Microsoft Office 2010
Microsoft Office 2010 Overview
Office 2010 has many new features that make an upgrade worthwhile—Web Apps is an online companion to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, and OneNote allows the user to do light editing and share documents from anywhere by using the Internet. Add Office Mobile 2010 and you can use your smart phone to access your documents (must be a phone running Windows Mobile 6.5 or greater). Office 2010 also includes some great collaborative features that allow people to coauthor and communicate while editing a Word or PowerPoint document or work in OneNote in real time. If such features are important to you or you work with graphically rich or very large documents, Office 2010 could provide a great productivity boost. Listed below is just a small sample of some of the features available with Office 2010.
Office 2010 Editions
Order Office 2010 Home and Student With Media (Licenses for 3 computers) — includes Word (word processing), Excel (spreadsheet), PowerPoint (presentation), and OneNote (organizer) – $149.99
Order Office 2010 Home and Business With Media (License for 1 computer) — includes everything in Office Home and Student plus Outlook (email client) – $279.99
Order Office 2010 Professional With Media (License for 1 computer) —includes everything in Office Home and Business plus Publisher (desktop publishing) and Access (database) – $499.99
If you are purchasing a new PC, it should be preloaded with Office 2010 (be sure to ask). You then purchase a Product Key Card (PKC) that has a code to unlock the edition you want. If you are upgrading an existing computer or loading Office on a PC that is not preloaded with Office 2010, you purchase the Full Packaged Product that includes the disk media. There is no discount for an upgrade.
Order Office 2010 Home and Student Product Key Card (Licenses for 3 computers) – $119.99
Order Office 2010 Home and Business Product Key Card (License for 1 computer) – $199.99
Order Office 2010 Professional Product Key Card (License for 1 computer) – $349.99
Office 2010 System Requirements
If you are using Office 2003 or Office 2007, your hardware meets the minimum requirements for upgrading to Office 2010. If you are using Office 2000 or Office XP, you should make sure your hardware meets the system requirements. Minimum requirements are shown below, but better performance can be achieved by exceeding these standards.
Processor: 500 MHz or greater
RAM: 512 MB or greater
Hard Disk: 3 GB or greater
Display: 1024X576 or higher resolution
Operating System: Window XP SP3, Windows Vista SP1, Windows 7
Office 2010 Features
WORD FEATURES
Word Text Effects—offers new formatting for text with such effects as reflection, glow, and shadow
SmartArt—transforms bulleted lists into stunning visuals
Document Map—See your entire document in outline form in a sidebar. You can rearrange, delete, or add sections from the outline. You can use the search feature to search for words or phrases, with every occurrence being highlighted. You can also view your search results in a thumbnail, section, or phrase view.
Insert Screenshot—insert screenshots in Word without leaving the program and still preserve the formatting
Background Removal Tool—removes unwanted background in photos
OpenType—numbers now match their uppercase and lowercase counterparts; for example, the number “2” is the same height as a lowercase “a”
EXCEL FEATURES
Excel Slicers—this feature adds drill-down capabilities, allowing a user to check the data that underlies a cell in a worksheet
Excel Sparklines—this option creates tiny line graphs in a particular cell of your spreadsheet for better analysis of trends
64-bit Edition—for those who work with large spreadsheets, this feature will greatly enhance performance and let you create even larger documents
POWERPOINT FEATURES
Photo Editing—crop and edit your pictures without needing additional software
Dynamic Slide Transitions—add animation, transitions, and graphics that are similar to the quality you would see on TV
Broadcast PowerPoint Presentations—so that people can view your presentations on the Internet, even if they do not have PowerPoint installed
SmartArt—adds templates to create graphics for your presentations, such as organizational charts, lists, and picture diagrams
Embed Online Video—embed your own videos into your slides or use videos from websites such as YouTube
Video Editing Tool—trim videos you wish to display on a slide without any additional software
Save Presentations as Video—in a WMV format and share them with anyone via email, the Internet, or on a DVD
OUTLOOK FEATURES
Conversation View—condenses and categorizes email conversations to combat information overload
Clean Up Conversations—consolidate and trim repetitive messages
Quick Steps—save time by executing commands such as reply, delete, and move these to a folder with just a single click
Manage and Synchronize—manage emails from multiple mailboxes and synchronize multiple accounts from such services as Hotmail and Gmail
Calendar—send your schedule to others, view multiple calendars, and save frequently used groups of calendars
SmartArt—is a graphics and photo editing tool that spices up your emails
Office Communicator—enables you to initiate an instant message or voice call without leaving Outlook
ACCESS FEATURES
Internet Access—allows users to open Web forms with a browser, and changes are automatically synchronized
Expression Builder—makes it faster and easier to build logic and expressions in your database
Macro Designer—makes it easier to create, edit, and automate database logic
Reuse Database Parts—built by others in your database
POWERPOINT FEATURES
Easier Alignment—of images and text boxes in your publication
Printing Enhancements—lets you see exactly how your publication will look when printed
Templates—hundreds of customizable templates that can be downloaded from the Microsoft Office website
Customer Lists—from Excel, Outlook, and Word can be combined and managed within PowerPoint
ONENOTE FEATURES
OneNote gives you one place to store and share your notes, ideas, thoughts, emails, meetings, audio and video clips, and Internet links. This program solves the problem of not having anyplace to store random data that can later be organized into useful information. Like a physical notebook, data is recorded on pages, and tabs are used for organization. A separate notebook is created for each subject. Unlike a physical notebook, many people can record information simultaneously, and it can be accessed from almost anywhere by using the Internet or your mobile phone. It is also easy to search and reorganize data into useful information. OneNote 2010 adds the following features:
Availability—OneNote is always available, whether you are working in Word or PowerPoint or surfing the Web.
Coauthoring—When working with many users, any changes made since you last accessed a notebook will be highlighted, with version tracking shown by date and author.
Searching—Search results are now shown as you type, and a new learning system remembers past selections for faster information retrieval.