Buying a Microsoft Office.

My school uses 2010, I use 2007.

They're both alright. Honestly, I can't tell the difference.

If you're a student, see if you can get it discounted via dreamspark. Not sure if they're still doing office, but I'll leave that for you to look into.

Microsoft Office really doesn't add so much for the price that it warrants spending the money on. I personally would just use OpenOffice, LibreOffice, or one of those solutions. If you must use Microsoft Office, maybe wait until you get there and see if you get free/discounted software from Microsoft. You might be able to get one of the Offices for free or really cheap You could also wait for stuff to go on sale in November, which would be like 2 months into school.

In terms of differences, the last few have more or less been the same. It isn't going to be the end of the world if you use 2010 instead of 2013. I would still go with a free solution.

Why not LibreOffice?

2010 is fine. 13 will be identical anyway

or try openoffice

Subscriptions on Word, pff. Thats the reason why everybody...

i use MO22013 and it's better than the 2010th one imo.

I know that my university provided students with a free Student copy of Microsoft Office.

omg... OMG! Dont buy anything! Just use openoffice, or libreoffice... Dont give Microsoft even one penny!

why not google drive? its free i do my homework with it

Wordpad is all you need.

I used Open Office for all my needs at the time I was at school, and it worked sufficiently well.

2007 is the best one.

2007 FTW

use or try Open office, its free and can open/ save in .doc format it has all you need and is free. Or google docs might be a good solution.

LibreOffice works just fine, there's seriously no reason to spend extra cash on overpriced software

Office 2010 would be your best bet for ms office versions, 2013 only allows one single activation. if you ever reformat your computer or lose it or anything you have to call their support service, and in the end you would probably save money over the recurring subscription based 365.

(also heard that if you ever unsubscribe you cant get your files off their cloud server which ounds retarted... dont know how much truth this has though.)

LibreOffice (mentioned by others) is also a good option but if you plan on building skills using Excell, Word, Powerpoint etc. for jobs you really need ms office.

just use Libre Office or Apache Open Office

Rrr, there's more to this than it looks.

If all you need is Word/Excel/Power Point at a normal level (nothing fancy, professional, production env. etc.) then I recommend you try Kingsoft Office Suite Free 2013. I personally stay away from Libre/Open Office since they are all Java based and I hate Java. Both, the technology and the programing language.

If you really need Microsoft Office ask yourself these:

1. What do you need it for?
2. How much are you going to use it?
3. Is there any chance you'll go short on money in the future?

If 3 = YES or you just don't like paying a subscription you can stick to 2010 or get 2013 retail. There is not much of a difference between them. I bet 2013 got that bad rating because of its subscription. As if you don't have that on security software. But this means you have to pay a lot of money once for every PC.

If you use it at home/school etc., you have more than 1 PC and you usually upgrade your software (Office included) regularly then go for Home Premium subscription.

But since you said you used 2003 for 8 years I suspect you'll do the same now so I think you should take Home & Student 2013 (Word/Excel/Power Point/One Note) retail ($139.99).

Personally I still use 2007 and had no problems with it. And as I mentioned before, I recommend Kingsoft Office Free for those who don't need too much. It has the best compatibility with 2007/2010 I've seen so far.

Hope this helps. :))

If you can wait, do it.

Try Google Docs. It's a student's best friend. Force your friends/teammates to use it. Collaborate like a goddamn champion. Get your fucking A.

If you're a bitch and you can't deal with Docs, try OpenOffice or LibreOffice. The last time I used them, they were horribly difficult to use compared to Office, but it's a good idea to see if you can deal with them.

If those don't work, get Office 2007, 2010 or 2013. There's no conspiracy where 2013 is much worse than the others. Ever since 2007, they have been pretty much the same.

There's really no justification for buying MS Office.

Libre Office is better than Open Office.

Your college should have student licenses. I got my MS Office 2010 ~3-4 years ago for $15 or less. Still works.