Microsoft Office XP Standard Upgrade [Old Version]

Other products by Microsoft

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B00005A1L2
• Item model number: 021-04753
• Date first available at Amazon.com: February 19, 2001
• Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #7,461 in Software (See Bestsellers in Software)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Review

Microsoft Office XP's empowering document design tools, integration of voice recognition functionality, and impressive network- and Web-based sourcing capabilities should be enough to convince those interested in saving time and consolidating effort to take the leap.

In keeping with Microsoft's much-ballyhooed .NET strategy, Office XP introduces several features that utilize the vast infosphere inhabited by the 21st-century desk jockey. Smart tags beckon underneath recognized objects like misspellings or symbols, offering a stock quote here, a synonym there, or "Would anyone care to configure my auto-correction list?" The task pane looks similar to Microsoft Internet Explorer's Explorer Bar, and acts like an open tool chest pulled up alongside each application in the suite, providing readily configured searches for information or multimedia files. Putting up a team Web site that tracks projects and serves as an information hub requires only the use of one of the included templates, ready to be customized and uploaded to the server.

The Send for Review feature further streamlines the collaborative process by allowing the sender to view revisions made by multiple parties within the framework of the original document. Outlook now features a color-coded calendar and easier meeting management, along with instant messaging and variable e-mail account access. All user system errors can be tracked globally, and then network security settings modified remotely while anti-virus and debugging IT resources are diverted accordingly.

After firing up Microsoft Word, typing "Dear Somebody," and hitting the Enter key, we made a startling discovery. Up popped Clippy, Microsoft's publicly pink-slipped office assistant. Clippy might have aptly announced, "Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated," but instead predictably observed, "It looks like you're writing a letter." Once the groans of disbelief had subsided, we quickly right-clicked and banished Clippy to the silicon ether, presumably forever. --Dominic Johnson

Amazon.com Review

After the most painless installation yet of a Microsoft product, Office XP Standard immediately starts to make a favorable impression. Not only does tighter code mean faster startup and shutdown times for each program, but many smaller tweaks have been introduced to improve functionality across the board.

The focus of this release is on making Office smarter, by providing better collaboration tools for organizations and more customization tools for individual users. The new smart tags are a clever way of automatically matching data in documents to tasks, such as inserting an address when you're writing a letter in Word, or copying and pasting data in Excel. This is extremely welcome, as is the ability to customize AutoCorrect (i.e., choosing which errors you want the program to correct automatically). Also new are task panes, which are essentially a cross between a wizard and the Help system. Using the drop-down menu format, these panes make relevant commands easily available, thus achieving faster results.

In addition to cross-product improvements, each application in the suite has had an overhaul. Outlook has seen many tweaks that improve usability and productivity, notably, AutoCorrect works as you type, and improved ease in setting up mail accounts. Outlook 2002 also includes support for Hotmail, so you can manage this account in the same place as your other e-mail accounts. PowerPoint contains a plethora of enjoyable new effects, including some useful new applications like the organization chart creator. Word and Excel make good use of smart tags and task panes. Some other useful new features include a merge function in Word for incorporating other users' changes, a word count display for those late-night essays, a drop-down menu in Excel with commonly used functions, and an extremely easy-to-use set of diagram creators.

Office XP Standard will improve productivity and results across the entire application suite. The improved functionality, especially with smart tags and task panes, will save users considerable time in creating quality documents. --Colin Neal

See all Product Description

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

39 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Why bother?, June 9, 2001

By A Customer

So I decided to get the latest version of Office and here's what I found:

-I get too few improvements to justify the outrageous price. Everything works about the same, and there's no single improvement that will make you much more productive or convince you that your money was well-spent.

-I have to ask for Microsoft's permission to install the software, move it to another computer when I upgrade, or reinstall the software if I have to reformat the hard drive. (And since I made the mistake of buying a computer with Windows ME, that is a real possibility.)

-The system requirements seem designed to help MS's buddies over at Intel move a whole bunch of Pentuim 4 systems that would otherwise gather dust in warehouses. Of course, if you have a lot of time on your hands, you can use your existing system and spend that time waiting for apps to load.

-The software is still unstable. Sure, I'm less likely to lose data after a crash with this version of the software, but am I the only one who thinks maybe the software shouldn't crash at all? I have thought for a long time that instead of adding dozens of new features with each new release, maybe MS should do a release of Office without new features, but with all of the existing features functional.

Don't waste your money on bug-filled software that doesn't make you significantly more productive.

65 of 73 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Buyer Beware!, June 8, 2001

By A Customer

When I ran OFFICE XP for the first time a message appeared telling me that I could run OFFICE XP only 49 more times without "activating" the software. Activating involves calling Microsoft and getting a code number to type on my PC. I called them and they explained that each time OFFICE XP is installed I will have to call for a new and different code number. If I replace my old PC and want to install OFFICE XP on my new one, I have to call for a code number. If I want to install it on my notebook as well as my desktop PC, I need 2 code numbers. And 2 code numbers is the limit! After requesting 2 activation codes for the same OFFICE XP CD, you are directed to speak with someone at Microsoft who will hear your case and decide if you have a valid reason for requesting a third code! Also note that OFFICE XP looks at your hardware each time you boot. If it detects a major change (new hard drive, new video board, etc...) it will disable itself and require you to call Microsoft for a new activation code. And remember, you only get two codes before you have to explain yourself.

I worry that Microsoft will stop giving these codes out in three or four years telling their customers instead that OFFICE XP is no longer supported and that they should upgrade to OFFICE 2XXX if they want to continue using the product.

I sent mine back to Microsoft for the 30 day money-back guarantee.

39 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars ((((B-L-O-A-T-E-D)))), September 11, 2001

By	TestMagic Inc. (San Francisco, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I've been using this software for about three months now and have installed it on seven or eight different machines that I maintain, and honestly, the best I can say is that the actual upgrade process is very smooth--this Office suite comes on one CD instead of two, it scans for previous versions, offers full installation options, and explains very clearly what it is doing. When I upgraded to Office 2000, the software took upwards of an hour; with XP, the upgrades took from ten to forty minutes, depending on the speed of the machine I was upgrading to.
You will first notice how nice everything looks and the new "Smart Pane," which is supposed to be a window with what Office thinks you will want to do. The contents of this pane include your most recently used documents and options to create new documents.
The menus look a lot like the DHTML effects common on many web sites--menu options are "highlighted" when you mouse over them. A few other things have changed, but the changes are mostly cosmetic.
The Smart Pane, which is really more of a "pain" than a "pane," is obtrusive to me--I am what is called a "power user," i.e., I use MS Office for about four hours a day, rely on it, and am very familiar with it. When I open an application, I want wide, open space. I often close the Smart Pane without using its features, instead opening documents the way I have for years-either by opening them from the Work menu I added or by clicking to them. This Smart Pane is supposed to close when you open something, but sometimes it doesn't, meaning I have to click to close it.
Worse, the Smart Pane automatically opens when you want to do something it thinks requires many options. For example, if I want to modify a style in Word, the Smart Pane appears and offers me myriad options for editing my styles. This whole process of opening the Smart Pane slows everything down (I'm running a Pentium III 933 mHz with 128 mb RAM and a 7200 rpm ultra ATA hard drive with relatively few applications installed; got to keep it clean!!).
Editing styles provides a good example of how bloated the software is. You may recall from Office 2000 that all the styles were either built in or created by the user. Now, however, XP creates new styles based on what it finds in your document. For example, if you have a italicized one of your Heading 1s, XP will show the regular Heading 1 style and the Heading 1 style with italics. Imagine how many such styles you might have in your document; with these new additions, XP has easily doubled or tripled the number of styles I must wade through to get the one I want.
XP slows down every machine it's loaded on. My oldest machine, a Dell Pentium 75 running Win 98, was still chugging along quite nicely, even with Office 2000 installed. Now, however, after I've installed XP on it, it moves so slowly that it's almost laughable-clicked buttons bubble up comically. The worst part is that the computer is much, much slower, even if I'm not using any of the XP applications. I guess there's too much XP stuff now running in the background.
I have a few gripes with Word, many related to printing problems, but one is particularly laughable, typical of Microsoft. Now, when Word crashes, it politely tells you that it has done so and offers to send a report of the problem to Bill. It swears that it won't send any personal data. The first few times I saw this, I thought, sure, why not, send it, maybe it'll help. Hah! Each time, without fail, my computer froze! So, instead of having just one program crash, I ended up with a frozen machine. Remember, I'm primarily using a new, major name machine with little other software installed. Learned not to do that real quick!
There is one change I do like in Word. Since I do a lot of editing for a living, I find the new style of showing comments much better than the previous method. In Office 2000, comments were shown as "sticky notes" that appeared when you moused over them. Now, however, the comments appear as neat rounded squares in the margin. They look good on the screen and they print out well for others to read.
Another major reason I upgraded was because of a fatal flaw in FrontPage 2000. I have detailed more of this problem in my review of FP2002, but essentially, FP2000 could not publish my web site because it was too large. I was hoping that the bundled FP2002 would have fixed that bug. It did, but it has other compatibility issues that MS hasn't been able to resolve with most web hosts.
My relatively low rating is for the upgrade, not for the overall quality of the product. The product, which crashes at least as frequently as Office 2000, seems to be no more functional than its predecessor, meaning that the upgrade is necessary only for those who want to have the latest thing. The best news is that I've learned how to take advantage of MS's support discussion groups. The answers and workarounds I found in those groups were a thousand times more helpful than MS's pitiful Help or canned tech support messages. Again: Don't pay for support-go to their support groups for help first.
In short, this is something of a "non-upgrade," and will most likely cause more problems than it will fix.