Rating: 
Summary: It's good
Review: It's good, I love Entourage much better than Apple's e-mail and calendaring software. The others are comparable to Windows products; nothing special about them.
Rating:
Summary: Does the job with some nice features
Review: Like almost everyone on the planet, I've used Office for Windows extensively and initially I was a bit put off by Mac Office as it does look and feel different (what the hell is Entourage anyway?). However on working with it more you get used to it, and it has some nice features that the Windows version doesn't. 3+
Entourage - I have really come to like the app - I use it as a replacement for Palm Desktop (Memos), Address Book (it is a little 'richer'), and Mail (it does hotmail as well as POP & IMAP), and everything integrates well.
Ability to mark a doc for followup - Office will give you a reminder, even when it's not running.
It's Office, right? It does almost everything. 3-
While docs are compatible with Windows versions, I have had problems with complex spreadsheets, so I do not think it is 100% perfect.
It is a little sluggish (800mhz G4 iMac, Panther, 512mb).
Entourage's calendar management isn't as good as iCal - can't publish/subscribe, or even import/export data. More generally, Entourage isn't very 'open' - it shares data well with other parts of the app, but not other apps. Overall, it does what you expect and let's face it, it's the de facto standard for a reason. Expensive thought!
Rating: 
Summary: Mediocrity Rules the office
Review: Microsoft has run every other major player out of the Mac Office market, and so why should they sweat it? Most Mac users need Office because they're outnumbered by Windoze machines at work and have to be able to read files generated by these apps... don't get me started. If we ever needed an example of why open, non-proprietary standards are important, you need look no further than office. Excel is actually a pretty decent spreadsheet, but it has some deficiencies. For example, the default templates don't work with imported files, like HTML or Filemaker tables. People overuse Excel, and spreadsheets in general. Word is an aggressively mediocre word processor, and isn't really suited for serious technical publication - use Adobe Framemaker for that. It's Ok for little memos, letters and suchlike. It would be better if people used it right - for example, using styles to designate space before a paragraph instead of hiting retrun to insert a blank line.... Powerpoint is an inhuman curse. Years ago, Symantec had an app called "More" that far superior, but the usual herd mentality favored Powerpoint. Get rid of Powerpoint and productivity would go up across the board. In fact, get rid of 90% of viewgraphs and the associated chartsmanship that clouds our communications so badly. Entourage is a good idea in broad concept, but is very poorly executed, won't synch with PDAs properly, and doesn't really interoperate with Exchange and Outlook as promised. It's very buggy and its junk mail filter isn't adaptable and doesn't really work at all (uss SpamSieve if you're stuck with Entourage, or switch to the OS 10.2 Apple mail app, which has a kickin' spam filter). Its support of Applescript is poor, and it fails to empty its trash when asked to do so. For some reason, you can't schedule the application of rules. Many other deficiencies. Unfortunately, there aren't many alternatives to Office on the Mac. OpenOffice is still pretty primitive, but if it fulfills its promise, it could rock. Appleworks is nicely done but underpowered, and only comes bundled with the iMac and iBook. We're stuck with monopoly and mediocrity for now.
Rating:
Summary: The Common Review of Microsoft Office v.X, pt 1
Review: Microsoft Office v.X gets a BUY recommendation. If thatÕs all you want to know, then get online and buy this beast! I call it a beast affectionately, but lets face it. If you didnÕt need to bring work home from the office, would you REALLY be buying a program with a word processor, spreadsheet, slide show and mail program? Probably not. However, having said that, if you were to consider buying any ONE of these programs separately, the cost difference between one and all four is such that any frugal buyer would opt for Office just on that basis. My wife would call getting Office instead of just Word being a ÒBetter Buyer Meijer Shopper!Ó Better to have them and not need them then need them and not have them. Besides, replacing the OS X native Mail program and TextEdit with Entourage and Word are worth the price of admission alone! Way back in the very early Ô80Õs, a pirateÕs flag used to fly over the building at Apple that were developing the Macintosh. MicrosoftÕs Macintosh Business Unit (MacBU) is trying to capture that same spirit. A band of rebels lurking inside the evil giant!! This is first product to be actively promoted as coming from them, while earlier versions of MicrosoftÕs Mac products may have had ÒMac only features.Ó In the ReviewerÕs guide, the folks at MacBU say their goal was ÒÉto lead the way by creating a product that looks exactly how a Mac OS X application should.Ó Speaking of looks, Office v.X has a kind of playful, very un-Microsoft like appearance to it. Going way beyond the basic Aqua layout, the icons look like a See ÔN Say toy for kids. If I didnÕt know it was from Microsoft, IÕd be looking for the fisher-price logo!! But make no mistake, beneath the playfully inviting exterior, is the heart of very powerful suite of programs! PowerPoint
My needs are such that IÕll probably NEVER use the PowerPoint slide-show portion much, but I did play with it a bit. I like the idea of having PowerPoint being QuickTime compatible, not only in format, but also able to use QT transitions and animations. For those who use QT for web movies and such, you are pretty much up to speed with PowerPoint right away. PowerPoint comes with a TON of clip art, as it always has. The method for adding them to the main program from the Value Pack add-ons (more on this later) is a bit easier then in previous versions of Office. I also like the idea of now having a much easier way of collecting all of the files for a PowerPoint presentation into one folder. Another cool feature of the new PowerPoint is the controllable transparency function. Built on the Quartz 2-D Drawing Technology of OS X, it works much like the opaque feature in Adobe Photoshop by allowing one image to be visible behind or through a second one. Excel
If you donÕt use an accounting program like Quicken or MYOB, then I suspect you will make good and frequent use of Excel. Some new features have been added to the spreadsheetÕs functionality, such as an AutoRecover feature (only available in Word till now), and CUSTOMIZABLE keyboard shortcuts. It seems Microsoft horked off a lot of people by changing the keyboard commands in Excel from Office 98 to Office 2001. So now you can make them pretty much what you want! And who said they donÕt listen? Like itÕs brethren, Excel also using the Quartz 2-D Drawing Technology for transparency work. Now charts can have a smooth look with Anti-Aliasing for lines and text, and depth as well. The coolest feature I found in this version of Excel is the FileMaker Pro import function. You can drag and drop a FileMaker Pro database (version 3 and up) onto the Excel icon and a wizard will walk you through turning it into an Excel spreadsheet. I used this to send my address book to my wife, so she could add them to our Christmas card list that she keeps in Excel 2000 on her PC. No sweat, no muss, no fussÉno hassle! For first time users of a spreadsheet, there is a calculator now available in Excel. ItÕs supposed to help you visualize how things like formulas and cell linking are done. One final feature that shows MacBU was thinking ahead is the Euro currency support. Since most of Europe (England was still a hold out at press time) went to the Euro on January 1 of this year, it was cool to have a currency converter built-in to handle it. Entourage
As a mail program, the one that OS X gives you is pretty basic. Once you start using Entourage, youÕll also find out itÕs pretty primitive as well. I really missed not having a calendaring program in OS X, and the ones I looked at look didnÕt really have the interactive functions I wanted. So to say IÕve embraced Entourage with open arms is an understatement. The mail functions are pretty cool. It lets you categorize your mail as well as your calendar and address book items. Just by turning ON the Junk Mail feature, it shows me all of the mail it thinks I donÕt want to see, and then when opening them if I wish, lets me tell it what to do with it if itÕs NOT junk mail. Importing my mail from OS X mail was pretty easy, once I found the import from Mail script in the Value Pack stuff. Lets say you sit down to do some mail stuff, and you know that you have to send pictures to Grandma from Christmas. Grandma is pretty hip, since sheÕs got a computer with email and all that. Just grab your attachments, drag them over the Entourage icon and that's IT! Entourage automatically creates a new outgoing message for you, brings the attachments in and presents you with the address block of who to send it to! A time saver at holiday and birthday time to be sure. Entourage automatically color codes new messages differently from old ones (duh), but also does the same thing with messages you have attachments on and assigns different flags to documents according to whatÕs happening with it, like embedded links, forwarded documents and such. Maybe not a big deal in and of itself, but it makes managing your mail easier. More in part 2.
Rating: 
Summary: Top notch stuff
Review: Mr Barker from Illinois has probably written down everything anyone will ever want to know about the technicals of Office:mac. Thanks mate. My penny's worth is that this Office program is the most slick, free flowing suite of programs I have ever worked with. It makes (new & improved?) Office:Windows look prehistoric and that awful thing from Lotus just, well, awful. Word and Excel have been transformed and are now both crashproof and visually appealing - unlike the Windows version. Entourage, the email program, has a first class layout and options menu. You can transform your layout in almost any way you wish. (Importing address books from yahoo is causing me some grief, but I'm sure that's more me than them). Overall, I'm just sorry our Windows friends aren't aware of what they are missing. All that stuff about software not being available for mac and the processors being slower than Intels and AMDs. What a load of hogwash. This is a top notch product for people with style and imagination. Right On!
Rating: 
Summary: A must for powerusers, not needed by the rest of us
Review: Office is far and away the best thing Microsoft does, and probably the main reason for their dominance in the software industry. The Mac OS X version of Office is generally regarded as superior to the Windows version, so this is the very best version of all. Having used a trial version for a month, I have to admit that it is in many respects very impressive. Although it occassionally misbehaves, for the most part it works splendidly with the OS X operating system. The interface is very nice: it looks better even than Apple's office suite, Appleworks. It does sometimes hog a little more CPU when it's open but not being used, but that's typical of 3rd party carbon ports. Despite the many fine qualities of his app, I cannot give it a complete endorsement. I suspect that many people buy MS Office because of its prestige and its dominance in the market, not because they necessarily need it. If you rarely use spreadsheet, don't really need to make presentations, and don't need all the extra features of MS Word, then you don't need this application. Excel and Powerpoint are industry standards. If you're in business and you need such things, those are the ones to have. If you're not, you don't really need them. The spreadsheet and presentation program that comes with Appleworks will do fine. (Or if you don't have Appleworks, install XDarwin and use gnumeric or KOffice for free.) As for MS Word, well, to tell the truth, I prefer the Appleworks: it's simply easier to use. In all the times I've used Appleworks, I've never had to go to the help browser to figure out how to accomplish something. With MS Word, even a simple task such as changing or realligning paragraphs requires a visit to the annoying little help box. While I recognize the awesome power of the program, I just don't need anything quite that sophisticated. I suspect that there are a number of people out there who shell out the big bucks for MS Word or Office but who don't really need its power. There's no reason for that. Nor is there any reason to buy it just so you can open us MS Word documents. Appleworks, Abiword, and OpenOffice will open all but the most sophisticated word docs. As for those they can't open, well, let's face it: Mac and Linux users really need to begin putting pressure on people to send documents in file types that use open standards, like rtf and PDF. There's no reason why non-Windows users should cooperate in extending Microsoft's dominance in the market.
Rating:
Summary: Macs and Business, Office v. X a must-have
Review: Office v. X is a solid upgrade of the venerable suite from Microsoft. It looks great in Mac OS X, and more importantly WORKS great. I spend a great deal of time using Entourage, Word, and Excel -- the more I do, the more I find to like. I get 400+ emails per day, and the extensive rules support, linking of messages to contacts, and linking between all aspects of Entourage to be a huge help in staying organized. I was a *long* time user of Eudora, and missed it at first, but appreciate the benefits Entourage brings. The other parts of Office are hugely powerful too, but by now, you probably know you need it anyway!
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing but necessary upgrade
Review: Office v.X is getting a lot of rave reviews. I have some problems with that. One, a lot of the compliments it gets are because of the Aqua interface. They didn't invent the Aqua interface, they only implemented it. Two, v.X has very little new features. You'll notice remarks that v.X is little more than Office 2000. Office 2000, though, was an awful lot like Office 98. What did they do in 2000? They "Aquafied" the interface then too. Everybody got really excited because OS X wasn't out yet. But that's what they're this time, too. They're Aquafying the interface for real. Actually, the toolbars were worse in the 2000 product, compared with the 98 product. And in v.X they're just like 2000. They don't orient automatically to the side of the screen. Stick a vertical toolbar on the top of the screen in Word 98, and it was a horizontal toolbar. Now? You've bisected the screen. It takes extra steps to reorient it. That's the Microsoft way: "Well, we can do it, it just takes extra steps." It was no doubt a big programming chore to move the code to OS X. We'll give them credit for that. And yes, it's a necessary upgrade. They know they've got us over the barrel, thus the price. But that doesn't mean it deserves 5 stars. OS X is a 5 star product. This version of Office, frankly, is not. Know the difference.
Rating:
Summary: Great Product!!
Review: Really Great! Microsoft did it. Feature rich software. It really works well than its Windoze counterpart. Price is a bit high, but once you start using it, you won't regret for that. A must have product for Mac fans.
Rating:
Summary: HOW TO FIX UNEXPECTED CRASH BUG
Review: Some very nice person posted this. So I feel it's my duty to spread the word.
You may get a "Word has unexpectedly quit your system has not been damaged" message. You'll see an angry review below about someone who was broken by this problem. Do the following
1. Open your folder with your user name
2. Open your library folder
3. Open your microsoft folder
4. DELETE the following two files: Word Font Substitutes
Word Settings (10) If for some reason you are having trouble finding the files just type them into the folder names into your search engine and you should be able to locate them. Microsoft Word will immediately work again and the files will be recreated automatically. SPREAD THE WORD (v.X)!
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