Microsoft hosts secret installation files for Microsoft Office 2011 for Macintosh as well. After pulling almost all other direct downloads, the Office 2011 downloads are among the few remaining ones.
Office Mac 2011 Download
Microsoft has taken down all previous and current download servers (msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net, msft.digitalrivercontent.net, digitalrivercontent.net and drcdn.blob.core.windows.net)! For Office 2011, we were able to find an alternative legitimate download channel.
When starting the installation, you will be provided the choice whether to install the full version of Office 2011 using a product key, or to install a trial edition. If you select the trial edition here, you can evaluate Office 2011 up to 30 days.
Should you want to use Office 2011 permanently, and don't own a product key yet, you can order it from an online retailer such as Amazon or eBay. As with all other Microsoft Office versions, the language of the key purchase has no effect on the activation. It can activate all language editions. Here are some purchase links:
Co-authoring allows you to save time and simplify your work by allowing you to edit the same Word document or PowerPoint presentation at the same time as others in different locations who are using Office 2011 on a Mac or Office 2010 on Windows. (Co-authoring requires Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 for enterprise use, or a free Windows Live ID for personal use, to save and access files via Windows Live SkyDrive.)
Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 offers a solid update to the Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and the other members of the productivity suite. Though the latest package is still not on par with the Windows version (you get only the four main programs--a big difference when you consider the Windows version has 10), Microsoft made a big leap with this latest version for the Mac in several other ways. Not only has it nearly reached feature parity (and cross compatibility) with the Mac counterparts to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, but it has finally added Outlook, the e-mail and scheduling client Mac business fans have been clamoring for for years.
Once we dug deep into the feature set of Office 2011 for Mac, we saw there were several enhancements that made the whole suite better, and some of the niftier tweaks are even Mac-exclusive. Certainly many Mac users will look first at Apple's iWork for a productivity suite, and it is a great office suite in its own right. But if you work with primarily Windows users who use Office, it's tough to beat the automatic compatibility of using the same programs. Add the ease of compatibility with a strong feature set across the entire suite and you have a desktop office package that's almost a must-have in both large and small businesses, and even home productivity settings.
All of the new tweaks to the interface and each of the apps in the suite make Office 2011 for Mac a great option, but with the rise of cloud-based computing and online office suites like Google Docs, we wonder how long the big desktop apps like Office will remain on top. This latest Office client for Mac is definitely a solid offering, but how long can Microsoft hold on to its dominance?
Office 2011 for Mac editions We reviewed Office 2011 Home and Business, which costs $199 for a single install or $279 for three installs if you want to put it on three computers at home or work. This suite includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. If you don't need a business-level desktop e-mail client, you should opt for the Home and Student version (at $119 for a single install and $149 for three installs), which includes just Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Unfortunately, there is no upgrade pricing for Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac because Microsoft found that most people buy Office when they buy a new computer and there was little interest in carrying upgrades at retail outlets.
Setup The installation for Office 2011 for Mac is quite painless. Just like any other software, you'll be asked for permission to make changes to your system, then it's only about 10 minutes install time (depending on the speed of your Mac). Like a lot of software these days, you'll need to have at least Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard to use all the features in the Office 2011 suite.
Interface The Ribbon has returned as the unifying interface component across all the apps in the suite. Though Microsoft has met some resistance from users on both platforms for this particular feature, we think once people get used to the flexibility of the Ribbon it will save them an enormous amount of time. Rather than digging through menus and scrolling through palettes, the Ribbon uses tabs that display commands relevant to a given task. As an example, clicking on an image in Word, PowerPoint, or Excel will change the tabs in the Ribbon to image-related tasks so you can make changes quickly without having to search through menus. If you still just can't get used to the Ribbon, in Office 2011 for Mac, you can turn it off and use regular drop-down menus (an option that several Windows users probably wish they had). Still, we recommend taking the time to learn the Ribbon as an investment that will save you more time in the future.
Template galleries One of the great things about today's office suites is that, with most documents, you don't have to start from scratch. Office 2011 for Mac features an enormous number of templates in the Template Galleries for Word, PowerPoint, and Excel. Choose among great-looking resumes and newsletters, complex photo catalogs, and calendar layouts, which let you fill in your information without the need for extra formatting. Even if the selection in Office 2011 doesn't have what you're looking for, you can browse more than 10,000 user-generated templates and filter by category or keywords to get exactly what you want. From there you can make customizations to your template to make the project your own. We particularly like the ability to mouse-over templates to view multiple-page layouts; it saves you a lot of time to not have to open each template to see what type of elements are used on each page.
New features Alongside interface enhancements like the Ribbon across all four Office applications, Microsoft Office 2011 offers a number of features that should reduce the time you spend gathering information so you can spend more time on getting the project done. The new Conversation View in Outlook collapses e-mail threads so you can view the entire conversation without sifting through your in-box, for example. Likewise, new image-editing tools in Word, PowerPoint, and Excel are welcome additions for anyone who works with media in documents and presentations, obviating the need for third-party editors in most situations. Many of the new features and tools help you push your presentations and documents away from the usual bullet points and toward more-engaging visual presentations.
Outlook 2011 With Outlook now available in Office 2011, several features are now available to Mac users that used to require separate (and often not fully compatible) software solutions for previous versions. Now, with a connection to Exchange Server (2007 or later), Mac users will be able to use global address books, set up meetings and send meeting requests, and check the availability of attendees on calendars. Like the latest Windows version of Outlook, Conversation View is now available for Mac making it easy to find older messages in a thread by putting them together in one place. You also can click an arrow on the left edge of the in-box item to instantly expand a thread into conversation view. According to Microsoft, this feature has gotten a mixed reaction from users, but we think once people get used to grouping e-mail threads together in Conversation View, it will save them a lot of time.
Some of the strengths of using Outlook in the workplace are the scheduling tools that let you map out your workday. In Outlook 2011 for Mac, some helpful new features include the ability to preview your calendar directly from a meeting invitation to see if you're available to attend. A small preview window shows up in the lower right of an invite showing what you have scheduled around that time. You'll also be able to stay on top of your busy schedule with the My Day window that lets you view upcoming appointments. Both of these features are great time-savers because you won't need to open your full calendar each time you need to check your schedule.
PowerPoint 2011 Microsoft's PowerPoint is a mainstay for business meetings and now has added features to make it easy to create engaging visual presentations rather than the usual boring bullet points.
An improved Presenter view in PowerPoint 2011 gives you all the tools you need to pull off a flawless performance. As your audience watches, you'll be able to view the current slide, see what slide is coming up next, view personal notes for each slide, see the elapsed time for your presentation, and stay on target with a progress bar to show where you are in your presentation.
Better slide transitions and animations in Office 2011 for Mac make it easy to create a pro-level presentation with new 3D effects, and a new tab in the Ribbon dedicated to Transitions keep them close at hand for on-the-spot changes.
Possibly the best-looking feature of all in PowerPoint 2011 is exclusive to the Mac version of Office and very useful for managing complex slides. Now when you create a slide that includes several graphical elements, you'll be able to use Dynamic Reordering to move objects between layers. By choosing Dynamic Reordering in the Arrange menu, you're able to look at graphical elements of your slide in a 3D layered view, allowing you to move elements toward the front or back by clicking and dragging them to your preferred location. These features are available in Word 2011 as well, and will be very useful for managing graphically complex newsletters or brochures with several graphical elements. 2ff7e9595c
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