How to Choose a Version of Microsoft Office 2007

Microsoft’s popular Office 2007 Suite of Software is one of the most recognized software packages next to only Microsoft’s own Windows and Internet Explorer. First introduced in office environments, MS Office is now found in the homes of many computer users. This fact alone makes many consumers wonder why Microsoft continues to market the software under the name “Office.”

As in many cases with big software companies, Microsoft offers its Office 2007 suite under a variety of package names including Home and Student, Small Business, Standard, and Professional. Each suite includes some combination of the following programs: Word 2007, Excel 2007, PowerPoint 2007, OneNote 2007, Outlook 2007, Publisher 2007, and Access 2007.

Which package to choose is a function of what you need the software to do.

Word 2007 in the newest version in the Word series of word processors offering everything you need to write letters, create letterheads, share content, and just about anything else to do with writing. Excel 2007 is Microsoft’s spreadsheet application that allows convenient data organization, calculation, and analysis.

You can use PowerPoint 2007 to create electronic slides for presentations for both face-to-face meetings and for the web. OneNote 2007 is a relatively recent addition to Microsoft’s Office lineup. OneNote is digital note-taking software allowing you to gather unstructured information (such as when taking notes, brainstorming ideas, etc.) into one place for storage, retrieval, collation, and sharing. Outlook 2007 is an electronic organizer that allows you to collect e-mails, schedule meetings, and store business and personal contacts in one program. In comparison, Outlook’s younger brother Outlook Express is only capable of e-mail and a few other functions such as newsgroup and RSS organization.

Publisher 2007 is a program that never became a major contender in the desktop publishing market. As a desktop publisher, it is aimed more for home rather than office user. Its main competitors are such giants as Adobe PageMaker and Corel Draw. Access 2007 is Microsoft’s main desktop database program allowing you to create and query simple or complex database relationships. Often, small websites use a version of Access to serve dynamic content to visitors to its page content.

Word 2007, Excel 2007, and PowerPoint 2007 are common to each of the four Office suites including Home and Student, Small Business, Standard, and Professional. These three programs are the core of the Office 2007 family of software; any suite of Office you buy will have these programs included. However, the remaining version of Office 2007 come with a variety of combinations of the remaining Office software titles including OneNote 2007, Outlook 2007, Publisher 2007, and Access 2007. See the Figure for a summary of each suite.

Each of the software titles that make up Office 2007 are available separately so you are not stuck having to buy a software title in one suite just so you can get the ones you want. The best advice is for you to buy the suite that has the software titles you want and then buy any remaining titles separately. However, buying a suite of Office 2007 is much less expensive than buying each application on its own. Be sure to do the math before making a final decision. Also, do not get caught up in the marketing categories Microsoft has created (Home and Student, Small Business, etc.); Word 2007 and the rest of the applications are identical in all of the packages regardless of which suite it comes from.