Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta testing

MS Office 2010 Beta is now available! After being invited to Beta test I decided to sign up. It comes in both 32bit and 64bit flavours suitable from Windows XP (SP3) right up to Windows 7 (32/64bit). Microsoft say that the 32bit works well for all platforms ... lets see.

This version comes with most of the familiar items: Word, OneNote, InfoPath, PowerPoint, Access, SharePoint Workspace, Outlook, Publisher, Communicator and Excel. The layout has changed and notably the big button on the left top corner has gone. For example, in Word, selecting the File tag gives you this (select image to enlarge):


This is back on the 'Home' tag:

Most Office 2007 users may be pleased to find a fairly familiar layout.

Another feature that has been added that I would describe as a 'Google Doc -ness' , whereby co-authoring is available allowing users to share and edit documents at the same time online, could be a very interesting feature.

Fanciful text effects anyone? :)


A note for those wanting to install the 64bit version. I use Office 2007 and even though Im using 64bit Windows 7 I had this error:


Although Microsoft ask for a clean install for testing, I can report that the 32bit version allows you to install 2010 alongside your existing Office :) Which is what I have done here.

I had one error opening Word for the first time:


But after this, Word open without a hitch, so far so good...

A rather fun element to the Beta testing is the ability to send a screenshot to Microsoft, either choosing to 'Send a Frown' or 'Send a Smile' depending on your experience:


Its still in beta, so lets see how it goes... ;)

Triple boot Windows 7 RC (64bit), Ubuntu and Windows XP

After a relatively successful beta test of Windows 7 and the warning from Microsoft to change to the latest iteration, it was time to try the release candidate...

Ok, how did I do the triple boot?
I already have Windows XP on an old PATA 200Gb Maxtor drive and was reluctant to over write this. The main drive is a SATA 1 Tb Samsung, which I intended to use as a dual boot with Windows 7 and Ubuntu 9.04 (64bit). To start with Microsoft requested a complete clean install of Windows 7 Release Candidate, and considering that I had Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid Ibex) on a dual boot previously, I thought it was time to upgrade both.

The first step was to back up all the important files you need for later. I then used GParted Live 0.3.4, a really excellent (free) Linux based partition tool. I wanted to split the 1Tb drive into 3 partitions, the 'main' partition for windows 7 at ~500Gb and the the other two approximately 250Gb each for Ubuntu and for 'an other' (I'm always looking to test other operating systems).

Just a note on the GParted bit...to save headaches...I found it was in fact easier to format just 2 partitions to NTFS, Ubuntu will work out the partitions later and you are left with the ability to set your final partition to 250Gb with a simple slider ;) (hey presto - 3 partitions). Why? I know you can format any which way using GParted but I found that Ubuntu airs on the side of caution and tries to add another partition if you have already catered for Linux operating systems, its just nice to keep things tidy. After all, I'm going to try to break the software in testing later.

From previous experiences I prefer using the Grub boot loader, advantageously this installs as standard on Ubuntu. This made for an easy decision on installation order, install Windows 7 first then Ubuntu last. The reality? It worked, Ubuntu 9.04 had no problem recognising the old PATA 200Gb (with XP), plus Windows 7, it then installed itself and quite happily set up grub. All that was needed was a simple tweak in Grub to set which operating system boots first, ...enter the terminal and sudo grub.

Grub tips
There are a lot of useful tips on the ubuntu forums and Grub site when I did the install, but recently I found this handy post that simplifies the process. Remember that if you put one 'section' of code above another, that will shift the order closer to the top of the boot loader window. The first section of code (one at the top) always boots first by default (e.g. just below: ## ## End Default Options ##). If you you want to tweak a little further, rename the 'title' to something more meaningful for your purposes.

Windows 7 Beta, any good?

I finally got around to installing Window 7 Beta (64bit) on my home PC and joined the Microsoft beta testers. In a nutshell I am finding it surprisingly good, and importantly very stable. The only issues I found was that the operating system got a little confused between my two on board LANs, nothing that the on board troubleshooter couldn't work out... But this glitch kept re-occurring... One for the Microsoft people to work out on the driver front.

What about using and installing software?
Well all the Microsoft Office 2007 components work beautifully. There was a slight glitch after putting on Adobe Web Standard CS3 suite, as I later discovered that the control panel was not functioning properly. It was all down to Adobe Cue, however disabling this by renaming a file did the trick!

To be fair on Win7 (it is in Beta) and Adobe (only meant for Vista at most) so I was very surprised that so many applications actually worked. All this aside Win7 is in fact a very stable and fast booting/shutting down operating system. Everything Vista was meant to be. So far so good :)