Office 2007 tools are nifty, but upgrade is pricey

Microsoft is betting a lot on its impending release of the next version of Office, its suite of productivity applications. To win that bet, however, Microsoft has to convince enough of us that it's worth shelling out our hard-earned dollars to make the move to the new product.

Well, is it?

The answer is, "It depends."

After spending some time trying out a test version (officially tagged "beta build 12.0.4017.1003," if you're keeping score), I found Office 2007 offers a dramatically new interface with lots of new time-saving features, as well as new work-group tools. But the new productivity suite, expected to be in broad release early next year, also involves a number of potential costs, which aren't limited to the price tag on the box of software. Some users may also find they need to upgrade their operating-system software and their hardware.

Whether moving to Office 2007 makes sense for you depends, in short, upon both how its capabilities match your needs and upon how big a bite it will take out of your wallet. Let's take a look at both issues.

What's better?

There's no denying it offers a much slicker interface than earlier versions. And it's not all just about looks — there are functional advantages to many of the changes.

The most dramatic change is the introduction of "ribbons" to replace the old pull-down menus. Ribbons offer collections of buttons and other graphic elements of the sort that used to be available on customizable toolbars in previous versions of Windows. Across the top of the displayed ribbon is a set of tabs for selecting other ribbons. In Word, for example, the available ribbons are Home, Insert, Page Layout, References, Mailings, Review and View.

There were a few ribbon assignments I couldn't quite fathom, The header/footer control, for example, is on the Insert ribbon instead of the Page Layout ribbon, which seems to me a more natural location.

Otherwise, the ribbons are logically designed and easy to get used to. And I liked that the Home ribbon contains the most commonly used formatting tools, as well as search and search-and-replace tools. While the ribbons are not customizable, there is a customizable Quick Access Toolbar just above the ribbon bar where you can stash tools you use frequently.

I also like the way Microsoft has made the ribbons context-sensitive. If you click in a table, for example, a Table Tools ribbon will automatically appear. If you then highlight some text, the Home ribbon will reappear with the selected text style highlighted. And many options can also be summoned quickly and made closer to hand by simply right-clicking on selected objects in your document.

What's more, the new Office applications make extensive and effective use of previews. If you highlight a selection of text and then pass the cursor over the different styles offered in the Home ribbon, the document's text will automatically change to the style under the cursor. Curiously, the previews don't apply across the board. While they work for font-style changes, for example, the only preview for paragraph-style changes is the one provided in the popup dialog box, as in earlier versions, and not in the actual text on the page.

Application improvements

While the main improvements in Office's applications are the ribbons and other interface enhancements, a few improvements in functionality are worthy of note.

For starters, there's a slick new versioning tool that allows you to scroll through multiple versions of a document simultaneously so that you can view what has changed.

Excel sports a variety of improved formatting tools, including "conditional formatting," which changes the background color of cells depending upon their value. Conditional formatting can also be used to vary other visual effects depending upon cell values.

Excel's charting tools are also much improved. Most notably, the live previews make them much easier to use.

Outlook is one of the most improved applications in this version of the suite, though most of the improvements are aimed at those working in groups. You can now overlay team schedules directly on top of your personal Outlook schedule for easier coordination. You can even e-mail a calendar or your availability to others.

The calendar won't list your actual appointments, since you may want that to remain confidential, but it will indicate what time is available on your calendar. Bear in mind, however, that these group-scheduling features require the use of Sharepoint Server, a separate Microsoft product.

For individual users, the new Outlook offers an instant search feature that allows you to quickly search across your calendar, e-mails, contact information and tasks, especially with respect to group scheduling. The contact manager also features a new to-do bar, and tasks can now be viewed and accessed on the calendar.

PowerPoint has adopted most of the new interface changes. In addition, the presentation program adds SmartArt, a tool that allows you to quickly and effectively change formatting of your slide shows.

Work-group collaboration

Much, if not most, of the effort Microsoft has put into this new version of Office is devoted to new and improved tools of interest primarily to offices rather than to individuals.

The applications of Office 2007 are tightly integrated with Office SharePoint Server to deliver a host of new work-group capabilities, including collaboration tools and document-management capabilities.

The new collaboration tools include an instant-messaging platform and a Web-based white-boarding tool. The document-management features include check-in/check-out of documents and routing documents for review and approval.

For most home and small-office users, of course, such capabilities are not a draw. Fortunately, such users can opt for versions of Office that don't require paying for such enhancements.

How much will it cost?

OK, so what's the bottom line on cost? That's a good question.

Even the upfront cost of the Office 2007 suite can be difficult to figure out since Microsoft is offering so many different versions of the suite. Generally speaking, that's a good thing since it allows you to buy a configuration that best suits your needs without paying for a lot of applications you won't use.

Indeed, Microsoft plans to deliver Office 2007 in seven different packages. The Basic version — which includes only Word, Outlook and Excel — is available only preloaded on a new PC. Next, the Home and Student version drops Outlook from the Basic package but picks up OneNote, Microsoft's nifty note-management program, for a list price of $149.

Office Standard costs $399 (upgrade is $239) and it offers the same programs as Basic with the addition of PowerPoint. From this point, as you move up the product ladder, each version adds work-group tools ... and a higher price tag. The Professional version costs $499 (upgrade is $329) and, in addition to the previously mentioned programs, includes the Microsoft Access database and the Business Contact Manager add-on to Outlook.

In addition to the price of Office itself, remember that you may incur other costs for upgrading your operating system and hardware. Office 2007 will run only run on Windows XP and the new Vista operating system, also expected in broad distribution early next year. If you're using earlier versions of Windows, you may need to upgrade your hardware to run either of those operating systems.

Finally, for those who feel time is money, be aware that moving to Office 2007 will require considerable time in training.

The differences between Office 2007 and earlier versions are significantly greater than with previous new releases and it's going to take most users several days to get back up to full productivity.

Patrick Marshall writes the weekly Q&A column in Personal Technology.