"Real" Office 2007 compatibility

[mic575]

I have read several threads stating things like:

"real" Office 2007 running on a Windows VM was the only way I could get full compatibility. Office 2008 is pretty close, but not perfect."

If that is true and a lot of my work is in Office 2007, is it worth buying a MBP - do they run okay in VM/Office 2007? Or do I just hang my head and buy a new windows box.

 

[miles01110]

Depends on what level of compatibility you need with Office. Most of the Office 08/07 incompatibilities involve minor formatting issues that can be solved with a few deleted spaces or tabs or whatever. If you need macros, Office 08 won't do it at all.

 

[MacDawg]

Office with VMware Fusion or Parallels runs very well
You will have no problems with it

However, "most" things are compatible through Office 2008 for Mac

 

[mic575]

Depends on what level of compatibility you need with Office. Most of the Office 08/07 incompatibilities involve minor formatting issues that can be solved with a few deleted spaces or tabs or whatever. If you need macros, Office 08 won't do it at all.

I'll add to this as it may help the discussion for someone else. I create many documents that I then push out to hundreds of others who all open them in Office 2007. Any spacing problems, strage font problems, stretched pictures etc. track changes issues, are not acceptable.

 

[amon91]

I also heard NeoOffice has great compatibility in addition to being free. I'd give it a shot before going for a paid app or virtualizing.

 

[exegete77]

I also heard NeoOffice has great compatibility in addition to being free. I'd give it a shot before going for a paid app or virtualizing.

I have used NeoOffice for 2+ years and yes, for most things it works well; so much so that for my work of exchanging files, no one can tell that I don't use Word. But you will notice tables sometimes don't match exactly, and page size is off a little.

 

[mslide]

The incompatibilities between mac office 2008 and windows office 2007 are enough that I won't use Mac office at work unless it's only to read files. I won't ever edit a file using Mac office that others will have to read. Part of the reason is because I work with so many people who insist on using excel macros that use VBA. Other reasons are because I've been bitten by formatting issues. I also don't use Mac office for any very important documents that others may read (e.g. a resume where the employer insists on a .doc file). In fact, for unimportant personal docs, I now use google docs. For everything else I use Windows Office. If I had to buy one or the other, even as a mac user, I would buy Windows Office and run it in a VM or through bootcamp depending on how often I have to use it.

Yes, Mac office is usually good enough, just like neo-office is usually good enough, but I've been bitten too many times that I don't take the chance anymore.

I really wish Mac office was truly 100% compatible with its Windows counterpart. Unfortunately that will probably never happen.

As for how Office 2007 will run in a VM, well, it will run fine but not as fast as a straight up windows machine. If I had to spend all day at work using office, I would greatly prefer to run Windows in bootcamp (or on a regular windows laptop) rather than use office through a VM. Of course, this is just my opinion and others may say that using it in a VM is more than fine.