Office 365 vs Office 2013

[DogNo1]

I have two new Windows 10 machines so I would like to install MS Office on them. I have a license for Office 2013 that would cover an installation on these two machines. There seem to be two options for buying Office 365: Buying 1TB of storage on One Drive which would include a license for Office 365 on two computers and two tablets or buying Office 365 Home which would give me a license for five computers, five tablets and five phones and include 1TB of storage each for five users. Both sell for about the same price - $99 per year. The Office 365 Home is the better deal but if the version of Office supplied is identical to Office 2013, it would be cheaper for me to buy an additional 100GB on One Drive for $1.99 per month (or $23.88 per year) and use my current Office 2013. Do any of the IT cognoscenti know if there is any difference between the version of Office included with Office 365 and a regular version of Office 2013? Thanks.

[NeverSure]

I don't know the answer, but I'll be danged if I will ever pay Microsoft an annual or monthly fee to use Office. If it ever gets to where 2013 will no longer work for any reason, I don't know what I'll do.

My guess is there will be some kind of a workaround such as an improved Open Office. I can't be the only one who likes to own instead of rent, can I?

[DogNo1]

An implied benefit to the Office 365 subscription is the free upgrade to a newer version of Office when it comes out and the ability to use Office on Demand on machines that are not covered by your subscription. There can always be changes and increased cost for subscription plans though. I got burned by buying a subscription to Bitcasa unlimited storage a few years back only to face a lot of problems and a lost computer when they transitioned to limited storage. I ultimately abandoned my files on Bitcasa so many, many hours of backup from my networked computers were lost.

[ETatBKK]

I use MS Office for decades, and I own standalone licences till Office 2010 Small Business ( 5 licence ), and then I switched to Office 365 Home ( 5 licence ) subscription. feature-wise they are the same.

the core benefits are the flexibility of supporting different computers, iOS and Android devices and the Office On-demand on any computer. 1TB per USER OneDrive storage is just a generous bonus.

the auto update and auto upgrade within the subscription is almost transparent. considering a newer version of Office could be ready within 2015 / 2016; buying an Office 2013 is not so cost effective though.

[Pib]

Microsoft Office 365 is the same as Office 2013, except the MS Office 365 is a subscription based model.

When MS Office 365 installs on your computer it installs as Office 2013 in the start menus and when you cruising around in the some of the Office 365 menus like clicking "About Outlook" or "About Word" where it pops up and tells you about the version you are running, here's a partial snapshot of what my MS Office 365 Office said for Outlook and Word....note where is shows the exact same Version number (i.e, 15.XX....) applies to Office 2013 and MS Office 365 and basically says Office 2013 is part of MSO 2013.

I've used a Microsoft Office 365 5PC subscription now going on 13 months on my three computers...in fact, I just renewed the subscription on 1 Apr 15 (now good to 1 Apr 16) by going to a JIB Computer store here in Bangkok, buying a subscription which they had on sale at Bt1,990 (approx US$61). That works out to a little over $20/year per each of my 3 computers...and I probably going to allow a couple of relatives use/share two other subscription seats which effectively brings the cost per computer down to a little over $12 per year to have the full & latest MS Office suite which includes Outlook, Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Publisher, etc., on 5 computers. When you can utilize at least several of seats of a 5PC subscription it's definitely a good deal to go with MS Office 365 subscription-based model compared to buying a standalone Office suite. Plus, with the subscription based model if say MS comes out with Office 2016, well, you be automatically upgraded to that under your Office 365 subscription where that would not occur if you had the standalone Office...instead you would have to go buy Office 2016.

MS Office 365 also comes in a Personal 1PC version which is about 20% cheaper than the 5PC version, but it can only be on one PC.

Also note that MS Office 365 has different pricing and renewal costs in different regions of the world. Like if you chose the option to do an "automatic" renewal from your Office account a U.S/NorthAmerican version will cost you $99/year...but if you have the MS Office 365 Asia-Pacific (APAC) English version like I just renewed with the Auto Renewal would run you Bt2,499/year (approx US$77). However, you will probably be better off money-wise in getting a new subscription by instead going to your local store, like I did by going to a JIB, and buying a subscription of Bt1,990 ($61) that way. Buying stuff/renewingdirectly from Microsoft will rarely be your lowest cost deal as Microsoft pretty always sells at full retail price where many stores sell at below retail. Yeap, renewing the subscription online via buying from Microsoft may not be the best deal when it comes time to renew the subscription.

Edit: oh yea, with my subscription I also get 60 free "worldwide" Skye minutes per month to call any land/mobile number....that comes in handy when wanting to call back to farangland say to talk to grandma who only has a landline phone (never touched a computer or smartphone in her life with no plans to either)...or just call anyone or a business at their landline/mobile number.

Edited April 3, 2015 by Pib

[kingstonkid]

People actually buy or rent real versions of software

[humqdpf]

In countries with less than efficient/stable Internet, be careful with versions of Office's server platforms on a software as a service basis where Office 365 or parts of it are streamed to your computer as opposed to running on your computer as a stand alone. I have never found a sustainable stable fast Internet service in Thailand (that is not to say that there is one somewhere) and therefore would never use a version of software that relies even in part on streaming to operate properly.

[impulse]

which effectively brings the cost per computer down to a little over $12 per year to have the full & latest MS Office suite which includes Outlook, Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Publisher

You sure there's Access? I was shopping around and it seems to be excluded from most of the consumer priced products. Only available for business pricing ($$$).

[Pib]

In countries with less than efficient/stable Internet, be careful with versions of Office's server platforms on a software as a service basis where Office 365 or parts of it are streamed to your computer as opposed to running on your computer as a stand alone. I have never found a sustainable stable fast Internet service in Thailand (that is not to say that there is one somewhere) and therefore would never use a version of software that relies even in part on streaming to operate properly.

Office 365 downloads/installs to your computer...just like you were installing it from a disc. No internet connection need to use it.

Now, there is also a Office 365 "Online" version which you do "not" need a subscription for but you need the internet connection...just need your Microsoft account to log onto and use.

https://office.live.com/start/default.aspx

[recycler]

I don't know the answer, but I'll be danged if I will ever pay Microsoft an annual or monthly fee to use Office. If it ever gets to where 2013 will no longer work for any reason, I don't know what I'll do.

My guess is there will be some kind of a workaround such as an improved Open Office. I can't be the only one who likes to own instead of rent, can I?

LibreOffice is the best branch of OpenOffice, works fine for me for many years, refuse to support Bill Gates on his global government ideas!

[rotary]

Open Office will do the job for many at zero cost

[Pib]

which effectively brings the cost per computer down to a little over $12 per year to have the full & latest MS Office suite which includes Outlook, Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Publisher

You sure there's Access? I was shopping around and it seems to be excluded from most of the consumer priced products. Only available for business pricing ($$$).

Yes, the Office 365 Home 5PC and Office Personal 1PC includes Access. But if you just look at the packaging/box the subscription comes in it doesn't not mention Access or Publisher which makes some people think it only includes the programs listed on the box. Like go one of below links and look at the box...it does not say Access or Publisher on the box, but scroll down the page and it provides more details on "all" the programs really included. Don't know why Microsoft don't say Access and Publisher right on the box.

MS Website in Thailand

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msapac/th_TH/pdp/Office-365-Home/productID.292114500

MS Website in U.S.A.

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/Office-365-Home/productID.286395000

Like when MS Office 365 Home installed on my computer it created 10 program links under a Office 2013 heading...those 10 links were Access 2013, Excel 2013, Office 2013 Language Preferences, Office 2013 Upload Center, OneNote 2013, Outlook 2013, Powerpoint 2013, Publisher 2013, Send to OneNote 2013, and Word 2013.

And below is a partial snapshot of the Access version installed after opening it and going to the About Access menu.

Here's another snapshot of some of the different versions of MS Office 365 and Office 2013 versions for sale....but it don't show "business" versions which are different at least price-wise.

Edited April 3, 2015 by Pib

[DGS1244]

I would not touch Office 365 with a barge pole. I installed the single version on my computer and when I came to the renewal the cost was going to be greater than going out and buying a new original copy. Depends where you come from etc. When I was trying to renewl I had nothing but problems with Microsoft, they seemed to think I was in the UK and wanted to charge more even though nothing on my computer has even had anything to do with the UK. I also kept referring me to a Thai site that could not be changed into English or any other language.

[Pib]

I would not touch Office 365 with a barge pole. I installed the single version on my computer and when I came to the renewal the cost was going to be greater than going out and buying a new original copy. Depends where you come from etc. When I was trying to renewl I had nothing but problems with Microsoft, they seemed to think I was in the UK and wanted to charge more even though nothing on my computer has even had anything to do with the UK. I also kept referring me to a Thai site that could not be changed into English or any other language.

I expect you had your "Microsoft account" setup for a different region for your first subscription than the 2nd MS Office 365 subscription region your bought.

Example: if your Microsoft account was setup for the UK and you bought a subscription coded for the UK, you could not install a Office 365 Asia-Pacific (APAC) version initially/to renew....or vice versa region-wise. To install the Office 365 APAC version you would need to change your Microsoft region profile to one of the APAC countries like Thailand although you could still keep English as the language. You would also need to set your PC's date/time clock to the Office subscription region you are installing...after it's installed/activated you can set your PC clock to whatever time zone.

Basically, Microsoft has been using software produced for certain regions for many years (as more software companies are increasing doing) in order to reduce piracy and being able to buy their product in one region of the world where the pricing is much lower, have it shipped to your across the world, and then activate it in another country/region of the world where the pricing is say much higher....like some the pricing differences I mentioned above between the U.S. and APAC/Thailand...significantly cheaper in Thailand. Heck, the MS Office 365 APAC pricing is approximately 61% of U.S. pricing just for example.

Basically, some Microsoft software is coded to be activated only in certain regions and the pricing varies among regions. Once activated it can be used anywhere on Earth. Yeap, expect you simply had a region setup conflict.

[DGS1244]

I expect you had your "Microsoft account" setup for a different region for your first subscription than the 2nd MS Office 365 subscription region your bought.

Example: if your Microsoft account was setup for the UK and you bought a subscription coded for the UK, you could not install a Office 365 Asia-Pacific (APAC) version initially/to renew....or vice versa region-wise. To install the Office 365 APAC version you would need to change your Microsoft region profile to one of the APAC countries like Thailand although you could still keep English as the language. You would also need to set your PC's date/time clock to the Office subscription region you are installing...after it's installed/activated you can set your PC clock to whatever time zone.

I hear what you say Pib and I know that problem but the Laptop was purchased at IT City in Thailand, paid in TBaht and has all Thailand purchased software. The computer came with pre-installed windows 8 and I am wondering if IT City use a UK supplied windows??? Any comment you care to make appreciated.

[lostinisaan]

People actually buy or rent real versions of software

+ In my thirteen years of living and working in Thailand I haven't yet seen even one genuine Microsoft, or other program on any of the school computers, nor an any of the administrators' machines.

These circumstances put many of my colleagues and friends in a situation to just follow them, by trying to keep those machines functioning.

Have you ever tried to talk to a school director to buy only genuine computer programs for a whole school?

Which leaves a lot of space for any assumptions.

Edited April 3, 2015 by lostinisaan

[Pib]

I expect you had your "Microsoft account" setup for a different region for your first subscription than the 2nd MS Office 365 subscription region your bought.

Example: if your Microsoft account was setup for the UK and you bought a subscription coded for the UK, you could not install a Office 365 Asia-Pacific (APAC) version initially/to renew....or vice versa region-wise. To install the Office 365 APAC version you would need to change your Microsoft region profile to one of the APAC countries like Thailand although you could still keep English as the language. You would also need to set your PC's date/time clock to the Office subscription region you are installing...after it's installed/activated you can set your PC clock to whatever time zone.

I hear what you say Pib and I know that problem but the Laptop was purchased at IT City in Thailand, paid in TBaht and has all Thailand purchased software. The computer came with pre-installed windows 8 and I am wondering if IT City use a UK supplied windows??? Any comment you care to make appreciated.

Where you bought the computer and what version of Win 8 you have installed (i.e., Win 8 OEM, Win 8 Full, Win 8 US, Win 8 UK, Win 8 Intl (Eng), etc) is not a player regarding activation of the Office 365 subscription.

Apparently what is important is the "Profile Info" you enter when you created your MS Account---not to be confused with MS Office Account because you use your MS Account credentials to log into ether your MS Account or your MS Office account. You might say your MS Office account is joined at the hip with your MS Account...the MS Account provides some key info your MS Office account uses.

Now when setting up your MS Account (not the Office Acct) did you enter info regarding your home country which I think may be the UK. If so, if the MS Office 365 "APAC" version you got at the store (I'm assuming it's APAC) unless maybe the store had some grey market subscription from other regions of the world, then when trying to activate the APAC version it's going to bump that against your MS Account info...."if" you have a UK city, state/region, postal code, UK time zone entered and then this region mismatch may cause a reject in accepting the APAC subscription. Below is a partial snapshot of my MS Account info which I have setup for my living location in Thailand. I've also got another MS Account setup for my US residence.

Now a person don't need two MS Accounts...I just do...because a person can change their location on Earth in their MS Account profile. I do know the APAC subscription I bought in Thailand will not accept against my US MS Account with will for my Thailand MS Account. You can change your MS Account info by logging onto your MS Account and then under Basic Info, Edit Details, Edit you can update your location/time zone on Earth which should match the date/time zone you have setup in your Win 8.

Now if your computer originally started off with a trial version of MS Office 365 then on the MS blog there seems to be quite a few folks who bought their computer in one part of the world, months and months later decided to activate the trial version which of course a may have been a version from one part of the world but the person tries to renew by buying a subscription from another part of the world and then runs into this activation conflict. But I guess if a person renew online at MS prices the problem don't occur because that renewal processes sense the correct version (or maybe a catchall version) to do the renewal.

If nothing else start a online Chat session with MS, from this part of the world you'll be hooked up to Manila, I don't expect you be on Chat hold for more than 5 minutes before a tech rep come online in your Chat, the Manila MS tech reps speak/chat very good English, and they can probably fix you problem unless maybe you bought the wrong region version. They can even take control of your computer if you allow it to check your settings, assist in their troubleshooting. Probably the first thing they do is check the region info you have loaded in your MS Account and the region/date/time setting you have on your Windows. They may even ask you to provide the subscription number so they can confirm it's valid and what region it is for if you now longer have the box the subscription card came in....on the top/side of the box there is a label that will identify the region...like APAC, US, NorthAmerica, or quite a few other possible regions around the world, etc..

A lot of folks badmouth MS tech support but I'd have had excellent results over the years in online chat sessions....sometimes I don't have any problem, but I just starting a chat to get clarification on an issue. So far it's worked great for me...your results may vary.

[Pib]

Take a look at this webpage talking "region" mismatches causing a MS Office 365 subscription not to activate in certain parts of the world. Link

Something to consider if say buying a subscription online like on Ebay, it gets mailed to you in Thailand, the version you bought was say a North America or UK MS Office 365, and then you possibly can't activate in Thailand when combined with online account info settings. However I will say my previous MS Office 365 subscription was a US version that I activated in Thailand but I used my MS Account setup for a US location versus my Thailand/APAC MS Account.

More and more now days software is being sold designated to only be activated in a certain region to reduce piracy ...after it's activated you are good to go anywhere on Earth you may be/travel to....just getting past the activation can be a pain sometimes. The days of software being able to be activated anywhere on Earth are slowly coming to an end as more software companies adopt this regional activation approach combined with info in your online account.

I will say my most recent MS Office 365 I bought at JIB said APAC English on the label....and before buying it at JIB due to lowest price I looked around other stores like BananaIT and all of them said APAC English.

[Pib]

One final note about a MS Office 365 subscription....you get an extra 1TB (1,024GB) OneDrive storage space....the free OneDrive storage space everyone gets with a MS Account is 15GB...a MS Office 365 subscription gives you another 1,024GB (1TB) OneDrive space. I'm not much for storing stuff online so this extra, big storage amount don't really do anything for me...but it's there with my subscription if I want to use it. A snapshot of my total OneDrive storage space follows:

[DogNo1]

I really appreciate all of the very informative posts. I have decided to go with Office 365 Home and to install the version of office that it provides on all of my computers and tablets here. I will only use Office on Demand occasionally so Internet connectivity shouldn't be much of an issue. I would like to caution posters that Office Online only offers dumbed-down versions of Word and Excel so you can't do much with the creating and editing of documents and spreadsheets online. I would like to suggest to Pib that he activate his Camera Roll 15 GB bonus. Photos that you take with your phones and computers will then automatically be uploaded to One Drive and stored there. It's really neat. Also if you install the new One Note Web Clipper, You can clip any web page or selected text and graphics directly to your One Drive. I still use Evernote but the One Note Web Clipper is a contender.

Regarding area versions, the problem in Japan is much worse than in Thailand. Google, Microsoft and others default to web pages in Japanese and sometimes it's a puzzle how to get things switched over to English. Amazon USA and Amazon Japan do not interact. Books bought on Amazon Japan are not viewable on Kindles bought in other countries. Netflix and other content providers are blocked in Japan. Fortunately, the USA Amazon Instant Video works there but only if the Movie or TV episode is rentable. The crackdown on piracy continues though so we may see less video content available in Thailand.

[Anon999]

Save your money and install Open Office 4, it's FREE and totally compatible with MS Office etc, etc. Furthermore it will be genuine s/w! Oracle is a very big provider of s/w including Java.

Check it out before you waste your time and money. You'll wish you changed to Open Office years ago.

Edited April 6, 2015 by Anon999

[Pib]

No shortage of comparisons between the free open office type software (e.g., LibreOffice, Open Office, etc) with the paid MS Office 365/Office 2013 software. Usually the comparisons are pretty basic and fall short in some ways...but depending on a person's software needs, maybe how they may need to interface the software used by their company, etc., a free open office suite combined with a separate free email client vs Outlook can meet a person's needs for word processing, spread sheeting, presentation, and data basing. Nothing wrong with saving money.

http://lifehacker.com/battle-of-the-office-suites-microsoft-office-and-libre-1147940828

Which Suite is Best for You

For the most part, LibreOffice and Microsoft Office have the same suite of software with the exception of one thing: Outlook. LibreOffice doesn't come packed with an email client, so if you need Outlook or an equivalent, you won't find it here. The rest of the suite is pretty similar.

It's pretty obvious that if money is tight, LibreOffice is the office suite for you. Even still, if Microsoft Office isn't actually required at your work (especially with Outlook), LibreOffice has a lot to offer these days. LibreOffice also supports extensions, which means you can customize the look, features, and feel of the suite to suit your needs. Fortunately, the two office suites usually play nice together, so if you want to give LibreOffice a try for a few days you should be able to continue working with documents you've already created in Microsoft Office (though as stated above, you may run into a few small issues).

If LibreOffice doesn't suit your needs, OpenOffice is also worth a look. Both LibreOffice and OpenOffice are built on the same foundation, and while they're relatively similar, LibreOffice has a little bit more of a mass appeal and gets updated more often. If you're sick of dealing with Microsoft or you just don't feel like paying a lot for software, LibreOffice and OpenOffice are both worthy alternatives. It's certainly taken a few years for them to really catch up, but now that they have, Microsoft has something to worry about.

[impulse]

If I were to have to reformat all the graphs and charts I have assembled in Excel, to display correctly in a free Office suite (if that's even possible), the cost to the company would be about 100 x what it costs to keep me in Excel every year.

Just like swapping to Ubuntu (free) would require me to leave behind thousands of hours of experience I have in dealing with Windows and it's stupid idiosyncrasies.

Just because it's free doesn't mean it's cost effective.

[kingstonkid]

People actually buy or rent real versions of software

+ In my thirteen years of living and working in Thailand I haven't yet seen even one genuine Microsoft, or other program on any of the school computers, nor an any of the administrators' machines.

These circumstances put many of my colleagues and friends in a situation to just follow them, by trying to keep those machines functioning.

Have you ever tried to talk to a school director to buy only genuine computer programs for a whole school?

Which leaves a lot of space for any assumptions.

Last school I worked at the students looked after the computers in the classroom. They could not figure out why there was a virus on the computer no matter how many times they reinstalled Windows