Katie MarsalThe Redmond, Wash.-based software giant said the frozen code will be released to manufacturing later this evening, ahead of the software's official launch next month at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco.
Come January 15th, Office 2008 for Mac will be available in three distinct editions ranging from an entry level $150 Home and Student Edition to a high-end $500 Special Media Edition.
However, Microsoft is currently running its "Super Suite Deal" promotion, which allows customers to purchase the current $330 Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac Standard edition or the current $130 Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac Student and Teacher edition and then receive the $500 Office 2008 for Mac Special Media Edition for only the cost of shipping and handling.
To take advantage of this offer, simply purchase Office 2004 for Mac Standard Edition ($330) or Office 2004 for Mac Student and Teacher Edition ($130) from an authorized reseller like Amazon.com by January 14th. (Your receipt must be dated between Nov. 1, 2007 and Jan. 14, 2008.) Then print and complete the Super Suite Deal Redemption Form [pdf].
Those customers who participate in the promotion and return the Super Suite Deal Redemption Form by February 14th, 2008 will receive a copy of Office 2008 for Mac Special Media Edition for the cost of shipping ($7.00 US, $10 CND) once it becomes available next month.
Microsoft does not appear to be requiring proof that participants who purchase Office 2004 for Mac Student and Teacher Edition are actually students or teachers. Therefore it appears likely that anyone can purchase the Student and Teach Edition for $130 from Amazon and then receive a copy of the $500 Office 2008 for Mac Special Media Edition for just the cost of shipping and handling.
Those readers interested in Office 2008 for Mac may want to check out AppleInsider's recent Road to Mac Office 2008 series, installments of which are listed below in the order they were published.
Road to Mac Office 2008: an introduction
Road to Mac Office 2008: installation and interface
Road to Mac Office 2008: Word '08 vs Pages 3.0
Road to Mac Office 2008: Excel '08 vs Numbers 1.0
Road to Mac Office 2008: PowerPoint '08 vs Keynote 4.0
Road to Mac Office 2008: Entourage '08 vs Mail 3.0 and iCal 3.0
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William Gallagher and Mike Wuerthele
Mike Wuerthele
62 Comments
I still use Office, but have friends that will no longer have anything to do with Microsoft. Office's pricing remains ridiculous. Since I have been dealing more with Pages, I may or may not upgrade to this version.
iWork all the way.... cheaper, more useful, easier, and MADE BY APPLE!
For those who are considering buying Office 2004 Student/Teacher edition now, and then taking the free upgrade to Office 2008 Special Media Edition, consider this:
1) The 2008 Special Media Edition only allows for installation on one computer, while the Student/Teacher edition allows for 3 computers. So when you get the 2008 upgrade, it's my understanding that you actually LOSE two legal licenses for other computers. (And yes, Office is smart enough to check to see if illegal installations are running on the same network, and will refuse to run.)
2) I checked the fine print on Microsoft's upgrade offer, and it says allow 6-8 weeks for delivery of your Special Media Edition upgrade. I don't know about you, but after waiting two long years for Microsoft to make a Universal Binary of Office available, I most definitely will not have the patience to wait another 6-8 weeks (potentially) for my upgrade to arrive in the mail.
I agree about iWork. In fact every time somebody says "...but still for serious word-processing needs Pages isn't enough" or something along those lines. I never understood what they meant. For me Pages is far far more advanced than Word. In fact had to use the newest Word with the ribbon interface on a Windows machine. It was a horrible experience! I couldn't make the line spacing right (the lines would just get cropped in half instead of shrinking the white space), found it was really hard to navigate through the ribbon to find the function I wanted and finally there was no "Save As"! I had to manually add a button to the ribbon to make such a simple operation happen. No, I'm never ever going to touch Office again. It's a beast that deserves to die along with all its disgusting proprietary formats that nobody (including Microsoft with its Mac Office) can properly decrypt. And the bottom line is that you just can't produce a document that looks neat and good and professional in Word. After using it for some time I understood the reason behind putting the zillion spaces on a line to straighten things up. You just can't do it any other way! But you can in Pages.
I agree about iWork. In fact every time somebody says "...but still for serious word-processing needs Pages isn't enough" or something along those lines. I never understood what they meant.
Ever had to submit a Word Document for publication in a journal or a book? Ever had to produce a format specific galley proof from a Word Document template given to you by a publisher? No? Then Pages will be fine for you. For those of us who need to actually use a Word Processor for a living, its not up to the job sadly. This is what people mean when they say that "Pages isn't enough".
In a Word dominated world, nothing less than 100% Word compatibility will do for people who publish professionally, and Pages isn't near close enough. I know, I tried writing a journal article in Pages using a standard template provided by the publishers, and Pages just didn't get any of the margins or formatting right, so I had no choice but to revert to Word. Word is just a necessary evil I'm afraid.
Thank god most of the work I do is in LaTeX!