New to Mac.... Advice?

[manderz]

My wonderful family pitched in to get me a Macbook Pro for my impending graduation! However, I'm not quite done with school yet, and I do plan to continue farther, so I'm in need of decent word processing software. My options are:

-Buy Pages and Keynote (since I will occasionally need a power point style program too) for a total of $40, even though I'm totally unfamiliar with them

-Buy Office for Mac, which includes Word, Excel, and Power Point for $79 (on sale for extended Black Friday) I'm more familiar with Microsoft as it is, also.

Any advice for me? No one else in my social or work/school circles use Mac, and I think there are a few Mac users around here.

 

[chemgirl]

I use Microsoft Office on my Mac. Its pretty simple once you get the hang of it.

 

[kenny]

I have used Macs for 20 years and always spent the big bucks to buy the full complete MS Office.

This time I just bought cheapo Pages and Numbers from the online apple app store (for I think $19.99 each when you order it from and for the new mac), and I have never needed anything more.

Your requirements may exceed mine since mine are pretty basic.
They can read and save files as Word and Excel documents.

 

[yssie]

The close is on the left...

The close is on the left...



The close is on the LEFT darnit!!

 

[swingirl]

Microsoft Office. Buy it and learn to use it to it's fullest extent.

 

[mrs taylor]

I run a dual platform and HATE IT. I've never used a PC....I've been a mac girl since the 80's. I do have a medical program that needs windows though. So I installed it on my mac. BLECH. Sorry. Had to get that out! I would far prefer to be able to buy mac software across the board.

Anyway, for that price I'd definitely do Office for Mac.

ETA: where is the deal on office for mac if you don't mind sharing?

 

[ame]

Get Office for mac. it's worth the spend, honestly. I have that and iOffice (Pages/keynote/numbers) and I only end up using Office. IT's easier since I open/send stuff to people on PC's frequently (excel, I rarely use word)

 

[manderz]

Thanks for the input, everyone.

Yssie, I hear you!! I can't tell you how many times I've had to google silly things like how to open another tab in Safari, and I'd hate to admit the fancy cool things that my completely tech handicapped Dad has accidentally shown me

Kenny, I'm not sure how extravagent my needs really are, I just need to be able to write papers with ease, manage my resume, and do the occasional power point presentation. Basic scholarly stuff. Good to hear that you haven't needed anything more than Pages. I was a little taken aback as I tried to open a file I'd emailed to myself in RTF and the text edit thingy that comes with the mac messed with the formatting. Made it clear I need something a little more.

Mrs. Taylor, the special on Office for Mac is just right on the Microsoft website, it was supposed to be a Black Friday deal, but it's still valid.
http://www.microsoft.com/mac

 

[Maria D]

Before I got a mac three years ago I had used Microsoft Office (Word, Excel and Powerpoint) extensively for years. I even go as far back to creating all kinds of documents on Wordperfect and Lotus 1-2-3 when they were DOS based programs, not Windows. Oh, what excitement when we were first introduced to WYSIWIG (what you see is what you get) as opposed to having to use/understand "reveal codes."

In answer to your question, when I got my mac I forced myself to learn how to use Pages and have never looked back. I mostly write math tests and handouts with all kinds of diagrams but also do newsletters, flyers, regular correspondence. Pages does everything I need it to do and I like the user interface better. Pages lets me place things (like tables, diagrams, pictures) exactly where I want them and easily let's me decide how much space I want around them. With Word I used to find it a challenge to do things like get diagrams to anchor with text.
Pages (and the other mac programs) have a utility called "Inspector" that makes it all very easy.

I do use Keynote and Numbers, but to a lesser extent so I'm not quite as proficient in those.

 

[distracts]

You'll be fine with Pages and Keynote. They're basically exactly like Word/PP, and you can export your documents to those formats. Keynote makes MUCH better slideshows than Powerpoint, and I always use it for that. I have MS Office but I mainly use it for Excel, as I do a lot of statistical computing and Numbers doesn't have the functionality I need for that (if you're just doing basic computing though, I can't imagine that numbers would be problematic). It's also easier to make things look prettier in Pages. If you already know how to manage all the little doohickeys in MS Word, that ease is not necessary, but it's nice. And, uh, it's also easier to make things look pretty in Numbers. Not gonna lie, I do my computing in Excel and then export it to Numbers before I print it out, so that I can arrange it all nice-like. I've never figured out how to do that in Excel.

 

[chemgirl]

Thanks for the input, everyone.

Yssie, I hear you!! I can't tell you how many times I've had to google silly things like how to open another tab in Safari, and I'd hate to admit the fancy cool things that my completely tech handicapped Dad has accidentally shown me

Kenny, I'm not sure how extravagent my needs really are, I just need to be able to write papers with ease, manage my resume, and do the occasional power point presentation. Basic scholarly stuff. Good to hear that you haven't needed anything more than Pages. I was a little taken aback as I tried to open a file I'd emailed to myself in RTF and the text edit thingy that comes with the mac messed with the formatting. Made it clear I need something a little more.

Mrs. Taylor, the special on Office for Mac is just right on the Microsoft website, it was supposed to be a Black Friday deal, but it's still valid.
http://www.microsoft.com/mac

Using Safari is your first problem! I don't find it intuitive at all. That could just be my lack of intuition though .

I use Google Chrome and its awesome.

I wouldn't recommend Firefox on a Mac because you really need to restart it once ever few days or else it starts to slow things down. I rarely have to restart my Mac so Firefox becomes this crazy memory eating monster that freezes everything in sight.

 

[Tacori E-ring]

I have been a mac user/lover since I was 6 years old. Without a doubt I would buy microsoft word. I am currently in Grad school and it is a universal program to send papers, receive flyers, design presentations, etc. Everyone uses word.

 

[Maria D]

Now when *I* was six years old I had a really great Etch-a-Sketch!

 

[mrs taylor]

Now when *I* was six years old I had a really great Etch-a-Sketch!

I bet you used it while you walked uphill to school, both ways in the snow too. lol.

Yes, at home personal computers where not a "thing" when I was 6! That's for sure!

 

[shimmer]

I use OpenOffice which is open source software very similar to MS Office. I have used their 'Word', 'Excel' and 'Powerpoint' successfully. Also, it's free!

 

[marcy]

I went Mac about a year ago. I always used Office especially Publisher, Power Point and Excel. The Mac Office doesn't have Publisher so I got Pages. I really struggled at first but went through a few tutorials online how to create a newsletter and now I am very happy with it. I was able to get the Mac Office last spring and I find I don't use it as much as I thought I thought I would. When I tried to do my clubs monthly newsletter in Word it didn't turn out as nice as the one I did in Pages. I do use Excel more than numbers but they are honestly very similar to each other. I think I use Excel more because I know how to do the formatting and formulas without looking them up. Pages is a very decent program.

 

[Hera]

I'm not sure it's been mentioned but a free program is Google Docs. I use it all of the time for my business and it has a spreadsheet, word processing and a powerpoint like program. It's simple but that means it's easy to use.

 

[manderz]

Thanks for all the experiences and input. I'm kind of surprised that the the opinions are kind of split. It definitely gives me a lot to think about. I have some time to think about it, and I can get a trial version of both to compare and see which I would rather use. Fi did a little snooping, and discovered that I could get a 30 day free trial for iWork, and I'd already gotten a trial of office. Will be interesting to see which I prefer.

 

[marcy]

Manderz, great idea to use both programs for 30 days to see which one you prefer. The first day I had my MacAir I was about ready to take it back. I couldn't figure out how to send email. The second day I was doing fine.

One weird thing happened to me on email. I used the Mac Mail program and when I got Office I set up Outlook as my default email program; I couldn't get my contacts to import so I put them all in by hand. About 2 or 3 days after I installed Office I had a notice there was a software update for it. The update completely wiped out all my contacts in email.

Have fun. Let us know what you like.

 

[rubybeth]

I'm not sure it's been mentioned but a free program is Google Docs. I use it all of the time for my business and it has a spreadsheet, word processing and a powerpoint like program. It's simple but that means it's easy to use.

This. I use Google Docs for everything since DH and I don't have Office on our laptop and that's become our primary computer since our desk is so messy. It's really handy since I do a lot of my work with Google Docs, share things with my supervisor or team members, and then have access to it from work, home, wherever. You can download things in Office formats if you need to e-mail a file to someone, and can upload Office formats to it, so if someone sends you a PowerPoint or Word file, you can edit it and share it with the original sender, thus doing away with 8,543 versions of things.

I really like Keynote better than PowerPoint, for what it's worth.