Office 2003 beta gift

[AQUaDeX]

So far colors that have been reported are:

Black

Green

Red

That's all I know for now. Still awaiting mine. :)

apparently they want us to clip that thing on our back packs and then...

free promotion for MS!! :pinch:

[MLapointe]

Well to be honest I can't blame Microsoft for not giving out free copies to its testers. They have so many people signing up for the beta just to get free software and not really doing much and they are the reason why we and myself as good and hard working testers as I've been since my first test of Windows 98SE aren't getting free software. Not that I ever expected it in the first place but now it is way too expensive to send out free software when there are so many testers who post bogus bug reports and how would Microsoft be able to filter those results with true bug posts. This would cost more money to make a list of testers and how many bugs they submit and which ones were bogus and good bug reports. After me saying the above do you think it is worth it too them. I still would like to get office for free but I can understand why they choose what they did send.

[kryptonik]

This is very weird. How come ya'll got a radio and I got a iPod saying MS Office on the back?

[FlishFun Veteran]

This is very weird. How come ya'll got a radio and I got a iPod saying MS Office on the back?

lol An iPod that says MS Office on that back, I'd love to see a pic of that! :rofl:

[kryptonik]

lol An iPod that says MS Office on that back, I'd love to see a pic of that! :rofl:

I'll post one tomorrow or something.... :whistle:

[JnCoKiLLa]

I'll post one tomorrow or something.... :whistle:

I hope i get something like that....I'm still waiting as you can guess

[bluebsh]

I like how only a very few ppl have recieved gifts so far... and no one else in the real tester group (not the 600,000 non-invited testers of course) have recieved anything yet...

[MajorSham]

Gee guys, the last two Microsoft events I went to, I received free copies of Windows XP, and *gasp*, Office 2003 Professional. :) Hell at the Office launch, I got to see Steve Ballmer as well. :) They fed us as well, a cold sandwich, as much soda as we could drink, and a nice red apple. ;)

[KTamas]

https://www.neowin.net/forum/uploads/post-7-1069713257.jpg

So far colors that have been reported are:

Black

Green

Red

That's all I know for now. Still awaiting mine. :)

I dont want to get red, i want black or green.... :whistle:

[cannhawk]

Office 2004 - Software with Style

I don?t normally describe software as sexy but with Microsoft Office 2003, it?s hard to do otherwise. Yes I know, that deploying it across a business will add a string of zeros to your total cost of ownership and might even force you to mortgage your house and sell your children to Microsoft but having Office 2003 sitting smugly on your PC is rather like, well, having the benefit of an expensive Italian mistress, without the grief of being manager of the England football squad.

I?ll leave product reviews to others who have a spare lifetime to find their way around the new Office features and wax lyrical on the subject of XML and digital rights management. I mostly use Word and Outlook, sometimes PowerPoint and occasionally Excel to help me add-up numbers when I run out of fingers. If you happen to subscribe to the theory that the Personal Computer only exists as a platform for Microsoft to develop Office upon, then you have to wonder how much more functionality can be squeezed from the Intel processor before it collapses from nervous exhaustion under the weight of new features.

If you can justify the upgrade, then I think you?ll enjoy the experience, as Office 2003 is finally turning the Personal Computer into something which resembles the Apple Macintosh experience from a usability perspective. Office 2003 seems to have added something that was lacking in Microsoft software in the past and that?s style. The question is of course whether you are prepared to pay more to be stylish?

A word to the wise though and the consequence of close to an hour on the phone with Microsoft support last week. Anti-virus software is causing the company a huge headache. Alright, it?s had to be sympathetic because after all, without it we?re toast on the World Wide Web. However, as I have discovered from hard experience, products such as Norton anti-virus and those from other AV vendors, wrap themselves around the Windows Operating System like a vine. Try and install any new software with AV software loaded in the background and you are likely to come to grief.

So, before you install anything new in future, in Windows XP, run ?MSCONFIG? from the Start box first. Choose selective start-up and turn everything off apart from the ?System.Ini? file. Then go to the services tab and make sure that? Windows Installer? is ticked to ?On?. You should now reboot your system and then when it?s ready again, from the Start box run ?Temp? and ?%Temp%? consecutively and delete all the temporary files that are displayed. You are now ready to install your new software, like Autoroute 2004 or Money 2004, hopefully without any problems. When the installation is finished, go back to MSCONFIG, reselect ?Normal Startup? and restart your system. This process may save you hours of grief in the future.

Returning then to the question of Office 2003. We have been asking for years in Computer Weekly how long Microsoft can continue to build more features into Office and when the public will simply give-up upgrading because the benefit is no longer visible or it?s too expensive. The answer it seems is that Office, like the universe will continue to expand ?ad-infinitum?. It arrived not long after ?The Big Bill? and will continue to fill most of the available space in processors yet to come and in another ten years, I?ll be wondering how I coped without Office 2013 although maybe not my Italian mistress.

http://microsoft_forum.blogspot.com/

Edited November 26, 2003 by cannhawk

[Sim31]

now all them pages was alot of reading for me lol

[mikey1001]

I just thought of a half decent idea. Since the "gift" is a two-bit piece of junk that most of us are insulted at getting for doing hours of work, then when you get yours, go down to your city's local Christmas hamper place, you know, the place that welcomes gifts for kids and food for families, and donate the radio to some child who otherwise would get absolutely nothing for the holidays because he/she lives in poverty. It might make a child happy and most of us are just gonna throw this made in Taiwan thing in a drawer or closet somewhere anyway, so maybe someone can get enjoyment from MS's new cheap policies.

For those that think that MS didn't promise anything so we should shut up and stop complaining, I just want to mention this fairly small company based in Spokane Washington that I did some testing for (http://www.tometasoftware.com/), when their product was released they Fed Ex'd me a check for $250 dollars, US dollars too! At least they know how to show some appreciation for hours of long work.

Anyway, think about the donation idea, I know that's what I'm gonna do.

[DrWatson]

Hey, I've not received my gift yet either but why are people calling the gift "junk" and such. I'm looking forward to getting mine.

I didn't really expect anything for the beta, I learned so much about the product during the beta, that alone is all the reward I need. :)

[DrWatson]

I dont want to get red, i want black or green.... :whistle:

I'm hoping for green or black too, red just isn't my color.

[Winston]

I think the scale of testers this time was just too large to provide free copies, i mean if they only gave it to Beta 1 testers and not Beta 2 testers, then that would be weird as some Beta 1 testers weren't as dedicated at the Beta 2 lot, so lets all end it here, think of it in terms of Office team, you designed the software and have people just using it and getting a early preview anyways, and you just give it away like that? Gees, if you were Bill i don't think you'd be willing to do that, yes you may say yea right if i had that much money i'll give lots of it away, but the fact is you won't once you're rich, your perception would be to want more money, not deplete your profits.

[knightracer]

I just received Office 2003 with my Microsoft Action Pack Subscription. It's definitely worth getting if you qualify for it. It doesn't cost that much either because you get $10,000+ of software for a few hundred. The only catch is that the licenses are good for only a year.

http://members.microsoft.com/partner/sales...tionpackus.aspx

[plasticparadox]

lol An iPod that says MS Office on that back, I'd love to see a pic of that! :rofl:

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebO...x/2.0.7.1.0.5.3

[AmpCoder]

Got my little radio today, its the black/silver one. btw, I was in the B1, B2, and BTR.

[dougkinzinger]

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebO...x/2.0.7.1.0.5.3

Good find. Nice!

[ring0]

they sent me a new bmw z4 roadster with "MS0FF1C3" on the license plates. i win.

[Spartan_X]

I just received Office 2003 with my Microsoft Action Pack Subscription. It's definitely worth getting if you qualify for it. It doesn't cost that much either because you get $10,000+ of software for a few hundred. The only catch is that the licenses are good for only a year.

http://members.microsoft.com/partner/sales...tionpackus.aspx

A friend of mine got an Action Pack from MS but he never got the black binder that appears in the web site, he got a big transparent plastic case. He?s a little worried if he is suppose to get the November update of the Action Pack, his subscription expired last week and he didn?t have the money to renew it.

[knightracer]

He should get email confirmation for the November update. I think I received an email about two weeks prior to receiving the update pack.

[ronaldinho2003]

Today I recieved my gift!!! a blue radio, a small booklet to write notes, including a pen and the proffesional edition of office 2003... The letter that was included there was stated that I was among the 60 most helpfull testers... I was only in Beta 2 and the refresh!!!

I'm so happy..

by the way there's also Onenote 2003 60 day trial included

[AltecXP]

i still havent gotten anything :( but i did get told i would

[bluebsh]

Just got a packadge from them... Office 2003 retail pro.. and the radio thing... i guess they pick your gift by how many good bugs you submitted