Office 2007 Enterprise vs Ultimate

[David Walker]

As part of my MS Partner Program, I downloaded a 90-day trial of Office
2007 Enterprise.

After a month or so, I decided to buy it. So I bought an Office Ultimate
2007 Uppgrade.

I figured I might have to uninstall the trial and install the Ultimate
upgrade.

First, I tried activating the trial that I had, using the license key
that came in the Ultimate Upgrade package. It worked, and I validated
using the Genuine Office tool.

I was a little surprised.

I know there's not much difference between Ultimate and Enterprise,
but...when I go to Excel 2007, for example, and go to Excel Options,
Resources, About, it says it's "Part of Microsoft Office Enterprise
2007".

I never put the Ultimate 2007 DVD in my computer; I just used the product
key and activated (or "converted").

I don't appear to have Accounting Express, which is part of Ultimate but
not Enterprise....which I don't really need (at the moment). I don't
have Communicator either, which is part of Enterprise but not Ultimate,
but it is "Scheduled for release in the second quarter of 2007" according
to the chart at http://office.microsoft.com/en-
us/suites/FX101635841033.aspx.

Is this expected? Do I now have Enterprise 2007 even though I bought an
upgrade to Ulimtate 2007?

If I call MS, I wonder if I would be able to talk to someone who knows
the gory details of this, or if they would tell me "don't worry about
it"?

Thanks for any insight.

David Walker

 

[Eric A.]

Hi David,

If you had the enterprise trial version on your machine and you used the key
from your ultimate disc to convert your trial into a full version, then that
is exaclty what happened. Your Office enterprise is now a full version of
enterprise not ultimate.

The RTM keys for ultimate suite will work with enterprise suite which is why
the key worked.

If you are needing the otehr components that are included with ultimate you
will in fact need to install ultimate using your disc.

 

[DWalker]

Hi David,

If you had the enterprise trial version on your machine and you used
the key from your ultimate disc to convert your trial into a full
version, then that is exaclty what happened. Your Office enterprise is
now a full version of enterprise not ultimate.

The RTM keys for ultimate suite will work with enterprise suite which
is why the key worked.

If you are needing the otehr components that are included with
ultimate you will in fact need to install ultimate using your disc.

So there is a set of products whose keys will work to convert the
Enterprise trial to Enterprise full. I wonder if an Excel 2007 key would
have worked to convert. (I suspect the answer is no.)

It's just odd that I ended up with a full Enterprise when what I bought was
Ultimate.

Thanks.

David

 

[Eric A.]

When it comes to an Excel key, if it was in fact an Excel standalone key it
would only work with an Excel standalone product. Standalone keys are not
interchangable with Suite keys and vice-versa.

Ultimate and enterprise keys are interchangeable however. It really isnt
that odd that you dont have Ultimate components since you have not installed
office using ultimate media which contains those componenets.