MS Office for Intel Mac?

[marko.asplund]

I've migrated to an Intel Mac some time ago. I noticed that the Mac OS
X version of MS Office 2004 is unfortunately for the PowerPC
architecture.

Is there a native Intel or universal binary build available? If not, is
there a schedule for creating such a build?


marko

 

[Michel Bintener]

I've migrated to an Intel Mac some time ago. I noticed that the Mac OS
X version of MS Office 2004 is unfortunately for the PowerPC
architecture.

Is there a native Intel or universal binary build available? If not, is
there a schedule for creating such a build?


marko

Hi,

I can understand why you would prefer every single application to run
natively on your Intel Mac, but objectively speaking, there's no real need,
is there? Based on reports I've read, it looks like Office 2004 runs fast
enough in the Rosetta environment, at least for the time being. Microsoft
have announced that the next version of Office for Mac is going to be a
universal binary, so I'm afraid you'll have to wait until the next release
to get an Intel-native version of Office. Nobody really knows when that
version is going to be released: it will most definitely be after the
release of Office 2007 for Windows, and if you take into consideration all
the other factors (rewriting Office in Xcode, implementation of the new XML
file format, new features, some of the UI changes taken from Office 2007
(maybe?) ), then I'd say you'll have to wait for *at least* one more year.

Michel

 

[r.googlegroups]

Hi,

I can understand why you would prefer every single application to run
natively on your Intel Mac, but objectively speaking, there's no real need,
is there? Based on reports I've read, it looks like Office 2004 runs fast
enough in the Rosetta environment, at least for the time being. ....

Michel

How can you "objectively" say office runs fast enough? I tested last
night at the local apple store with some spreadsheet macros I use for
work. I didn't use a watch but it didn't seem to perform any better
than my G3 ibook at running these macros. I have done a comparision
between the speed of running my macros on my ibook (Mac OS X 10.3;
Office 2004) and my pc at work (Win XP; Office 97) and literally the pc
was 25x faster. I like macs. I'll almost certainly buy a mac again, but
I need a little more power/speed from excel.

 

[Michel Bintener]

How can you "objectively" say office runs fast enough? I tested last
night at the local apple store with some spreadsheet macros I use for
work. I didn't use a watch but it didn't seem to perform any better
than my G3 ibook at running these macros. I have done a comparision
between the speed of running my macros on my ibook (Mac OS X 10.3;
Office 2004) and my pc at work (Win XP; Office 97) and literally the pc
was 25x faster. I like macs. I'll almost certainly buy a mac again, but
I need a little more power/speed from excel.

There's an interesting article on the MacTECH website,
<http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.22/22.05/Office2004Benchmark/>,
which states in its conclusion that Office 2004 performs really well on the
new Intel Macs, even surpassing in some instances its performance on
equivalent PowerPC Macs. Your mileage may vary, of course, but then again,
not everyone uses macros, and since the OP seemed to ask in a more general
way, I'd say that my original statement was objective enough.

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:Mac (Word & Entourage)

***Always reply to the newsgroup.***

 

[Bob Greenblatt]

There's an interesting article on the MacTECH website,
<http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.22/22.05/Office2004Benchmark/>,
which states in its conclusion that Office 2004 performs really well on the
new Intel Macs, even surpassing in some instances its performance on
equivalent PowerPC Macs. Your mileage may vary, of course, but then again,
not everyone uses macros, and since the OP seemed to ask in a more general
way, I'd say that my original statement was objective enough.

Microsoft has announced that the next version of Office will be a dual
binary that will run in native mode on the Intel chip macs. As of now, there
is no schedule for this release. It will be some time (maybe a long time)
after Office 12 is released for the PC. Until then there is no alternative
but to run Office 2004 under Rosetta. Macro performance on Macintosh has
always been slower than on the PC. Lets hope that this will improve greatly
with Office 12.

 

[Gavin Lawrie]

I've migrated to an Intel Mac some time ago. I noticed that the Mac OS
X version of MS Office 2004 is unfortunately for the PowerPC
architecture.

Is there a native Intel or universal binary build available? If not, is
there a schedule for creating such a build?

Office 2004 works as fast or faster on our 2.0 MacBook Pro / iMacs as
it does on 1.67Ghz G4 Powerbooks. Our G5 Dual runs it faster. Based
on subjective assessment mostly of work in large documents in
Powerpoint, some in Word. But YMMV.

However, there appears to be a bug in Word that appears when it is run
on MacIntel that is not there on PPC - to do with OpenType fonts. If
you use OpenType fonts you might want to check out what happens when
you save files with your OpenType fonts in - some (it seems) may crash
Word on saves.

Gavin Lawrie.

 

[Jason Wagar]

Office 2004 works as fast or faster on our 2.0 MacBook Pro / iMacs as
it does on 1.67Ghz G4 Powerbooks. Our G5 Dual runs it faster. Based
on subjective assessment mostly of work in large documents in
Powerpoint, some in Word. But YMMV.

However, there appears to be a bug in Word that appears when it is run
on MacIntel that is not there on PPC - to do with OpenType fonts. If
you use OpenType fonts you might want to check out what happens when
you save files with your OpenType fonts in - some (it seems) may crash
Word on saves.

Gavin Lawrie.

Gavin, have you had any luck in getting Microsoft to recognize this issue? I
have had SO many problems and lost hours of work trying to figure out this
ridiculous issue.

They need to fix this bug soon. Thousands of users out there who paid good
money for Office:mac and for OpenType fonts now find themselves screwed while
trying to use the de facto industry standard, Word.

Jason Wagar

 

[Michel Bintener]

On 24.05.06 11:38, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Jason Wagar" <Jason

Gavin, have you had any luck in getting Microsoft to recognize this issue? I
have had SO many problems and lost hours of work trying to figure out this
ridiculous issue.

They need to fix this bug soon. Thousands of users out there who paid good
money for Office:mac and for OpenType fonts now find themselves screwed while
trying to use the de facto industry standard, Word.

Jason Wagar

Microsoft is aware of this issue, thanks, to a considerable extent, to
Gavin's thorough testing. You might want to check out a thread called "Word
2004 + Macintel + Some Adobe OpenType Fonts = Crash on save" in the Word:mac
newsgroup where the entire problem has been discussed in detail.

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:Mac (Entourage & Word)

***Always reply to the newsgroup.***

 

[Jason Wagar]

On 24.05.06 11:38, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Jason Wagar" <Jason


Microsoft is aware of this issue, thanks, to a considerable extent, to
Gavin's thorough testing. You might want to check out a thread called "Word
2004 + Macintel + Some Adobe OpenType Fonts = Crash on save" in the Word:mac
newsgroup where the entire problem has been discussed in detail.

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:Mac (Entourage & Word)

***Always reply to the newsgroup.***

Thank you very much Michel. Looks like it still hasn't been resolved, but
hopefully soon with people looking into it. I'm glad I'm not alone.

Thanks again!

Jason Wagar

 

[Kurt]

On 24.05.06 11:38, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Jason Wagar" <Jason


Microsoft is aware of this issue, thanks, to a considerable extent, to
Gavin's thorough testing. You might want to check out a thread called "Word
2004 + Macintel + Some Adobe OpenType Fonts = Crash on save" in the Word:mac
newsgroup where the entire problem has been discussed in detail.

Amazing that a multi-billion dollar company can only get it together to
fix a major problem when one man (a volunteer) takes it upon himself to
troubleshoot it.

 

[Jim Gordon]

Amazing that a multi-billion dollar company can only get it together to
fix a major problem when one man (a volunteer) takes it upon himself to
troubleshoot it.

You raise an interesting point, which leads to lots of other notable things.

Troubleshooting is a tricky business in computers. There are many
variables to complicate things. It takes a set of circumstances that can
be elucidated and then replicated for the engineers to figure out what's
wrong and then to correct the problem.

I think it is to the Mac Business Unit's credit that one person who
volunteers to help solve the problem does get listened to and the
person's offer of help is accepted, acted upon and valued. To me this
says the even though Microsoft is a huge multi-billion dollar operation
that they are interested in what a single volunteer had to say and was
willing to work with that person. Having a corporate culture that really
does listen to customer feedback and then acts upon it is a good thing
for Microsoft and for their customers, I think.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

 

[Kurt]

You raise an interesting point, which leads to lots of other notable things.

Troubleshooting is a tricky business in computers. There are many
variables to complicate things. It takes a set of circumstances that can
be elucidated and then replicated for the engineers to figure out what's
wrong and then to correct the problem.

Ys, but it seems to me that primary obligation of a software company
should be to produce the most bug-free software they have the resources
to produce. We're talking billions and billions of dollars to work with,
not two guys in a garage.

Makes it sounds like only 5 people work in the Mac division, and they
make them work in the shed out back, with leftover resources.

The only thing I can think of is that the entire company is scrambling
to fix Vista.

 

[Barry Wainwright [MVP]]

Ys, but it seems to me that primary obligation of a software company
should be to produce the most bug-free software they have the resources
to produce. We're talking billions and billions of dollars to work with,
not two guys in a garage.

Not really. Like most, if not all, multi-nationals, Microsoft is divided up
into divisions & business units. Each of these business units has its own
goals and target markets, and has to demonstrate profitability in that
market. The Mac Market is not the biggest area that MS is operating in and
doesn't control all of Microsoft's many billions.

Makes it sounds like only 5 people work in the Mac division, and they
make them work in the shed out back, with leftover resources.

Heh! No, it's not as bad as that! They have a perfectly acceptable building
on the MS campus in Redmond (see here: <http://tinyurl.com/muw9p>) and
another facility in Silicon Valley. In total they employ about 200 hundred
people (see here: <http://tinyurl.com/nkpzx>. They do serve up some
exceptionally good software, and I have heard it said (but can't
substantiate with any documented information) that hey are one of the most
productive Bus in MS when you look at the sales they generate for the
resources they consume.

The only thing I can think of is that the entire company is scrambling
to fix Vista.

Well, Vista is certainly eating into more of those billions than Office:Mac
ever will, but the profit potential in vista is also significantly bigger!
That seems to be a sensible balance

 

[JE McGimpsey]

Ys, but it seems to me that primary obligation of a software company
should be to produce the most bug-free software they have the resources
to produce. We're talking billions and billions of dollars to work with,
not two guys in a garage.

Nope. Not even close.

The primary obligation of a software company is to return a profit to
its shareholders.

That *can* mean that they make the most bug-free software they have the
resources to produce, which they can then sell at a premium to generate
a profit.

But if the premium prices them out of the market, they get no profit,
and investing fewer resources in an almost-as-good product is optimal.

The Mac Business Unit (MacBU), like any other profit center of a
multi-division company, has to produce a target profit, or it's no
longer in the best interest of shareholders to keep it running. Other
than the potential for future profit, there's absolutely no reason that
shareholders should subsidize the Mac:Office market, so it has to pay
for itself.

Makes it sounds like only 5 people work in the Mac division, and they
make them work in the shed out back, with leftover resources.

Less than 200, and they have great facilities.

Without speaking for MS or MacBU, my guess is that MS would gladly hire
more people and purchase more resources for MacBU, if a business case
could be made for the investment.

There's only three ways to do that, that I can think of: (a) increase
the number of copies of Mac:Office purchased, (b) increase the price of
Mac:Office, or (c) cut the cost of producing Mac:Office.

My observation is that MacBU is pretty lean already, so absent a radical
change in the way they write software, (c) isn't a huge option.

(a) is at least partly dependent on the number of Macs in use, so to
that extent is out of MacBU's direct control. Presumably, their
marketing efforts are largely saturating the Mac market, so only by
making their software attractive enough to create more conversions to
Macs (and they did just that with Office v.X to save the Mac platform)
could they have a significant direct impact.

Which leaves (b). How much more do you want to pay?

 

[Kurt]

Less than 200, and they have great facilities.

Then the question would be, how many of these actually do the work?

Not be be facetious, just know how terribly awry corporate culture can
go. MS is not immune from the "it's not my job" or "let's have a
meeting" mentality.

 

[Kurt]

Nope. Not even close.

The primary obligation of a software company is to return a profit to
its shareholders.

That *can* mean that they make the most bug-free software they have the
resources to produce, which they can then sell at a premium to generate
a profit.

But if the premium prices them out of the market, they get no profit,
and investing fewer resources in an almost-as-good product is optimal.

The Mac Business Unit (MacBU), like any other profit center of a
multi-division company, has to produce a target profit, or it's no
longer in the best interest of shareholders to keep it running. Other
than the potential for future profit, there's absolutely no reason that
shareholders should subsidize the Mac:Office market, so it has to pay
for itself.


Less than 200, and they have great facilities.

Without speaking for MS or MacBU, my guess is that MS would gladly hire
more people and purchase more resources for MacBU, if a business case
could be made for the investment.

There's only three ways to do that, that I can think of: (a) increase
the number of copies of Mac:Office purchased, (b) increase the price of
Mac:Office, or (c) cut the cost of producing Mac:Office.

My observation is that MacBU is pretty lean already, so absent a radical
change in the way they write software, (c) isn't a huge option.

(a) is at least partly dependent on the number of Macs in use, so to
that extent is out of MacBU's direct control. Presumably, their
marketing efforts are largely saturating the Mac market, so only by
making their software attractive enough to create more conversions to
Macs (and they did just that with Office v.X to save the Mac platform)
could they have a significant direct impact.

Which leaves (b). How much more do you want to pay?

Thank you for pointing out what is wrong with much corporate culture.

We're talking a company with billions in cash. if the Mac market is that
small, easy to bury the extra effort to fix things in the accounting.

Yes, you do the obligatory kiss-up to those you need to, but my God,
look at the money you have to work with!

 

[JE McGimpsey]

Thank you for pointing out what is wrong with much corporate culture.

"Wrong" is a political and moral evaluation, one that I have opinions
on, but they're not particularly relevant here. I was simply describing
the reality that MS and every other corporation operates in.

We're talking a company with billions in cash.

Which belongs to the shareholders, from Bill G to the proverbial widows
and orphans.

if the Mac market is that small, easy to bury the extra effort to fix
things in the accounting.

Burying it in the accounting would, of course, be violating their
fiduciary responsibility.

MS management *could* decide that subsidizing the Mac market was in the
best interest of the company. But what makes the Mac market so special
to MS that they'd subsidize it? Where does the obligation to subsidize a
competitor come from?

Yes, you do the obligatory kiss-up to those you need to, but my God,
look at the money you have to work with!

*I* don't have any of that money.

Nor is there anyone I'm obliged to "kiss-up to" - certainly not at MS,
anyway. In fact, while I genuinely like every single person I've met
from MacBU, and am amazed at what they produce, I generally detest MS as
a company - perhaps for some of the reasons you cite.

Many of the decisions that MS and MacBU have made have significantly
adversely affected my business. I'm pissed off about it - and have told
them so. I could make a lot more money if they only adopted my
priorities. But they are *their* choices, not mine.

I don't imagine that they have any obligation to me, other than as a
customer.

 

[Kurt]

"Wrong" is a political and moral evaluation, one that I have opinions
on, but they're not particularly relevant here. I was simply describing
the reality that MS and every other corporation operates in.


Which belongs to the shareholders, from Bill G to the proverbial widows
and orphans.

Plenty of money for the company.

Burying it in the accounting would, of course, be violating their
fiduciary responsibility.

Didn't mean it like that - meant allocating a tiny portion from a huge
portion somewhere else.

MS management *could* decide that subsidizing the Mac market was in the
best interest of the company. But what makes the Mac market so special
to MS that they'd subsidize it? Where does the obligation to subsidize a
competitor come from?

It's more that they try to give the image of how wonderful they are for
the Mac market and how what they produce is the best possible. The usual
corporate puffery.

*I* don't have any of that money.

Nor is there anyone I'm obliged to "kiss-up to" - certainly not at MS,
anyway. In fact, while I genuinely like every single person I've met
from MacBU, and am amazed at what they produce, I generally detest MS as
a company - perhaps for some of the reasons you cite.

Sorry, never meant this as a personal comment about you - meant it in
terms of the company itself. It controls its pursestrings and can make
any decision it wants.

Many of the decisions that MS and MacBU have made have significantly
adversely affected my business. I'm pissed off about it - and have told
them so. I could make a lot more money if they only adopted my
priorities. But they are *their* choices, not mine.

I don't imagine that they have any obligation to me, other than as a
customer.

Don't see hordes of MS techs flooding the their newsgroups with
insightful solutions. Their own website is tedious (and often lacking)
at best with respect to easy customer support answers. Other software
companies do properly moderated discussion forums quite successfully.
I can get quick, expert answers from Adobe all the time.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

Which belongs to the shareholders, from Bill G to the proverbial widows
and orphans.

Plenty of money for the company.[/QUOTE]

No. It ALL belongs to the shareholders. The company managers and
directors are responsible to use that money wisely for the shareholders'
benefit.

Didn't mean it like that - meant allocating a tiny portion from a huge
portion somewhere else.

I strongly disagree - when I make an investment in a company, I expect
the management of that company to be diligent and deliberate in using
ALL of that money. While a case can be made that corporate charity can
enhance a company, both by being a responsible "corporate citizen" and
by the fact that a good reputation may lead to future profits, I can't
make a case that providing charity to Apple Macintosh owners
accomplishes either of those goals.

It's more that they try to give the image of how wonderful they are for
the Mac market and how what they produce is the best possible. The usual
corporate puffery.

Yeah, marketing gets smarmy sometimes. OTOH, I have to give credit where
credit is due: without a Herculean effort by MacBU to produce Office
v.X, Apple's *entire* business today, assuming it survived, would likely
be limited to iPods...

Sorry, never meant this as a personal comment about you - meant it in
terms of the company itself. It controls its pursestrings and can make
any decision it wants.

No, it really can't. Nor should it. Again, I'd love for MS to give me,
and every other Mac user, a gift by subsidizing MacBU. But I can't think
of a justification, nor do I expect any such gift.

Don't see hordes of MS techs flooding the their newsgroups with
insightful solutions.

Nope - MS techs mostly work on product, though they do monitor the
groups. A few post occasionally. Support techs work in providing paid
support. The newsgroups have always been about peer support.

Their own website is tedious (and often lacking) at best with respect
to easy customer support answers.

Have to agree with you here.

Other software companies do properly moderated discussion forums
quite successfully. I can get quick, expert answers from Adobe all
the time.

If you're getting support from Adobe employees (I never got a darned
thing from their GoLive forum - every one of my questions went
unanswered), then *someone* is paying for it. MacBU could certainly
provide tech support in the newsgroups, but then they'd have to raise
the price of MacOffice. How much more will the market bear?

I guess for me the bottom line is that, as far as MS is concerned, the
MacBU is the red-headed stepchild of their business. They like the fact
that it returns a profit, but MacBU is on a strict pay-as-you-go
program. There's no obvious justification for the idea that the best use
(i.e., the highest return) of MS's cash is investing in the Mac platform.

Anyone who continues to adopt a platform with a tiny market share, as we
have, is going to have to live with the implications of that status,
including everything being more expensive. If the expense is more than
Mac users are willing to pay, then we have to live with that, too.

 

[Kurt]

Plenty of money for the company.

No. It ALL belongs to the shareholders. The company managers and
directors are responsible to use that money wisely for the shareholders'
benefit.[/QUOTE]

But money can be alloted for things that matter. You are saying that the
Mac unit is simply not worth the cost of doing what they advertise.
Fair enough.

I strongly disagree - when I make an investment in a company, I expect
the management of that company to be diligent and deliberate in using
ALL of that money. While a case can be made that corporate charity can
enhance a company, both by being a responsible "corporate citizen" and
by the fact that a good reputation may lead to future profits, I can't
make a case that providing charity to Apple Macintosh owners
accomplishes either of those goals.

Charity is not doing what they promise in their advertising.

Yeah, marketing gets smarmy sometimes. OTOH, I have to give credit where
credit is due: without a Herculean effort by MacBU to produce Office
v.X, Apple's *entire* business today, assuming it survived, would likely
be limited to iPods...

...or a way to circumvent the MS stranglehold. Tough one, I'll agree.
MS calls the shots on this one.

No, it really can't. Nor should it. Again, I'd love for MS to give me,
and every other Mac user, a gift by subsidizing MacBU. But I can't think
of a justification, nor do I expect any such gift.


Nope - MS techs mostly work on product, though they do monitor the
groups. A few post occasionally. Support techs work in providing paid
support. The newsgroups have always been about peer support.

You'd figure that out of 200 employees, they could rotate a few around
for an important part what they tout as "customer support"

Have to agree with you here.


If you're getting support from Adobe employees (I never got a darned
thing from their GoLive forum - every one of my questions went
unanswered), then *someone* is paying for it. MacBU could certainly
provide tech support in the newsgroups, but then they'd have to raise
the price of MacOffice. How much more will the market bear?

Funny, I use the the forums regularly, GL, AI PS and ID.
Always get a response.
Like I said before, 200 MS MacBu employees and they can't rotate a few
around to man the boards? A multi-billion dollar company. Adobe can set
up a dedicated forum, why can't MS?

I guess for me the bottom line is that, as far as MS is concerned, the
MacBU is the red-headed stepchild of their business. They like the fact
that it returns a profit, but MacBU is on a strict pay-as-you-go
program. There's no obvious justification for the idea that the best use
(i.e., the highest return) of MS's cash is investing in the Mac platform.

Anyone who continues to adopt a platform with a tiny market share, as we
have, is going to have to live with the implications of that status,
including everything being more expensive. If the expense is more than
Mac users are willing to pay, then we have to live with that, too.

Yes, the more it kills the competition, the more we pay them.

More reason to "think different".

Why not sub out the Mac end if resources are so "constrained by
stockholders"?