what does the 64-bit version of MS Office 2010 have going for it?

September 26, 2010 9:04 AM

What would the 64-bit version of MS Office 2010 get me that the 32-bit version of MS Office 2007 would not?

I have a 64-bit, quad-core processor.

I work with very large spreadsheets and long Word documents.

I am aware of OpenOffice and Google Docs, but this question is not about OO or GoogleDocs but rather MS Office. Assume I am willing to pay for Office 2010 if I want to use it.

And, please, spare me the "get a mac!" comments.

Thanks.

posted by dfriedman to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

It will not necessarily be faster, but the 64 bit versions would be able to deal with extremely large datasets.

If you can currently run the documents in the older or 32 bit versions, you'd not notice the difference.
posted by Threeway Handshake at 9:17 AM on September 26, 2010

2nd Threeway Handshake. The main use case is for people with ginormous spreadsheets. Also keep in mind that there are some things in 32bit Office that aren't in 64bit Office namely some ActiveX controls that are used by some Microsoft web apps like SharePoint.
posted by mmascolino at 9:22 AM on September 26, 2010

That really boils down to being able to work with Excel files > 2Gb in size at the expense of losing any 32bit Office add-ons e.g. ActiveX, or those that use Visual Basic. i.e. Depending on they types of data you deal with it may actually be less functional. than the 32bit version.

Have you seen what Microsoft have to say on the subject?
posted by dirm at 9:32 AM on September 26, 2010

Nthing larger excel files. Access remains unchanged.
posted by stratastar at 10:53 AM on September 26, 2010

When comparing 2007 with 2010, I'd say that the tweaks to the user experience are pretty helpful - the ribbon is a little easier to work with, and "find and replace" is also improved. The image/photo editing tools are little more powerful.
posted by KokuRyu at 10:58 AM on September 26, 2010

OK, these are all very helpful, thanks.

I don't use spreadsheets quite that large, so it looks like there's no real use for me other than perhaps the tweaks to the user experience. But I don't think that's really that big an issue for me.
posted by dfriedman at 2:56 PM on September 26, 2010