Computer Question....

[Kevin Palmer]

Being a Fed Employee I am able to buy any Microsoft product for $19.99. So, I am going to buy about $100 dollars worth of various products that I want to update.



At any rate, there are two new versions of MS Office available. The newest version requires the following minimums,

Computer/Processor Personal computer with an Intel Pentium III or equivalent processor recommended; 233-megahertz (MHz) required. Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor will provide optimal performance for Microsoft Office Professional Edition 2003.

My computer is the following. 4-M (Pentium 4) CPU 2.20 GHz and 1 gig of RAM.



My question is, the software requirement says MHz and my processor is says GHz. Do you think this is a typo or what. Is my processor fast enough or not? I honestly do not know what is faster, GHz or MHz...



Thanks in advance...

 

[Chet 02]

If I'm not mistaken, 2 Ghz would be 2000 megahertz. That may not be the correct conversion, but yours is quite abit faster. You should have no problems.

 

[Mike M 6]

You are good to go.

 

[Keith Lewis]

You won't have any probs...you could get P3's in pretty slow speeds (I wouldn't run it on anything even close to 233mhz though).



Chet is right, 2ghz is 2000mhz, so you have plenty of hz to go around

 

[Greg Stuhlsatz]

No worries.

 

[peter barone03]

Spoke with the computer Guru's here at Rutgers and they told me no problem.:lol:

 

[Kevin Palmer]

I looked it up as well, same info as you are telling me. I was just concerned that it was a typo and I would be screwing myself.



Thanks all...

 

[Kevin Palmer]

Ok, as long as I am asking questions...



I am able to buy any of the following for $19.99. I know I want office for sure, beyond that, is there something else here that others feel would be good to have? If so, why or what is it used for.



I know I can read details from the Microsoft site, but would like honest input as to the use and quality of product. I don't mind spending the money, just want to ensure I can use it.



MS Office.

Front Page.

Office Mac.

Project.

Publisher.

Visio Pro.

Visio Standard.



Thanks again...

 

[Gavin Allan]

Depends on what you want to do. It's just like buying tools-- do you want to do framing construction, or do you want to rebuild engines?



Get Windows XP Professional and MS-Office Professional as a basic, minimum requirement. The others are just more specialized tools.



You should also consider doubling your RAM to 2 Gig. RAM is very cheap, and 1 Gig is kind of the bottom level needed for running Windows XP and MS-Office.

 

[Casey B]

Publisher should come with Office Pro. Front Page is for web design and Visio is for modeling.

 

[George C]

Coastie, your computer more than meets the required specs. What version of office 2007 are you getting? Below it a link to what each suite offers. Most of them include Publisher so you don't have to buy it seperately. If you can get the Professional Plus version for $20 definitely get that. Just be aware that there are big changes in the new office. Not that you will have to relearn but things are moved and the look is much different. Kind of cool and a lot of new graphic enhancements.



Front Page has been discontinued and replaced with a product still in beta.



Project and Visio are cool but unless you have reasons to get them I wounldn't. Is this a 1 time offer or can you do it anytime? What about ordering Vista when available? Then again for $20 it might be worth getting everyting.



George

 

[Kevin Palmer]

I can order as often as I want but only one of each product until the newer/replacement version comes out.



Pretty good deal.



Meant to do this before but just got to busy to do so. I have known about it for like 8 months... LOL

 

[Jeff C]

That is pretty cheap, and if you have to have MS then that's cool, but have you considered Open Office? It's free, and it's simple. Unless you're going to be doing business models and all that other stuff that MSOffice can do that the average consumer doesn't know about, there's no reason you can't get by with Open Office...

 

[Michael Hale]

I wasn't aware that Fed employees got a price break. I wonder if they have a similar program for state, county, and local employees? Anyone know?

 

[Mark S 3]

I wonder if they have a similar program for state, county, and local employees

It seems to depend on the agreement that your department set up. I know In Alberta, the provincial government employees get the same deal for purchasing microsoft Office and several other tools (But not Windows XP / Vista). I used it to purchase Mac Office a few years back for $20.

 

[Bill V]

Coastie, where are you ordering this from? My dad is a fed employee (post office), and if it's available to him, I'd like him to get some software. He won't use it--he doesn't even own a computer--but for that price, I would definitely like to have it. Is there a website or something else you're going through to get this, or that would have more info?



Thanks!



Bill

 

[Kevin Palmer]

Our office set up the account. You go to a web site and put in a code number. That opens a new window and then you put in your e-mail. You get a link sent to you, click on the link and your good to go.



I have the code but will choose not to post it if only for ethics type reasons. I do not know if the code is tied directly to me, our local office, or our agency.



I will do some digging and see what I can do to get you good info or at least a point of contact.

 

[Richard L]

Kevin,

It is not a misprint. Some Pentium III's were that slow :wacko: The fastest were only about 350 Mhz.



I remember working on 8 Mhz PC's, with 32 MB hard drive limits. Now you can carry 2 GB on a jump-drive that hangs on your key-ring



...Rich

 

[Tom Schindler]

Information about the P3.... The slowest were about 450 MHz.





Tom

 

[Michael Hale]

Similar benefits are available to those of us in government work with regard to cell phone rates, hotel rates, etc..