Office 2000

At first glance, the price of this product may make you break into a sweat! It is for that reason that I took a good look at Office 2000, in hopes of letting you know if you should sell your first-born to purchase the new program. The price for this new upgrade ranges from $250-$499 depending on how many features you feel you need.

While it is certainly not worth selling your first-born, it is worth purchasing...for some of you. Office contains the following programs:

• Word
• Excel (spreadsheet)
• Outlook (e-mail program)
• Power Point (presentation software)
• Access (database management)
• Publisher (desktop publishing)
• Front Page (web site design and management)
• Small Business Tools
• Internet Explorer 5.0
• Clip Art and Photo Draw

While I do not have the space here to give a detailed review of each product (and frankly I'm still learning!) I can tell you what I have seen so far.

• Less system crashes than I had with previous editions
• GREAT on-screen help with a beefed up paper clip guy. If you still have an older version you are missing out on the cute little paper clip guy who pops up and gives suggestions, as well as answering questions in real English. He is great, and the new version is much more animated than Office 97.
• Incorporation of e-mail. You can use Word to create any document you like. Then click on the 'send' icon and it automatically turns into an e-mail for you. This is one of the most helpful new features as far as I am concerned!
• I have still selected to use Outlook Express rather than Outlook as my mail program. I have heard too many people having problems with Outlook.
• I have not changed to Front Page as my web design package. While the new web design features are wonderful, make sure your ISP will accept Front Page document first. Some don't, and you will waste a lot of valuable time. If you can use Front Page, the new web design features make creating your site easier than ever.
• New version is much easier to use, and more intuitive. Unlike some products, however, it doesn't second guess you to the point where you want to beat it with a large stick (ie. Quickbooks).

If you have Office 97 right now, your decision will depend on how often you use Office, and what features you use. If you are a casual user, who types letters every so often and just needs a word processor, don't make the jump. If you are a serious Office user, or use Word constantly, you will be pleased with the upgrade. If you have any version older than Office 97, by all means purchase the new upgrade! Waiting too long can cost you money. Eventually you will want to catch up and will need to spend more money in the end. As a slightly paranoid Y2K person, I also like to know I have the latest versions of software. This upgrade is substantial enough to make upgrading from pre-Office 97 versions to this one worth the effort.

If you need a good tutorial for Office 2000, I was very impressed with Individual Software's Professor Office 2000 package. This will walk you through everything you need to know. The program is not too hard to learn, but some people really benefit from these tutorials.

See all Microsoft Office programs at Amazon!