When Microsoft Office 2010 was initially released early this year, it was (and still) available as a bundle of several applications packaged together in a ‘suite’. This has always been the way ever since MS Office debuted in 1992. This time around, Microsoft is offering standalone versions of the different component applications that make up the suite.
Microsoft is currently allowing users to download and try out Office Access 2010, Office PowerPoint 2010, Visio Professional 2010, Office Outlook 2010, Project Professional 2010, Office Publisher 2010, and Office OneNote 2010 individually. All the office 2010 components mentioned above are available from the company’s website as trial downloads.
As you might have noticed Word 2010 and Excel 2010 are missing from the list. Customers who want to try out Word 2010 and Excel 2010 will need to download and install one of the suites provided by the company. The remaining components are offered as standalone downloads.
All of the Office 2010 components can also be purchased as standalone applications, and this time, both Word 2010 and Excel 2010 are included. Office Word 2010, Office Excel 2010 Office Access 2010, Office PowerPoint 2010, Office Outlook 2010 and Office Publisher 2010 are each priced at $139.95 while Office OneNote 2010 can be bought at $79.95.
This lets you save a couple of bucks at least. For instance, if you buy the Home and Business edition you pay $279.95 and get Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and Outlook. Then if you throw in Publisher into the shopping cart your checkout price totals $419.90 and you get the equivalent of the Professional edition which is priced at $499.95. That’s a saving of 80 bucks.
But other combination don’t work too well. I don’t see anybody buying only one component like Word 2010 for $139.95 when they could have the Home and Student edition with Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote for only $10 more. Most customers are better off buying one of the bundles put together by Microsoft, as they are guaranteed to get a much better deal compared to purchasing all the components separately.
[via Softpedia]
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