Wind 8 - No experience of previous windows help please

prowla

macman wrote: »

The chance that a school is running Office 2003 on a virtual machine over OSX or Linux is fairly negligible...

Sure, but the point is that it is Office 2003 that is the required item, so that would give the OP the option of running the exact software on their existing Mac laptop rather than buying a new one.

MollyJoe

prowla wrote: »

Sure, but the point is that it is Office 2003 that is the required item, so that would give the OP the option of running the exact software on their existing Mac laptop rather than buying a new one.

Thank you but my son wanted his own as his present from Santa, not that we are buying solely for school work.

It will be used for the internet etc.

Lum

If the school is running Office 2003 then they are probably still running Windows XP. Both of these are ancient and nearly obsolete.

Office 2003 is particularly problematic because the UI in office changed drastically with the next version (Office 2007) and it is unlikely they are going to go back to it any time soon. I'd be worried that your son is being taught to use something that simply wont exist by the time he finishes school.


But I'm getting a little off topic here, since Both Windows 7 and Windows 8 are going to be a noticeable change from what is on the school machines, may as well go with Windows 8, it'll be around for longer.

prowla

MollyJoe wrote: »

Thank you but my son wanted his own as his present from Santa, not that we are buying solely for school work.

It will be used for the internet etc.

Aha - scope creep!:)

Pretty much any current machine will do internet and run Office (2003) perfectly adequately.

The gotcha is if DS then wants to play some more intensive games; that's when things get more complicated (dedicated graphics and so-on).

One other consideration is where you will get Office 2003 from, and which version (for instance "Pro" includes the Access database).

MollyJoe

prowla wrote: »

Aha - scope creep!:)

Pretty much any current machine will do internet and run Office (2003) perfectly adequately.

The gotcha is if DS then wants to play some more intensive games; that's when things get more complicated (dedicated graphics and so-on).

One other consideration is where you will get Office 2003 from, and which version (for instance "Pro" includes the Access database).

Hi
He wants to play Minecraft and Football Manager on it.
He has an Xbox already for the more fast games FIFA etc.

A dedicated graphics card was way out of my price range.

I may be misleading the way I have written my original question.

He will use office 2003 while at school as this is what they have, but he won't need to take work from home to school.

I was just worried it would confuse him but I can see now its the operating system that is the difference.

Thank you