What's new
Pinball info

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Windows Office Software

DRD

Registered
Joined
Oct 26, 2014
Messages
5,433
Location
Newark
I am replacing my 9yr old laptop with a Windows 10 one. I need excel , word, ppt, outlook etc for home working. I do not like the look of this Microsoft annual subscription malarkey, so would rather buy software outright.

What is the best/ cost effective way to buy it nowadays please ?

I don't need the latest versions of the office software suite.

Thanks
 
You should be able to pick up office 2010 pretty cheap. That's an install from disc, has no subscription, and is compatible with windows 10
 
  • Like
Reactions: DRD
I've still got Word 2002. It does what I need - think its the 4th (and 5th if you add my laptop) desktop PC I've had it on.
 
Yeah Libre Office is a perfectly good alternative. The only thing to be aware of is if you share your documents with people that use MS Office, you may have the odd compatibility issue. But if your documents are only viewed by yourself, no problem.
If you do want MS Office, the prices that are closest to zero can be found on ebay :)
Amiga is a good workhorse too, build one yourself if you don't already have one ;)
 
Yeah Libre Office is a perfectly good alternative. The only thing to be aware of is if you share your documents with people that use MS Office, you may have the odd compatibility issue. But if your documents are only viewed by yourself, no problem.
If you do want MS Office, the prices that are closest to zero can be found on ebay :)
Amiga is a good workhorse too, build one yourself if you don't already have one ;)
I ended up with an A1500 68060, can’t remember what happened to it😭
 
Whatever you do, don't buy cheap knock-off pirate software on ebay, some can contain malware.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DRD
You can still get one time purchase versions on Amazon, "Home and Student" will probably do what you want and get the 2016 version if you want to save some money.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DRD
You can get Office 2019 from eBay for between £5-£10. You will be provided with just the license key, download the application direct from Microsoft and enter the key that you were provided. Done this on many machines now, the licenses are unregistered OEM ones.
 
Without wanting to sound like the licening police....
Yes you can get Home and Student cheaper than the full products, but beware the licence terms are it is to be used for non-commercial purposes only.

Any software that is over £300 new offered online at £30 is unlikely to be legitimate, at best I'd guess they are selling volume licencing keys from a 'company that went in to liquidation' which is either completely untrue and the keys are either generated or stolen, or even if it is true an extremely legally dubious practice (as I recall it's not allowed at all in the states and breaches the EULA everywhere but there was a court case in the EU or something)

As with all things, if it sounds too good to be true.....

OEM licencing cheaper than FPP but is non-transferable (as in dies with the PC to which it is attached) and cannot be sold legally without hardware

To be honest, the easiest and safest way to get Office as a SME (and increasingly for corp customers too) nowadays is just to buy the subscription..... as I recall it's £8 a month if you just require the applications
You get the rights to install the software on 5 devices of your choice (assuming they are yours, you can't share them around other people), it will be supported and patched regularly and you can move the licences to new devices as you see fit.
Office 2013 is the oldest currently supported version that still receives security updates, anything older than that does not.
There are still instances where per user single install versions of Office are a valid path (certain Citrix/RDS environments, companies with long term VL agreements or very specific requirements), but they are decreasing to the point of I doubt they'll be available in the next iteration.

I get your point about it doing what you need, and to be honest a Windows XP PC with Word 2002 will probably do most of what the average user wants in isolation, however that would not be a safe device to connect to the internet in today's world - it's not so much the use cases that have changed as the world has changed around them.....
 
Without wanting to sound like the licening police....
Yes you can get Home and Student cheaper than the full products, but beware the licence terms are it is to be used for non-commercial purposes only.

Hands up, I hadn't noticed the "home working". Assuming that means working from home, Home and Student would not be the proper license.
 
Back
Top Bottom