Mac Experts - Apple iWorks or MS Office

[DavidD]

We're getting ready to send the daughter off to college next month. We bought a Mac Book Pro for her high school graduation and I was wondering if we should get Microsoft Office for Mac, or iWork. A friend who is “a Mac†says spend the extra and get both. What do you Mac guys say?

[Lumber_Jack]

We bought Microsoft Office for the simple reason that that's what we were familiar with, no learning curve. I have used the iworks stuff but I like Microsoft better. Plus if she needs to exchange documents with classmates she won't have to worry about compatibility. Just my thoughts. I would not buy both, that just seems like a waste

[Guest clownsdd]

We bought Microsoft Office for the simple reason that that's what we were familiar with, no learning curve. I have used the iworks stuff but I like Microsoft better. Plus if she needs to exchange documents with classmates she won't have to worry about compatibility. Just my thoughts. I would not buy both, that just seems like a waste

+100 stick with MS Office....

[mikegideon]

Office is the standard in business. Gotta have.

[Guest UberDuper]

Pages blows. The iwork spreadsheet (numbers) isn't very good either. Get Office.

[ls3_kid]

I'm in college and nobody uses the mac version. MS all the way. If she is going to be an engineer then you will probably want to boot camp your hard drive and install windows because 99% of engineer programs are PC based. Lastly if somebody at the mac store tries to sell you "mobile me" that is also a waste of money. Sounds nice but is pretty much pointless.

[Guest db99wj]

I don't have any experience in Apple products, however, in real world finance, real estate, lending, banking, accounting, investments/insurance, etc, MS Office is the standard, I would buy the office in order for her to be experienced in it. I've never met anyone in these fields that use anything other than MS Excel and Word. I'm not saying it is better, I'm just saying it is, in my opinion, the most accepted and the most used, and the most expected platform.

[Guest bkelm18]

As much as I hate to say this since I'm a Mac/Apple fanboy, iWork blows. There is so much more you can do with Office. It's just the standard. My professors frequently email out documents which are usually either in PDF or Word format. iWork is really useless in today's world. Nobody uses it so there's really no need to get both. Just stick with Office. I used to use Apple's word processing programs before getting into college and was apprehensive about switching to Office, but now I can't imagine using anything else.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Open Office is what I use on Mac and PC.

But if better Office compatibility is needed, then the academic price on Office is pretty good. If I could stay up-to-date on Office at academic prices would probably do so, but Open Office works too good for free to pay non-academic retail on Office for two different platforms.

[ls3_kid]

I don't have any experience in Apple products, however, in real world finance, real estate, lending, banking, accounting, investments/insurance, etc, MS Office is the standard, I would buy the office in order for her to be experienced in it. I've never met anyone in these fields that use anything other than MS Excel and Word. I'm not saying it is better, I'm just saying it is, in my opinion, the most accepted and the most used, and the most expected platform.

This even applies at college. Accounting I needed MS Excel, group projects when you share with other members they will have MS Powerpoint, same with sharing papers for english with teachers or peers they all (by all I mean 999 out of 1000) use MS Word.

[56FordGuy]

I just asked this same question, and wound up buying iWork Numbers last night. Haven't used it yet, but I looked through it and I like the layouts. Seems easy to navigate, and it's supposed to be compatible with Excel documents.

I could've gotten Excel, but I've used it before and had trouble getting it to do what I wanted. Probably my own lack of knowledge, but I figured I bought a Mac to get away from all the PC/ Windows stuff that annoyed me, so it seemed like going backwards to put Windows type software on a Mac.

Granted, I may use Numbers for a week and hate it. Don't know yet. Can you go buy a store that sells Macs and test out the Mac software?

[Lumber_Jack]

:DI just asked this same question, and wound up buying iWork Numbers last night. Haven't used it yet, but I looked through it and I like the layouts. Seems easy to navigate, and it's supposed to be compatible with Excel documents. I could've gotten Excel, but I've used it before and had trouble getting it to do what I wanted. Probably my own lack of knowledge, but I figured I bought a Mac to get away from all the PC/ Windows stuff that annoyed me, so it seemed like going backwards to put Windows type software on a Mac. Granted, I may use Numbers for a week and hate it. Don't know yet. Can you go buy a store that sells Macs and test out the Mac software?

Numbers is compatible with excel, but I would not risk it for professional or Student use. If Excel won't do what you want, its definitely because you don't know how to make it do it. Excel is a very powerful tool if you can get the education on how to use it to its potential. Most people though only scratch the surface of it's capabilities.

[soapy]

I have found that pages, won't open a MS .doc without some translation errors. Some docs it's no big deal, others, loose lines, and the pages edit on a doc was jacked....

[56FordGuy]

If Excel won't do what you want, its definitely because you don't know how to make it do it.

No argument here. I had no real idea what I was doing with Excel. With Numbers, I still have no real idea what I'm doing, but it's 'idiot proof' enough that thus far it's doing what I want.

[Guest monkeyhumper]

Everything M$ touches is a joke.

I steer clear at all costs.

[Guest bkelm18]

Everything M$ touches is a joke.I steer clear at all costs.

Ah so I guess that's why the majority of the professional world uses MS Office products.

[DavidD]

Thanks to all, I appreciate your advice and opinions. While I am a PC guy, I do really like the Mac thus far, especially the Hardware. It is far superior to my HP and even the daughters Sony this one is replacing. Like someone else mentioned, I was trying to set her up on Mac across the boards, but now believe this might not be the best thing after all. I've decided to get Office for Macs (Student version) and install it.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Apple makes good hardware. Even a die-hard Windows or Unix addict would have a top-notch computer with an apple even if they decided to erase MacOS entirely from the system.

Laptops have limited lifetime compared to a good desktop and I've worn out a lot of PC and Mac laptops and desktops. But the last MacBook and MacPro I got have lasted longer than most and still seem quite healthy. Now that I've gone and said that, then they will obviously fry spectacularly within the week.

Is Office academic pricing still around $99?

[KahrMan]

Get MS Office since she has a Mac Book Pro. If she is ever going to be doing a lot of work on an iPad, then consider iWorks.

[Guest nicemac]

I support both.

You need to get Office. The world runs on Office–for now (cloud services may make all these desktops obsolete).

M$ Office sucks. Office 2011 for Mac takes sucking to a whole new level. I use a lot of different applications and decided years ago that MS just doesn't get human interface. See if you can get a copy of Office 2008 and you will be much happier. The files are compatible between both versions.

iWork is OK. It is all most people need. It does not have all the bells and whistles of Office in Word and Excel, but most people don't need most bells and whistles most of the time. However, Keynote blows Powerpoint out of the water. It is simply a better app and anyone who gives it an honest appraisal will agree.

I personally use Apple's Text Edit for word processing whenever possible. It does everything I need for 99% of the documents I create. I have to use Excel though. Numbers just doesn't cut it.

[DavidD]

I support both.

You need to get Office. The world runs on Office–for now (cloud services may make all these desktops obsolete).

M$ Office sucks. Office 2011 for Mac takes sucking to a whole new level. I use a lot of different applications and decided years ago that MS just doesn't get human interface. See if you can get a copy of Office 2008 and you will be much happier. The files are compatible between both versions.

iWork is OK. It is all most people need. It does not have all the bells and whistles of Office in Word and Excel, but most people don't need most bells and whistles most of the time. However, Keynote blows Powerpoint out of the water. It is simply a better app and anyone who gives it an honest appraisal will agree.

I personally use Apple's Text Edit for word processing whenever possible. It does everything I need for 99% of the documents I create. I have to use Excel though. Numbers just doesn't cut it.

Thanks nicemac! I've heard the same thing about Office 2011 for Mac so I will take your advice and try to find Office 2008.

[DavidD]

Apple makes good hardware. Even a die-hard Windows or Unix addict would have a top-notch computer with an apple even if they decided to erase MacOS entirely from the system.

Laptops have limited lifetime compared to a good desktop and I've worn out a lot of PC and Mac laptops and desktops. But the last MacBook and MacPro I got have lasted longer than most and still seem quite healthy. Now that I've gone and said that, then they will obviously fry spectacularly within the week.

Is Office academic pricing still around $99?

I have found it as low as $86 at Amazon.

[Guest nicemac]

You are welcome David.

RE: " setting her up on Mac across the board"

Using Office is not "un-Mac" at all. Historically, Office is the single biggest selling Mac application. In fact, Excel was available on the Mac before it was available on Windows…

You don't have to stick with all Apple software to be a Mac user in good standing.

[Guest WyattEarp]

MS Office. iWORKS is one of the few Apple programs that sucks.

[Guest 73challenger]

Office! I use my office for mac in college and have no problems. It is different than the windows version though.