Opening Office Documents with other programs

[Magsmom]

I recently experienced my first ever hard drive crash. Fortuneately, I had
been backing up "My Documents" folder by simply copying the entire folder
onto an external hard drive instead of using a back up program, which would
have been on the crashed drive, and therefore unable to restore those files.

Prior to my retirement, I had used Microsoft office because that's what I
used at work. I decided to get a new computer, which had Vista OS which
rejected my older version of Office, but came with Microsoft works. I didn't
want to spend the money to buy the newer Office version that would work on
Vista because since I was retired, I no longer needed that particular program.

I found that I could use Works to open those older documents that I had
saved on my external hard drive, but only in "read only" mode. However, once
opened, I could do "save as" into a works format. Then I could open the
works formatted file and edit it if necessary. I think that some
sophisticated formatting could be lost in the transition, but the data would
be there. That's nice to know.

 

[DL]

All versions of Office can be installed on Vista, allthough pre Office 2003
may have issues with, most notably Outlook
You have to uninstall any trial version of Office prior to installing any
paid for vrsion

 

[Bob I]

It's also possible she has an OEM version which would balk at being
installed.

 

[DL]

Apparently not in this case, as her other post in another group staes she
has installed Outlook 2003, from her cd

 

[Bob I]

That set of symptoms may be the result of having a Trial version of Home
and Student on the PC.

 

[DL]

Her other post is just as confusing in that she mentions 2 PC's, an old &
new one