Microsoft Office 365 - yearly subscription or am I being a mug?

[minxthemanx]

Just had an email from Microsoft reminding me that my subscription is due in March - £79.99 a year. I bought this laptop 2 years ago and must have signed up for the package at the time (struggling to remember). But I'm wondering if I'm paying through the nose to keep going annually? We use it on one laptop, for Word, Publisher, Excel and Powerpoint thing, Mainly for my work and the DC homework. Does everyone pay yearly, or should I just have bought it once, outright? Sorry to be dim.

I think you are being a large coffee receptacle. Why not download one of the free versions. I currently use Libreoffice and have in the past used OpenOffice. When work was paying I used MS but not since.

I would first check to see whether they are offering unlimited file storage (the OneDrive facility) as that could be used for "free" backup (compared with some other services) for all your computers. Just an idea.

While LibreOffice and OpenOffice are good alternatives, I don't think it a bad idea if you use MS Office at work to have a legal version at home, too.

If you do decide to pay I think you can get it cheaper than that. I bought it outright though.

Marking my place as ours has just run out and I'm wondering the same.

I bought mine about six years ago for £80 and I'm still using it now. It was an actual disc that I put in my laptop - thinking about it now, my laptop must have been a couple of years old so maybe the free version that was on it when I bought it had expired?

The advantage is you get new versions as soon as they're released, and you have the option of paying monthly to spread the cost.

You can buy the package outright for about the same price, the only downside being when the release the new version, you don't get it automatically (not likely to be a problem).

There's a new release of MS Office expected in the autumn (Office 2016, probably will be released in parallel with Windows 10 so there will be new laptops, tablets and desktops with both new items of software available).

From what I've seen, it should be possible to upgrade Office 365 Personal (allowed to run on 1 laptop, 1 mobile phone, and 1 tablet) to Office 365 Home (5 users), for about a tenner.

If you have Windows kit, you'd gain access to MS Access via the Office 365 subscription (whereas it would need the most costly version of Office if a licence is bought outright, rather than under the 365 subscription system).

Obviously, with student licensing options, some may find it cheaper to pay a one-off fee and not worry about the 365 method. For others, the cheap online storage might tip the balance.

Might be worth watching "Windows Weekly" on TWiT.TV (This Week in Technology), or subscribing to this particular show via (say) iTunes, so you can keep up to date with news, products, and rumours(!)