Can I Uninstall Excel 2008 & use Excel 2004?

[Jellybean742002]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

Despite its new features, without the functionality of macros/VBA, Excel 2008 is not an option for our company's 850 users.

Can we uninstall Excel 2008 and install Excel 2004 in its place? Will 2004 work with the other 2008 Office Suite programs?

Or do you recommend we leave 2008? If we do, is there a way to set Office up so all Excel files open by default to the 2004 Excel version instead of Excel 2008?

 

[Bob Greenblatt]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

Despite its new features, without the functionality of macros/VBA, Excel 2008
is not an option for our company's 850 users.

Can we uninstall Excel 2008 and install Excel 2004 in its place? Will 2004
work with the other 2008 Office Suite programs?

Or do you recommend we leave 2008? If we do, is there a way to set Office up
so all Excel files open by default to the 2004 Excel version instead of Excel
2008?

Excel 2004 and 2008 will peacefully co exist on the same machine. However,
there is a bug which results in Excel 2008 opening all files even when 2004
is selected as the default. You can also remove Excel 2008 and use Excel
2004 instead. If you do this, I would leave the Office 2008 folder in tact.
You can delete Excel 2008, and install 2004 in it's proper Office 2004
folder.

 

[Phillip Jones]

Hey Bob,

That's not just a bug for Excel. it extends to word, PowerPoint and
Entourage as well. office products are the only applications that do
this. You can go to finder choose one or a Bunch of files you want to
open with Office2004 Application till the cows come home. Will do no
good. will always open in Office2008.

Only work arounds are:

1) click on desired document one time to select and go to finder menu
and from File menu open with. You then have t wait until a list of
Applications is built. Then choose the office2004 application desired.

2) much the same as one above, only right click on document and wait for
context menu come up. Then choose open document with.

if there is a key combo to do the same thing, I've never used key
combos. They are too hard to remember. and I've always worked faster
using the mouse. Plus always reminded me to much of using a windows
machine to use key combos.

Excel 2004 and 2008 will peacefully co exist on the same machine. However,
there is a bug which results in Excel 2008 opening all files even when 2004
is selected as the default. You can also remove Excel 2008 and use Excel
2004 instead. If you do this, I would leave the Office 2008 folder in tact.
You can delete Excel 2008, and install 2004 in it's proper Office 2004
folder.

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

mailto[email protected]

<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/90th_Birthday/index.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Fulcher/default.html>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Harris/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

Despite its new features, without the functionality of macros/VBA, Excel 2008 is not an option for our company's 850 users.

Can we uninstall Excel 2008 and install Excel 2004 in its place? Will 2004 work with the other 2008 Office Suite programs?

Or do you recommend we leave 2008? If we do, is there a way to set Office up so all Excel files open by default to the 2004 Excel version instead of Excel 2008?

Hi,

You can put Excel 2008 application in the trash and empty the trash and
then install Excel 2004 (custom install) from the install disc. This
will work for Word and Powerpoint, but NOT for Entourage.

Once your Entourage database has been migrated to 2008 it can not be
used by Entourage 2004 (a copy of the old 2004 database is retained if
you upgraded).

As was pointed out, if you keep both, the 2008 version wants to take
over as the default application.

You can install NeoOffice (free) from http://www.neooffice.org/ to open
and convert to XLS the occasional Office 2007/2008 formatted documents
that come your way. OpenOffice version 2.4 (free)
http://www.openoffice.org/ may be something to check out if your macros
are not very exotic.

-Jim

 

[George]

Am I able to take the Data analysis tool pak from excel 2004 and add it in to excel 08. I am able to do this on my widows machine but will it work the same on mac?

 

[Mike Middleton]

George -

No. The wizards of the Excel 2004 Analysis ToolPak use VBA, and Excel 2008
does not include VBA.

The add-in worksheet functions of the Analysis ToolPak are available as
native worksheet functions in Excel 2008.

- Mike Middleton
http://www.DecisionToolworks.com
Decision Analysis Add-ins for Excel

 

[Jack Marr]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

Despite its new features, without the functionality of macros/VBA, Excel 2008 is not an option for our company's 850 users.

Can we uninstall Excel 2008 and install Excel 2004 in its place? Will 2004work with the other 2008 Office Suite programs?

Or do you recommend we leave 2008? If we do, is there a way to set Office up so all Excel files open by default to the 2004 Excel version instead of Excel 2008?

Can Excel 2004 still be purchased from Microsoft? I see some
references to it on the mactopia site, but no way to actually purchase
it. If they're no longer selling it maybe MS should reconsider, given
the outcry over missing features in XL08. There is some precedent
with the Vista/XP situation.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

Can Excel 2004 still be purchased from Microsoft? I see some
references to it on the mactopia site, but no way to actually purchase
it. If they're no longer selling it maybe MS should reconsider, given
the outcry over missing features in XL08. There is some precedent
with the Vista/XP situation.

MS doesn't typically sell products directly to consumers (at least, not
Mac products).

Try the on-line vendors.

 

[Jack Marr]

MS doesn't typically sell products directly to consumers (at least, not
Mac products).

Try the on-line vendors.

I've got my "due diligence" hat on, and I'm concerned about the
Microsoft end of the pipeline. The on-line vendors might have XL04 in
stock today, but can they continue to obtain XL04 from MS? I'd like
to have some confidence that XL04 will be available in the long term,
at least until XL08 is viable, which IMO it is not now.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

I've got my "due diligence" hat on, and I'm concerned about the
Microsoft end of the pipeline. The on-line vendors might have XL04 in
stock today, but can they continue to obtain XL04 from MS? I'd like
to have some confidence that XL04 will be available in the long term,
at least until XL08 is viable, which IMO it is not now.

MS's typical life-cycle for WinOffice makes products available for most
or all of their "mainstream" phase, i.e., 5 years from release or 2
years after a successor is released, whichever is longer. If MacBU
follows that life-cycle, it would put availability for Office 2004 out
to late-2009 or early 2010.

But I haven't seen anything official on whether that will be the case
with Office 2004.

 

[JeremiahK]

Thanks to the experts for all the good advice about whether/how-to and consequences of uninstalling 2008/re-installing 2004 Excel. I use Excel extensively at work and for personal stuff, and although I haven't used VB scripts, Excel 2008 is already giving me headaches. I've had several 'Not enough Memory' pop-ups (I have 4gb on a new MBPro w/Leopard) and I really liked using the Print Preview button and doing all my page setup fiddling right from there. One additional question - can you advise best way to completely remove 2008 to reinstall 2004 - I'm new to Mac and concerned about leaving pieces of 2008 behind that may give me more headaches than working around the 2008 Excel glitches.
Thanks for the advice.

 

[Jack Marr]

Thanks to the experts for all the good advice about whether/how-to and consequences of uninstalling 2008/re-installing 2004 Excel. I use Excel extensively at work and for personal stuff, and although I haven't used VB scripts,Excel 2008 is already giving me headaches. I've had several 'Not enough Memory' pop-ups (I have 4gb on a new MBPro w/Leopard) and I really liked using the Print Preview button and doing all my page setup fiddling right from there. One additional question - can you advise best way to completely remove 2008 to reinstall 2004 - I'm new to Mac and concerned about leaving pieces of2008 behind that may give me more headaches than working around the 2008 Excel glitches.
Thanks for the advice.

There's a 'Remove Office' application under '/Applications/Microsoft
Office 2008/Additional Tools' that should do a complete job of
uninstalling Office 08.