It's true: every application in the suite has been improved and tweaked in an effort to make your busy days more efficient, but you'll need to be ready for a learning curve to get accustomed to Office 2010's changes. Playing catch-up and looking forward simultaneously, Microsoft tries, in Office 2010, to remain (or become) the central hub of your working life, letting you use your PC, smartphone, and the Web to make your projects come together more efficiently. Even with the vast user base of Microsoft Office products, with new competitors in the market, Microsoft Office 2010 needed to be good. In that time, Google has become a major player, with its suite of online tools, and even Apple has made inroads with its iWork office suite, though admittedly within a smaller set of computer users. The world has changed plenty since Microsoft introduced Office 2007. Users looking for bare-bones, dead-simple office software should stick with Google's and other online offerings or continue using older Office versions they have already mastered. It normally costs $195.The bottom line: Microsoft Office 2010 is a worthy upgrade for businesses and individual users who need professional-level productivity apps, but it will take some time to get acclimated with the reworked interface. I should note that this deal is for the downloadable version of Office, not a boxed copy, but that's actually a good thing: you'll get it faster.īonus deal: Speaking of dirt-cheap software, SAP is offering its Crystal Presentation Design software (which 'transforms spreadsheets into captivating presentations') absolutely free for a limited time. Needless to say, if you have access to this deal at your company, you should jump on it. Microsoft doesn't even show a price for buying this suite by itself, but the non-Plus version (which lacks InfoPath and SharePoint) lists for $499.99. Office 2010 Professional Plus includes not only Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook, but also Access, InfoPath, OneNote, Publisher, and SharePoint Workspace.

It's all part of Microsoft's Home Use Program, which is described in a bit more detail in the TechNet post, Office 2010 Available via Home Use Program. All you need is a valid work e-mail address and a program code, which your IT admin should be able to provide.

Where can you buy office 2010