Windows Vista Review – Part Six (MY OPINIONS)

Now it is time to give you my opinions in the final part of my Windows Vista Review. My opinions on Vista are varied, there are parts I like and parts I hate, you’ll here about these throughout this review.

 

My Favourite Part of Vista

My favourite part of Windows Vista has to be the new interface, although I am not running Aero itself, the basic interface is a massive improvement although it gets a little confusing sometimes which is the active window because there is little difference between an active and inactive titlebar.

The new start menu looks much better and the sidebar makes the whole user interface look fresh and modern. The black taskbar isn’t as bold as the blue in XP which is good and the new start menu button is a thing of beauty.

 

My Worst Part of Vista

The worst part of Vista for me is the security, I have been using Vista for about 2 and a half weeks now and I am still getting bubbles appearing from my system tray every now and then asking me to look into my security settings, whats wrong? Well, i don’t have automatic updates enabled, I dont want automatic updates enabled.

UAC (or User Account Protection) is, well was, a pain until I turned it off, why should I need to give permission to send a file to my recycle bin, it’s lucky I don’t password protect my area else I would be having to type my password in time and time again.

 

Advantages

So what are the advantages of Vista that are different from Windows XP, well:

• The new aero interface makes your time using the PC more enjoyable although I dont think to many people would keep this theme on because it will slow down their PC to much.
• Search Capabilities, a desktop search program is offered by most large search engines like Google and Ask Jeves, but having it integrated is a lot easier plus it doesn’t slow down your computer like Google Desktop or Windows Live Desktop Search.
• Start Menu Search, this is a great feature, well it was when I started using Vista, now it is really slow, I waited nearly a minute for it to find the program I requested, it would have been quicker using the convential way.
• Bundled applications, there are masses of applications bundled in with Windows Vista meaning that you can carry out most tasks without having to install software.
• Live previews. This is a handy feature which allows you to see a preview of the presentation, spreadsheet etc. in the icon, similar to thumbnails.
• Speech Recognition to control your computer “COMPUTER LIGHTS”, we move into the sci-fi world of Star Trek.

 

Disadvantages

There are many disadvantages to Windows Vista, a few are shown below:

• Driver support is crap, trust me, if you install Vista expect at least 3 or 4 devices not to work, as I say to a lot of people, why not just make it compatible with XP drivers. Oh, and don’t expect to many companies to write Vista driver right away, because not many people will be using it.
• Slow, startup time is ridiculous, expect to be sitting there for at least a minute before doing a single thing, and thats without applications launching at start up (virus checkers and the like).
• You need a decent machine, well that’s what Microsoft says, I’m running it fine on a P3 1GHz with 512MB RAM, 30GB harddrive and only 4MB, yes 4MB of video memory. Obviously, I’m not running Aero so if you want to run it get a bigger graphics card and maybe some more memory.
• Buggy, as you would expect with a new product it has a lot of bugs and problems, but hang on a minute, they have had over 5 years to make this, so there is no excuse this time.
• Installing programs. You will most likely come across programs that wont install, the most famous of these is Nero, you’ll need to get Nero 7 to stand any chance of using it. There are also problems with Norton (apparently).

 

Conclusion

Windows Vista isn’t all bad, I use one computer and on that computer is Windows Vista, it is now the only operating system I use, so it must keep me hanging on somehow. I would however, not recommend it to home and office users yet, if you get a free upgrade then fair enough install it but be prepared to have trouble, I would however, recommend it to computer enthuisiasts like me, because it is so much better than XP.

 

Well that’s it, this was my final part of my Windows Vista review, but keep coming back and look at my other reviews. I have also set up a Windows Vista forum, so go to there and discuss the new OS and if you have any problems with Vista make sure that you post your problem there, you can find it at: http://mswindowsvista.informe.com

Thankyou for reading

 

Simon North, 19th February 2007

Windows Vista Review – Part Five

Windows Vista’s security has massively improved with the introduction of User Account Protection and Windows Defender. However, how annoying is this protection?

 

User Account Protection

User Account Protection is to protect users from themselves, it is designed to stop a user from performing a system task like deleting a file or changing a setting, asking for a password in order to continue a task.

In Linux and Mac OS you are not set up as an administrator unlike in Windows where you have up until now had the option to change or do anything on your system. User Account Protection stops this. You can however turn it off, and you may find that you will end up doing this because of how much it gets in the way, for example, deleting a shortcut off your desktop requires no less than three windows before it finally is deleted.

The way it works is that when you ask the computer to make a system change or install a program, your desktop gets blanked out and a dialog appears asking for your username and password. Only if you input the correct details will the task start.

 

Windows Defender

I mentioned this in a previous part of my Windows Vista Review, but I’ll mention it again, it is aimed at protecting you from malicious software or malware. It is not an anti virus program, I recommend AVG for this, but it does allow you to run a scan of your system for malware.

 

Conclusion

My personal opinions of UAC in Windows Vista is that it gets in the way too much, in Linux it’s out of the way and I feel secure without having to enter a password everytime I want to do something. However, it does secure you very well from yourself and hackers, and most users of Windows don’t actually delve into the system settings anyway, so for most people this is a good thing, for enthusiasts like me, I hate it.

 

Part Six

Part Six will be my final review of Windows Vista, where I conclude my dealings with it, it’s advantages and disadvantages and tell you why or why not to buy it.

 

Simon North, 14th February 2007

Windows Vista Screenshots

Take a look at these 15 screenshots of Windows Vista to give you an idea of what the new OS from Microsoft looks like.

Click here to view screenshots on Flickr

Click here to view Flickr Slideshow of screenshots

 

Simon North, 8th February 2007

Windows Vista Review – Part Four

In this part of my Windows Vista Review I will be looking at the shell of WIndows Vista, this will also include the new system structure.

 

Windows Explorer

The new Windows Explorer has been massively improved with new features and a recharged interface, it is no longer just a place to search through folders to find a file.

Search

A new desktop search has been added to Windows Vista, which makes finding files much easier, you can access it through any Windows Explorer window and it can be found in the top right hand corner. If you don’t know what a desktop search is, it searches all your files content, so for example if you have a letter on your hard drive, you can type in ‘Dear Tom’ and it will find every file with ‘Dear Tom’ inside it. The desktop search shows results as you type so you can access your files quickly and easily.

If you search from an explorer window, it will only search the folders and subfolders from that location (eg, If you are in Documents, it will search just Documents). To access the full system desktop search, select Search from the Start Menu.

 

Location Bar

The location bar has changed in Windows Vista, making it even easier to navigate to your files. This new location bar takes each of folders you have navigated along your way and gives a list of all the subfolders next to it, so that at any point you can go back to a certain folder on the way. The picture above will explain this.

 

Sidebar

The sidebar now gives a list of locations so you can easily navigate to the main loactions on your system such as Documents and Recently Changed. You can access the classic Windows Explorer sidebar with a list of Folders by clicking the folders button at the bottom.

 

Properties Pane

By default this can be seen at the bottom of the window, it gives all the main details of the seleted file(s), or folder information if nothing is selected, it gets rid of the idea of having to right click and select Properties. There is a large version of the icon shown at  the far left and all details are shown in small lists. You can change the size of the Properies pane, the bigger it is, the more information that is shown.

A handy feature of the pane is that you can simply click on say, the title of the document and you can rename it, click Save and it is done, instead of the conventional way of right clicking, selecting Rename and then renaming the file.

 

Icon Views

In Windows XP we saw thumbnails and tiles added to the list of views, now Windows Vista, goes one step forward and offers the ability to show any size of the icon through a slider on the Views menu.

You can also simply click the type of icon view you want, and the Extra Large Icons are very big. What is impressive about the icons is that, they still look good even on the highest icon size.

 

Computer

Now ‘Computer’ rather than ‘My Computer’, you can access all your drives from this point, it can be launched from the Start Menu.

Your harddrives now have a handy progress bar which tells you how much space you have left on your drive without having to go into the properties pane, tasks are seen across the toolbar at the top and the sidebar gives links to the most popular folders. The properties pane at the bottom of the window gives you more indepth information about the drive.

It is easier to use, as is the whole of the new Windows Explorer Shell, with links to the main folders on the sidebar it makes navigating much easier.

 

Folder Structure

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The structure of files have now changed in Windows Vista, no more is there ‘My’ before everything (eg, My Computer), now it is just the word (eg, Computer, Documents etc.).

In previous versions you found My Pictures, My Music and My Videos within your My Documents folder, now they are stored as seperate folders under your user folder.

 

Conclusion

The new shell is great, it is easier to use and enables you to find your files much quicker than before. The sidebar is much better than in Windows XP even if it doesn’t offer as much as it did (this is on the toolbar). The properties pane helps a lot and the option to change details from that makes it even better. Overall, a great improvement on the previous Windows Explorers

 

Next Review

In the next review I will be discussing the security in Windows Vista, as this is one of the ‘main’ improvements in the new OS. Come back soon to read Part Five.

 

Simon North, 8th February 2007

Windows Vista Review – Part Three

In part three of my review on Windows Vista, I am going to look into some of the bundled applications including Windows Media Player and Windows Internet Explorer.

I personally am not very happy about some of the applications included, as a software developer I feel that I will lose out on potential customers because of the included programs such as Windows Photo Gallery, because users of Windows Vista will just use that rather than looking at applications on the internet.

All the same programs see a return in Vista, including good old Notepad, Paint and Sound Recorder. All applications have undergone a new look making it fit in with the rest of the OS.

 

Windows Media Player Version 11

This application is also available to Windows XP SP2 users. The new version is much more attractive and fits in perfectly with the new interface. You can change the tints of the interface as well to customise it to how you want it.

A much improved library makes it easier and quicker to find music. Album Art icons allow you to quickly find an album just like you would on a CD rack. There are plenty of viewing options such as Artist and Genre for better sorting.

A handy back button allows you to go back to the task you were previously doing and all controls are centred at the bottom of the window.

 

Windows Internet Explorer Version 7.0

Again, available to XP SP2 users as well, this new version of the highly popular Internet Explorer offers tabbed browsing, better (but annoying) security, RSS support, better CSS support, advanced printing and fantastic page zooming options.

The new browser claims fantastic security but it is very annoying, if you used IE 6 you may have noticed that annoying yellow bar at the top of the browsing frame, well it returns in full force in IE 7.

IE 6 was behind the times for a long time, this is when my favourite browser, Mozilla Firefox started to get a look in. 6 years later IE 7 was released and many of the features had been around for a number of years including tabbed browsing and RSS feed support.

Better CSS support make pages look much better and the zooming capabilities are much better than any that I have seen previously because IE enlarges everything including images and videos along with the text.

 

Windows Photo Gallery

Windows Photo Gallery is designed to be your main image viewer and has some small fix tools such as red eye removal, adjusting colours, exposures and cropping your images, that is about all you can do in editing, so you may want to buy a dedicated graphics package or take a look at Google Picasa.

Google Picasa is something that I am reminded by when I look at this application because there are parts which look very familiar hmmm…, Microsoft are moving to copy Google now.

You can build a movie using Windows Movie Maker by simply selecting your images and clicking Make a Movie. You can also print or email your images.

Images are sorted into playlists like in Windows Media Player which is what the looks of the application are based on.

The program is perfect for organising, printing, emailing and performing quick fixes on your images, for more advanced editing and organisation I suggest Google Picasa although the application is good enough for most users.

 

Windows Defender

Like Media Player and Internet Explorer, Windows Defender is available for both Windows XP SP2 and Vista. It is designed to protect against malicious and unwanted software (malware), it is not an anti virus software, so make sure that you install something like AVG to ensure maximum protection.

The application is simple to use and sticks close to the Windows Vista theme. You can perform a scan of your system which is quick and thorough, and there is also a handy software explorer so that you can see in depth details about currently running applications.

 

Accessories

All the main accessory programs like Paint, Notepad and Calculator return in Windows Vista, all sporting the new Vista interface, Paint seems to have gone through a nice upgrade with a move around of controls and much better zooming capabilities.

There are many more accessories included in Windows Vista, along with the sidebar there are better system tools like backing up facilities and the Welcome centre.

 

Conclusion

I have just looked at the main bundled programs in Windows Vista, there are more such as Windows Movie Maker and Windows Media Centre (available in higher end versions). I am glad to see that Paint has been improved as it is very popular for simple image tasks, it is little updates which make Windows Vista much better than previous versions.

 

Next Part

In the next part of my review of Windows Vista I am going to look into the shell of Windows Vista including the new file structure and Windows Explorer. So come back soon to read part four.

 

Simon North, 6th February 2007

Windows Vista Review – Part Two

In the next part of this review I will go into detail on sets of features within Windows Vista. Part Two will talk about the interface and its looks.

As I said in part one, I am not currently running the Aero Interface but I will still review it for you. I would like to point out that your computer must have a DirectX 9.0 3D graphics card of at least 64MB, 128MB is recommended.

Windows

The new windows look much better, the titlebar and sides of the window are all semi-translucent and you can change the tint of the glass effect and transparency so you can tailor it to how you want it.

Opening, closing and minimizing effects look beautiful as it smoothly fades out.

New titlebar buttons glow as you hover over them which makes the whole windows look much better. Microsoft’s take on the windows is that rather than focusing on the bold windows borders like in Windows XP, you are focusing on the content inside that window.

Flip and Flip 3D

This is a more advanced feature based on the Alt + Tab function in previous editions of Windows (if you don’t know what Alt + Tab do, it switches between open windows).

Flip is based on the old style Alt + Tab, a simple bar appears and you choose the window by pressing Tab until you find the window. There are however, some differences. Obviously, the back of the windows adopts the glass effect. Also, when you press Tab the list of open applications smoothly moves to the next.

Flip 3D is the more advanced version of Flip, you may have seen this in adverts for Windows Vista because it is such an impressive feature to look at. So what does it do? Well, it takes all of the open windows and stacks them at an angle, as you move between them, the next active window comes to the top and the whole things looks professional and attractive, although I don’t see why many people would use it, most people will just use Alt + Tab (or Flip) for quickness.

Windows Sidebar

Windows Sidebar went through many stages throughout the 5 or 6 years of Vista development, from being included, to not, to being included again but not as a default part of the OS, rather just an Accessory program.

The sidebar is a bit low on options, you can set it to start with windows, but you have to either choose it to appear over the top of your windows or just on the desktop, however if you have it on top then your windows are a lot smaller, really I think that MS should have included an auto hide function.

The sidebar is just seen as a base where you can add gadgets. These are very small applications that carry out simple functions like tell the time, news headlines and search the internet. You can download more gadgets from the Windows Live Gallery and you can add, remove and rearrange your gadgets as you want to. You can also drag your gadgets on to the desktop and use them like Mac’s widgets.

Start Menu

The new start menu looks much better, if you are running Aero then you will get a transparent effect similar to the glass look on your windows. Menus have now disappeared and you now simply choose your application from the list which uses a treelike interface, or you could just use Start search, which I will go into more detail in a later part.

The start menu “orb” looks better than previous start buttons with a sphere look so that it sticks out from the taskbar.

Now as you hover over a function on the right hand side, your user account image smoothly changes to the icon of the task hovered over. There are also new buttons to shut down, restart, logoff etc. but there is a button simly dedicated to shut down your computer without any messages asking what you want to do, you simply click the button and your computer will shut itself down.

Desktop Backgrounds

This is only a small feature of Windows Vista, however it is worth a simple note, the new wallpapers look brilliant and with so many available you will be spoilt for choice. Screensavers are also good but you will need a good graphics card to run them. There is only two main themes, Windows Aero and Windows Basic, although Windows Aero can be customised. There is also the old Windows themes like Windows Classic.

Icons

Icons can now be different sizes, you can have large, medium or small icons on your desktop, and when you hover over them a filter is added on top which is personally a bit annoying. The icons themselves have also improved immensely, they look much better than in previous versions, for example in the folders icon the files in that folder are sort of shown within the icon, you can see this in the image opposite.

Windows Basic Interface

In earlier builds of the OS the basic interface was rubbish and you felt punished for using it, however in the final build it is much better, it bears resemblance to both the Aero interface and the previous Windows XP. You don’t get the glass effects but you still get a more attractive interface with professional effects and icons. If you do not have the appropriate graphics card installed then this will become your interface, I am running Vista with an AGP 4MB card, so you don’t need much.

Conclusion

Windows Vista has massively improved in it’s looks, it is now black rather than blue and everything in the OS looks graphically better, even when you copy or delete a file the dialog box that appears has a brilliant animation to it. Even if you cannot run Windows Aero, Windows Basic interface works brilliantly and you will still notice significantly better looks.

Next Review…

In Part Three of Windows Vista Review from Tech Review Zone, I will go into detail with Windows Vista’s applications and program support. Check back soon to read part 3.

Simon North, 5th February 2007

Some pictures have been taken from www.windowsvista.com.

Windows Vista Review – Part One

Windows Vista is the “next generation” operating system from Microsoft, well that’s what they say. The “WOW” starts now is their new tagline, so does it really? I am going to review the new and rather expensive offering from the biggest computing company in the world.

Microsoft say that they are hoping for Windows Vista to be installed on 100 million computers by the end of 2007, but the people that I have discussed Windows VIsta with, all say the same thing, they’ll buy it when SP1 (codenamed, Windows Figi) is released, this will get rid of all the bugs in the system, of which there are a lot.

For a start, if you think there is fantastic driver support, then think again, when I installed Vista there were 4 drivers missing, OK, go online and get some new drivers, but the Ethernet card driver is missing, I cannot get on the internet. I finally get a driver for the network card and out of three I tried only one worked. Driver support isn’t good, I think you can establish that and this is one of the main reasons why people are reluctant to upgrade, after all why couldn’t MS just offer support for XP drivers.

Installing has its problems as well, I started an upgrade from XP Professional SP2 at about 8:30 at night, I ended the setup at about 11:45 after I wanted to go to sleep. I get up the next morning and turn on the computer only to have it say there was a problem and it was restoring to XP, over three hours of my time and electricity disappearing before my very eyes. I would like to point out that the clean install that I did the following night finished in just over an hour.

I’ve had my moan now, so lets start to point out some of the good parts of Windows Vista.

It looks great, my computer cannot run the new Aero interface at the moment, but the basic interface works a treat. The user interface is very similar to Windows XP with the taskbar and desktop setup. A new addition is the Windows sidebar which allows you to add widgets (sorry, gadgets) which you can download from the internet, these include things like live feeds and news and weather.

Microsoft keep pointing out that Windows Vista is more productive enabling you to carry out tasks quicker and more effectively, with features like desktop search and start search. You can now launch any application or file on your computer by simply typing in the title of the file in the start menu. As you type, search results will start appearing as soon as the file you want to open is at the top of the list, simple press Enter and it will open.

That is all for part one, I will go into more detail of the many features in Microsoft Windows Vista in the following parts, including the security, the new interface, new applications and better organisation. So keep coming back for new parts and why not subscribe to the RSS feed.

Simon North, 4th February 2007

Windows Live Writer Beta

Windows Live Writer is designed to enable bloggers of any blogging service, be it blogger, wordpress, spaces etc. to update their blog, add new posts and edit posts quickly and simply from a small WYSISYG application rather than having to go into the dashboard and add a new post.

There are also more options that may well not be available on your blog posting area, such as font colours and bulleting and numbering. You can add links, pictures, keywords. tags and maps into your post as well as change the post’s properties (allow commenting etc.). You can edit your images and add filters as well as change fonts, font colours and bulleting and numbering and even spell check your post. You can save a draft and publish it all from one simple window.

Editing your previous posts is simple, you just have to click Open Post on the File menu and choose the post you want to change, once finished editing simply click Publish. You can save your post as a draft and come back to it later by clicking the title in the Draft’s section on the sidebar which give you links to some of he main features of the program.

You can add a category (if your blogging service uses them) to your post by choosing the appropriate category from a drop down menu. You can also add tags from the most popular tag providers including ‘43 Things’ and ‘del.icio.us’.

You can add effects to your image and align them to the left, right or inline. You can add a drop shadow or photopaper effect as well as filters like ‘black and white’ and ’sharpening’. You can also define what size you want it either by inputting the pixel size or choosing from small, medium, large or original. You can change link and alternative text.

The application is perfect for bloggers of any size, whether you have one blog or 20 blogs (you have support for multiple blogs), it can save you masses of time and you can add extra options that are not available by your blogging service. You can download it now from http://windowslivewriter.spaces.live.com/.

Simon North, 28th January 2007

Microsoft Office 2007 Review

The first time I used the new version of Office was when it was in Beta 2 stage and there were a lot of things wrong with it, the main one was the slowness that came with a recharged user interface. There was also inconsistency between the applications with a handful of the suite using the new interface, and it is sad to report that it is still slow, you certainly cannot run one of the new Microsoft Office applications whilst running something like Flash or Visual Studio.

However, it isn’t all bad. The new interface is beautiful, you can choose from three colour schemes, black, blue or silver and the new ribbon style menu and toolbar replacement, works a treat and was pretty easy to start using. The tools are situated under the right tab, so if you want to insert a picture you’ll find the insert picture option under the Insert tab.

Ribbon

The ribbon is a new strip similar to a tab control at the top of the application, this removes the idea of menus and toolbars which is a step forward in user interface design and you may well see this in a lot of applications in the coming years. To use a tool (of which there are over 1500 in this version) you simply click the relevant tab, so for example you want to add a header, you will click Insert and then click the Header option. Now this doesn’t mean that you have 20 tabs on the ribbon because that would make it very confusing. Instead you have just the main tabs and then when you click on say, a picture, the picture tab will appear at the end. When you click off the picture the tab disappears, called ‘Contextual tabs’, this removes the idea of having a WordArt toolbar or Picture toolbar on your work area whilst your not actually working with an image.

Toolbars
Toolbars haven’t totally disappeared. If you select some text on a document then a semi translucent toolbar appears just above the text. But unlike in previous versions, this toolbar doesn’t get in your way, if you don’t want it then simply move your cursor away from it and it will disappear. If you want it again then hover over it, the closer you are to it the more opaque it becomes. This idea is certainly a gift from Microsoft and it proves that they do listen to the customer (occasionally).

Main Menu (Office button)
There is just one menu on the new office and this can be found in the top left hand corner, this acts as a kind of File menu and gives you all the options to save, print, publish and send. It is a large area which can be seen by clicking the Office button in the top left hand corner. As you hover over a command, a list of options will appear on the right.

Live Preview
Live Previews have been around for a long time in some applications and now they make their way into Office and I must say it is a great idea. To explain this I will use an example. I have some text which its font is set as Arial, I want it to become Verdana so I highlight the text and click on the drop down menu for the font on the Home tab. I hover over Verdana and the text font turns to Verdana, I haven’t clicked anything at this point, this gives me a ‘live preview’ of what it will look like. This feature is not just for text, you can use it for images, tables, text boxes, shapes etc. and it certainly speeds up the time it takes to perform a task. It is a perfect addition to Office 2007.

New File Formats
A new file format has been introduced into Microsoft Office 2007, the new format is called Microsoft Office Open XML and is based upon the XML language and uses a zip style for compressing the files to 75% of the size it would be. The new file has a new file extension which is basically the same as the traditional file extension (.doc, .ppt) but with a ‘x’ on the end (.docx, .pptx). Office also supports previous versions of the file format so you can still use the traditional Office 97-2003 filetype.

In the beta builds leading up to the release of Office there was support to export your documents into Adobe’s Portable Document Format (or PDF), this has been removed from the final release due to legal objections from Adobe, however you can install a third party plug in.

Inconsistency
I mentioned this above and I will go into more detail now because it is a serious problem and would really annoy some people. I used Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise for this review and this includes the following programs:

* Microsoft Office Word 2007
* Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007
* Microsoft Office Publisher 2007
* Microsoft Office Access 2007
* Microsoft Office Excel 2007
* Microsoft Office Info Path 2007
* Microsoft Office OneNote 2007
* Microsoft Office Groove 2007
* Microsoft Office Outlook 2007

Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Access all sported the new Office interface, whereas the rest just used a variation of the new interface and in some cases like Publisher it still used the old 2003 interface. Office, since 1997 has created consistency which meant that if someone used Word, for example, they would also be able to use all the other applications in the suite with little effort because they looked and worked in the same way. So for a new Office system that already people are steering well clear of until they need to upgrade because it looks too complicated, the state of this inconsistency within the suite could have a massive impact on the customer. Microsoft’s excuse for the inconsistency is that the applications that use the new interface centre around document authoring meaning that there is a wealth of features which need to be organised in a manner that is user friendly. The applications that lack the interface will be upgraded to the interface in future versions of Office.

Microsoft Word
Microsoft Word has undergone the most changes and it is the centre of the new office. It uses the new user interface and is packed full of great new features in order to help you produce professional documents. Better integration with the new recharged Office Online allows for more templates, updates, clipart and help. The office assistant has finally died due to the massive help that is included with office. New imaging features allows you to add nice looks to your images including, 3D effects, glows, shadows, reflections and bevels.

It includes much better support for blogging allowing you to upload straight to your blog. Blogs that can be uploaded to include the main names like Blogger and Spaces. A perfect addition to the program is the real time word count in the status bar which is perfect for authors and students. Easy zooming by the use of a slider in the status bar eradicates the need for choosing the right size from a drop down menu. There is the ability to add cover pages with customisable fields. A new default font called Calibri makes your documents look modern and professional. You can add styles to pages as well as colour schemes. The main tools can be found on the Home tab of the ribbon and all other tools are on the correct tabs with long informative explanations appearing whenever you hover over an option.

So, Microsoft Office Word 2007, which is regarded the centre of office is fantastic, with new looks and new features it enables you to produce a professional document with little hassle and with little time spent.

Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint is also spoilt with the new interface. Microsoft claim that the new PowePoint makes it easier for you to design and produce professional looknig presentations due to its intuative interface. Microsoft PowerPoint has many new features including new templates, styles, all the user interface features (ribbon, live previews etc.) and finally after all these years, new WordArt. Better imaging tools allows you to create much better looking presentations with the ability to add reflections, glows, shadows, bevels, 3D effects or soft edges to your images. Not much has changed in animating effects, you still have the same slide transistions and item animations.

A new feature that is present in Microsoft PowerPoint called ‘SmartArt’ allows you to produce relationship, workflow, or hierarchy diagrams easily and quickly making producing company styled presentations a much quicker process. There is also the option to create a photo gallery slideshow, this is done automatically as a seperate presentation and all you need to do is add the images you want, perfect for showing your family and friends your holiday pics.

So, Microsoft Office PowerPoint has undertaken a new look and feel and a few new features have been added, but I do feel that there hasn’t been enough development, for example I would have expected new animation effects to make presentations look more unique rather than the traditional checkerboard or blinds animation.

Microsoft Publisher 2007
Microsoft Publisher 2007 doesn’t have the new interface which is a shame, because it is seen as a second rate program in the Office suite, used by very few people either as an extra (people don’t spend hundreds of pounds to produce amateur christmas cards) or for fully fledged graphics designers who would probably use a more suitable DTP package anyway.

Very little has changed in the application and is sports the same traditional menu and toolbar feel of previous versions of Office. The task page however, has had a re-design with nice effects when hovering over choices curtosy of work done in the new user interface. The task page also looks a lot easier to use with a new icon style interface making it quicker to choose and customise your design including setting colour schemes and orientations.

A nice edition to the program that is going to make a lot of users happy is something called the Content Library, this is a type of clipboard which is independant to each publication meaning that you can basically save images and text and use them in other publications by simply dragging and dropping the item from the panel.

There isn’t much to say about Microsoft Publisher, the company hasn’t really put much effort into it, especially because of the Microsoft Expression suite that Microsoft is producing especially for designers.

Microsoft Excel 2007
Microsoft Excel 2007, a spreadsheet application, has been improved with the new user interface. The main focus on Microsoft Excel is to provide everyone with an easy to use application to support their company or personal finances. This is done via the new user interface which has been dramatically improved in order for you to use formulas and graphs easily and quickly. Formatting has also been improved and with live previews you can be much more productive. Graphs now look more professional with new rendering with the use of bevels and other imaging effects seen throughout Office 2007.

Behind the scenes things have changed, limits have been taken off, for example there are over 1,000,000 rows compared to the previous 65,000, memory management has been adapted so that you can run your spreadsheets much faster than the capped memory usage in previous editions.

Microsoft Access 2007
Microsoft has been blessed with the new interface which makes the application much more pleasurable to use, although it still seems more like an application for a professional rather than an amateur computer user, who would probably be best suited to Excel. However, Access does provide plenty of templates to help you get started and does bear resemblance to the previous editions of the application. It has a number of extra features to help you build your databases much quicker and has much better integration with Excel.

Better organisation of the interface allows for much better editing of forms and reports unlike the previous builds which featured multitudes of floating windows which got in your way. A new feature allows you to simply organise fields on a form rather than having to redesign the whole form interface.

The new Access has masssive improvements on version 2003 and it’s much welcomed new design and features will impress regular and even new users of the application.

Everything else
I have detailed the main applications in the Office suite, but there are plenty more depending on which suite you purchase, details are below. Microsoft FrontPage has been discontinued in Office 2007, but you have two different alternatives, part of the Office suite (selected editions) is Sharepoint Designer 2007 which looks and works similar to FrontPage 2003, but it is based on the Sharepoint server, the other alternative is part of Microsoft’s new suite of applications designed for designers called, Microsoft Expression. Microsoft Expression Web, like Sharepoint Designer is similar to FrontPage 2003. New applications and new versions of 2003 applications are also featured in the new office system, including OneNote, Visio, Project, InfoPath and of course Outlook (which features the new interface).

Conclusion
Microsoft Office 2007 has seen significant improvements, the main one being the look and feel of the new interface which will recharge the designing not just of Microsoft applications, but applications from other companies. There is inconsistancy throughout the suite but at least Microsoft have said that they will work on integrating the interface throughout the system. Some programs have seen significant work, whereas others just cosmetics and in some cases not even that. But as much as I put down the new Office, I cannot help but like it and I’m sure you will too. Thankyou for reading

Take a look at my screenshot gallery (Requires Flash Player 8), click here to view.

Simon North, 16th January 2007