but there isn't a workaround I can find to replace VBA and the related essential features in the add-ins which require VBA. I don't tend to write macros myself that often but I do have to be able to use spreadsheets that do.
Having changed back, I can't think of a single advance in the new version that I actually used and now miss. A few basic templates for beginners that take seconds to put together from scratch don't represent a major advance for me. On the other hand, it is a joy to be able to use again the features in 2004 that were deleted. Such as not having to spend hours constructing a toolbar that doesn't become hidden when running two spreadsheets side by side; the print preview button (yes, it can be worked around but why should this be required?); the useful tick box in the formula bar; the ability to cut and paste high quality meta files from Excel to Powerpoint, instead of lower quality pictures. Plus a number of other things.
Finally, the whole programme is much faster, especially when saving Powerpoint, which in 2008 brings up the spinning disc - something of a disappointment given it was supposed to be quicker for Intel machines (I mainly use a MacBookPro 2.4 with 4gb of memory)
Unfortunately, eventually it will become necessary to open xlsx files and that will be the end of well over a decade of working on macs for me. But until then, I'm a happy camper once more.
Cheers
Andy