Microsoft Office for Mac Home and Student 2011 Family Pack

Reviews for Microsoft Office for Mac Home and Student 2011 Family Pack

Customer Reviews and Ratings

2.5 out of 5 stars

Based on 228 reviews

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    I like it

    • Written by from Wells

    I like iWork for it's simple functionality that is geared towards great screen presentation, but you can't beat the powerhouse punches of Excel, Word and Powerpoint. For those still stuck in a 'PC at work, Mac at home' world, this offers some resemblance of the familiar Office. For many who are still stuck with old Office like XP and such, you'll find the leap to 2011 quite a change. The Home & Student version is a compelling package at it's price... and I'm interested to see if the next iWork can compete! For now - it's Office 2011 all the way.

    1033 of 1199 people found this useful

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    2011 great product for the mac

    • Written by from Galway

    2011 is a great version of Office for the mac.

    Finally something to compare to the windows version.

    823 of 1076 people found this useful

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    so far so good

    • Written by from litchfield

    Reminds me a lot of iwork with full screen mode and other features...big improvement over office 2008, my student edition came with outlook though?

    631 of 796 people found this useful

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  • 4.0 out of 5 stars

    Great product. Shame it's necessary

    • Written by from Milton Keynes

    Office 2011 is by far Microsoft's best attempt to publish Mac friendly productivity software. The look and feel of all of the applications is just similar enough to their Windows counterparts that new Mac users won't feel left out, while remaining true to core Mac principles for ease of use and stability. I would go as far as to say that MS have surpassed the Windows version here. It's also a better price point. All three main products feel less bloated, more intuitive, and overall much slicker. Messenger for Mac is now a pretty good app, utilising video as well as test messages.

    It is a shame, though, that Office is still necessary. It does almost nothing significantly better than the fully featured, better priced iWork (although I do love MS's SmartArt in PowerPoint). Trouble is, so many business have MS so deeply engrained in their tech infrastructure that most users need the easy portability of file formats without the hassle of export/import routines or converters.

    329 of 361 people found this useful

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    LOVE IT. particularly Word.

    • Written by from Fayetteville

    I don't care what anyone says. I LOVE Microsoft Word for Mac! Although, it doesn't have everything that MS office has for PC computers, it's 10,000,000x better than pages. I suggest the free trial before paying for Microsoft Office if you are unsure. It lasts a month, which is a reasonable amount of time to test it out.

    232 of 241 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Buyer beware of asterisk issue

    • Written by from Chicago

    I'm a graduate student who relies on Word, Powerpoint, and Excel on a daily basis. When I first installed MS Office 2011, I was very pleased. Unfortunately there is a serious bug that Microsoft has not fixed yet.

    Without any warning, Word has been known to change open documents to asterisks. When that happens, you need to force quit WITHOUT SAVING, otherwise it will save the asterisks. You'll only have the most recent backup that you saved. I changed my preferences to save more frequently, and I also command-s like a mad woman. This bug is unacceptable. This happened twice, and of course both times were during finals.

    I may not have the most up to date information, so please check to see if Microsoft fixed the problem. I hope my review will save some people from having major headaches, or in my case, major meltdowns.

    194 of 200 people found this useful

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  • 4.0 out of 5 stars

    Very good product, but it is overpriced.

    • Written by from Thisted

    This product makes it much easier to work with other office users, who do not use mac. Besides that it runs much smoother than the older version.

    However, the product is extremely overpriced. How can demand 149.95$ for this product, no student can afford that. This is not Apple's fault though, this is microsoft going ballistic with the prices. Actually if you buy it at Apple homepage you save 0.05$ on the product! How ridiculous is that?

    224 of 272 people found this useful

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    WHERE THE "'EKY PECK" IS ENTOURAGE

    • Written by from Wokingham

    I don't think anyone needs to say that MS OFFICE is brilliant. I purchased an IMAC in September with OFFICE 2008 home and student edition. The deal is you get an updated OFFICE 2011 home and student edition upgrade free.

    Well, this week I got the upgrade, I haven't had time to see the differences (but I'm sure they will be great) BUT ENTOURAGE is no longer part of the package, you can BUY OUTLOOK though.

    Why would you want to buy something that should be part of the package, it doesn't seem fair to me. If this is an upgrade it should include everything that was available before NOT reducing the package.

    MICROSOFT have missed an opportunity to impress the MAC market. Not only should they have included ENTOURAGE in the package (even if it had been the older version) but the should also have included MS MONEY.

    234 of 304 people found this useful

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    No problems at all

    • Written by from Duvall

    I purchased my first Mac (a 15" Macbook Pro with upgraded everything) late last year. Based on the mediocre Office for Mac reviews and upon the advice of the specialist I placed the order with, I purchased iWorks with the laptop. iWorks is "fine", but if you have experience using MS Office, stick with it. After a few weeks with iWorks, I went ahead and purchased Office and have been completely satisfied. I haven't had a single problem and all of my PC-version Excel and Word files work perfectly. I would rate myself an "advanced/proficient" Excel user, so my comfort level with Excel is high.

    172 of 182 people found this useful

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  • 4.0 out of 5 stars

    Faster but I prefer 2008

    • Written by from Sunnyvale

    In 10.6 and 10.7, Office 2008 became ridiculously slow so I bought Office 2011. 2011 is much faster but, in Word, there are so many new menus and layouts that I have a hard time finding what I need when I need it. Setting up a 2008 tools layout seems not to be an option.

    In Mountain Lion, Word 2011 got faster - but so did Word 2008, so much so that I have now gone back to the older version.

    Those who complain of Office 2011 being slow in 10.7 or 10.8 need to look into Font Book.app. Resolve any duplicates - this will increase your performance by quite a bit.

    The next version of Office needs iCloud and GoogleDocs support. If not, I won't buy it.

    173 of 185 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Microsoft for Mac

    • Written by from Spanish Fort

    Word is decent and Powerpoint stable. Excel, which was the primary reason for purchasing Office for Mac is terrible. I can't use old files with older macros!! Every file goes into debug mode! Worst part about it is I called Microsoft sent a file and they acknowledged the problem....promised to have a fix with the next update...that was six months ago.

    174 of 189 people found this useful

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  • 4.0 out of 5 stars

    Office Mac 2011

    • Written by from Cheddar

    I recently switched to mac after 25 years of pc and 15 years of MSOffice use. I was given iWork which I was told was simpler and easier to use.

    I have to say that this was not the case for me, so I splashed out and bought office:mac - it might just be my familiarity with MSWord (which I use most), but even simple tasks like applying and formatting styles, using footnotes, superscript, bulleted list, column format, column/page break, graphic insertion/text flow etc seem far easier in office:mac. I find document file size is significantly smaller too.

    Word is sluggish when using lots of graphics and multiple frames in publishing layout view, and since there is no Publisher for mac, if you want page layout don't use a this word processor, use a DTP programme such as Scribus instead. It doesn't always print as seen either, so I usually save as pdf and print that - it could be my printer though.

    If you are familiar with Word/Powerpoint/Excel, this is worth a look. If you are just starting out, I would recommend you look at iWork which is considerably cheaper.

    168 of 177 people found this useful

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  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Useless for past docs and some newer dock

    • Written by from Washington

    I have struggled with these applications for months and they simply do not open older docs even if I try to convert to compatibility mode. I have to open with a Mac application, like TextEdit for WORD or Preview for Excel and then copy and paste into a new WORD doc. If I plan to send it to anyone, I have to convert it to a .PDF or an older WORD mode. I have had help from Mac consultants and have done everything including turning off all Virus Protection applications. Nothing works and it is the most frustrating 3 applications. Even Power Point does not open PPT docs and I have to default to a Mac application from iWORKs. Wish I could get my money back.

    180 of 207 people found this useful

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  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Dreadful

    • Written by from BUXTON

    I've been a Mac user for more than 20 years and I can confidently say this is the worst version of Office ever. It's even worse than the notorious version 6 edition of the mid 90's. Dreadfully slow, buggy, overblown and frankly awful, awful awful.

    If you need compatibility with old files and other users then I'm afraid you've got little choice but to suffer the constant menu delays, beach balling, mind-of-its-own auto formatting and all the other frustrations. When will someone at Microsoft realise that we don't want 'features', we just want a basic, competent, reliable and fast word processor capable of producing straightforward business documents in a quick and simple manner.

    If you don't need compatibility with old files and other users, spend your money elsewhere.

    172 of 195 people found this useful

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    IT WAS GREAT

    • Written by from Malverne

    I love it!!! I am a COLLEGE STUDENT and the note taking section allows me to audio record my professors!!! If you are a student and want to do better I highly suggest it!!!

    153 of 166 people found this useful

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  • 5.0 out of 5 stars

    Never had a problem

    • Written by from CALDWELL

    I currently have a PC laptop and just last summer purchased an iMac. I wanted something that would be easy to use back and forth between my two computers and I haven't had any problems. Some reviews made comments about excel and word being slow or not working in the full screen mode. I haven't noticed that at all and I have the 27" iMac (but its pretty much a power house). I am getting a new macbook pro and I hope it works just as great on that too. One of the reasons why I got office instead of apple's iWork is because I was already really familiar with word applications and formats since that is what I was taught to use. My pc is the 2007 version so there was a serious update with the new office for mac but it has been a good thing not a bad thing. There are some fun options in the 2011 version. I'd highly recommend this product if you are already familiar with Microsoft Office or are going to be working back and forth between PC's and Mac's.

    147 of 155 people found this useful

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  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Dreadful bugs- flaky performace - dont buy yet!

    • Written by from Vancouver

    I was really looking forward to Office 11 for Mac because of the return of Visual Basic within Excel that would enable me to use again a stack of useful programs written under the old system. Oh dear! Oh dear! I find the system effectively unusable in its present form because of very serious instabilities and inconsistencies.

    Here are some examples of the many problems. 1. flashing screen, flashing program code boxes, hanging the whole mac such that not even 'force quit' will work. 2. The useful command "Application.Calculate" no longer works at all and replacing it with "DoEvents" works only sometimes in some places. 3. You cant add a macro name to a custom menu button. 4. One of my old routines in an ".xla" add-in calls a DLL file for a complex analyses - I cannot get this to work at all, and now any Excel file name held in the 'recent files' bin can be replaced at random by this DLL file and wont open! An you have just lost a spreadsheet (fortunately I always back up) . The only way out is to cancell the add-in and empty the 'recent files' bin every time. 5. A simple command that writes data into a a txt file does not work consistently, and when reading a simple txt file carriage returns are interpreted as blanks!

    There is a free version of (an improved) Solver available from the solver people, but I found that this makes the whole of Excel virtually unusable and you see lot of the spinning wheel hang. There is a pro solver available, which would be attractive to me, as it can use the VB code, but there is no way I am buying this while the system is as flaky as this.

    Even using Powerpoint, I have found serious hangs and an irritating time delay between inserting material and seeing it appear on the screen - this delay gets longer and longer as a file gets larger until the file becomes unusable or the whole machine hangs.

    Why did we ever lose the old Office 2003? 8 years later, there is nothing better or more helpful in this new version, and I find the 'ribbon' thing intrusive and irritating.

    Hopefully, there will be some fixes to these major issues, but a the moment I feel I have wasted my money. I would just love to switch entirely to Mac software, but unfortunately in the professional world there is no real substitute for Excel, and we are all locked into MIcrosoft products.

    160 of 183 people found this useful

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  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Doesn't work with Retina - DO NOT BUY FOR RETINA MBP

    • Written by from Hemel Hempstead

    Nowhere on the product page does it mention that this office suite manages it's own text rendering and therefor is pixelated, blurry and unusable on the Retina MacBook Pro. Do not waste your money on this as I did.

    150 of 164 people found this useful

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  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Awful, dreadful, flawed and presumptious license key scheme...

    • Written by from Wylie

    First and foremost... If you plan to use an eSATA disk drive (like with a Mac Pro), then you will have a constant licensing issue, wherein MS Office 2011 WILL eventually become disabled if you swap out the eSATA drive on a regular basis as I do. You need to read MS Support Article ID: 2476507. To paraphrase, this article says, "...eSATA. This is an unsupported configuration by Office for Mac. The workaround is to use Firewire 800 instead of eSATA." Wow! Microsoft is now dictating, limiting how I use my Mac Pro.

    The solution to the licensing issue is simple, aside from the obvious. However, I'm not telling as you need to experience an afternoon working with Microsoft Support. Make no mistake, the people are nice and use mostly understandable English, but... you need to experience Microsoft Support.

    If the licensing problem isn't enough, MS Office 2011 for Mac is just plain buggy and dog slow. I cannot copy and paste a contiguous group of about 700 cells without Excel 2011 becoming "unresponsive", with a spinning beach ball. I let it sit for over 2 hours this afternoon, and Excel 2011 would NEVER complete the copy (never got to telling it where to paste the cells!). I then tried a copy of 65 cells... it did complete. After 10 minutes or so of waiting, I could then select the cell to start the paste, then I had to wait another 3 or 4 minutes for that to complete. Not good!

    Working with older Excel "xls" files, as oppose to the current, native Excel 2011 "xlsx" file... it takes a lot of time to simply save a "xls" file, even with minor changes. I'm talking minutes to complete the "xls" save.

    One last thing... I am not certain... I do not think Office 2011 is a 64 bit binary. I think its compiled as a 32 bit binary. Why? Activity Monitor shows all Office 2011 apps as being "Intel". All of my other third party apps, as well as all Apple apps, are showing as "Intel (64 bit)".

    Background setup: 2 foolishly bought, LEGAL copies of Mac Office 2011 running on the following hardware:
    Mac Pro (MacPro5,1, Quad-Core Intel Xeon), 16 GB RAM, 2x256 SSD HD RAID 1, 10.6.8
    Mac Mini (latest, Core i7), 8 GB RAM, 2x128 SSD HD RAID 1, 10.7.3

    164 of 194 people found this useful

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  • 4.0 out of 5 stars

    So Far So Good

    • Written by from North Las Vegas

    I hesitated to buy Microsoft Office for the Mac since I have the Macbook Pro with Retina screen. I bought it on a gamble since my daughter wanted Word on her iMac. Once I downloaded the program, microsoft automatically downloaded all the updates onto my laptop. I had no problems even when I downloaded it from the internet as I have no optical drive on my laptop. The window and document is clear, no blurriness and it appears to be working. I've had no issue. YAY! :)

    132 of 142 people found this useful

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