Archive for Office 2013

Download Microsoft Office 2013 from Office 365

imageMicrosoft Office 365 makes available the most recent version of the Office software for licensed users to download. In this case that would be Office 2016.

But for any number of reasons, there are still cases where someone may need Office 2013. Up until March 1, 2017, Office 2013 was easily available through O365.

Now that we are pass that deadline, the question is: Can we still download Office 2013 for our O365 account users. And the answer is: YES!!!!

My good MVP buddy, Boon Tee, recently posted directions (click here) on where one can still download Office 2013 from Office 365.

Bootstrapper error during Office 2013 installation

I was attempting to install Office 2013 Professional Plus on a new workstation that had already been joined to the SBS 2011 domain. It kept crashing just a few minutes into the intallation with the error message: “Microsoft Setup Bootstrapper has stopped working”.

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If you search the Microsoft forums, you will see several recommendations, including:

  • Remove all prior installations of Microsoft Office
  • Make sure that the Task Scheduler is running
  • Try burning the Office .iso to a DVD to do the install

In my case, we were good in all those departments.

Then I came across a forum post that raised the question:

Have you implemented a Cryptolocker group policy at your site?

Oh, my, yes! I quickly logged onto the server, moved the new workstation out of its normal OU. Voila! Office 2013 installed immediately.

Moving multiple folders in Outlook 2013

I was doing a recent migration of email from Windows Live Mail (WLM) to Outlook 2013. The built in transfer within WLM worked perfectly in moving folders over to Outlook with one exception. This customer has two mail accounts created in Outlook, and the folders being transferred over from WLM needed to go into the second (non-default) email account.

No problem, I thought. I’ll transfer them over to Outlook, and then drag and drop the folders from the default mail account to the second mail account.

But Outlook does not support selecting and moving multiple folders, and this customer had several dozen mail folders to be moved. I wanted to see if there was a workaround or a fix for moving multiple folders within Outlook, and I found Pandali Folder Master for Outlook utility.

I ran this on the customer’s Windows 8.1 laptop, and quickly moved the folders to the proper account.

In summary, I was very surprised that the WLM to Outlook transfer worked without a hitch, and that this utility program took care of getting multiple folbers moved to the right email account.

Fix Sluggish Outlook 2013

I finally made the jump from Outlook 2010 to Outlook 2013 last week on my primary work desk computer. There are many things that I really like about Outlook 2013, which I will put in a separate blog post.

But almost immediately on using it, Outlook 2013 appeared to be “sluggish” (is that a technical term?) compared to Outlook 2010. No hard facts, just end user observation. Switching from mail to contacts to calendars, for example. Also emails with graphics appear to take more time to open than before.

It turns out that I am not the only one with these observations. You can do your favorite web search to find similar remarks.

But, the purpose of this post is simply to identify how to speed up the interaction between Outlook 2013 and the end user, because out of the box, I’m not ready to drop 2013 on my customers who are heavy Outlook users.

FIXING SLUGGISH OUTLOOK 2013

Here are the three changes that I have implemented to date to help speed up performance:

  1. Open up Outlook 2013, click File –> Option –> Advanced
    1. Scroll down to the Display section and check (turn on) the ‘Disable hardware graphics acceleration’ option
    2. Then scroll down to the Other section and UNcheck the ‘Use animations when expanding conversations and groups’ option
    3. Click OK, then restart Outlook 2013
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  2. The other recommended change is via Registry Editor:
    1. Open up Registry Editor
    2. Drill down HKey Current User –> Software –> Microsoft –> Office –> 15.0 –> common –> Graphics
    3. Right click on Graphics in the left pane, and then click New –> DWord (32 bit)
    4. Click to name this new key: DisableAnimations
    5. Double click on the new key, and change the value from 0 to 1
    6. Close registry
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You may find that a reboot may be necessary as well.

Upgrading to Office 2013

I’d like to think I’m the type of person who likes to be using the latest technology (hardware or software). The truth of the matter is that I don’t seem to have the time or desire to always jump on the newest thing.

Case in point is Office 2013. It was released for general availability at the end of January 2013. However, here it is in August and I’m just now getting around to installing it on my Windows 7 desktop computer, where I have been using Office 2010.

This upgrade was very simple and painless. So let’s get to it.

Step 1 – Uninstall Office 2010

  1. As always, if you have not already done so, stop and make a full image backup of your workstation before proceeding.
  2. Now the reality is that, except for Outlook, you can indeed run Office 2010 and 2013 side by side on the same computer. But not Outlook. Only one version of Outlook will function on a workstation.
  3. As I was not interested in running both versions, I proceeded to uninstall Office 2010 completely..
  4. Here’s the good news: when you uninstall Office 2010, it leaves intact all your settings, including Outlook.
  5. After uninstalling Microsoft Office, you will be required to reboot your computer.
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  6. Please note: there may be several Office-related programs that you may want to uninstall, such as Microsoft Outlook Connector or Microsoft Publisher.

Step 2 – Install Office 2013

  1. After your system has rebooted, insert your Office 2013 DVD and start up your installation.
  2. After accepting the License Terms, take a close look at the next screen where you will select the installation you want.
    – If the top button says ‘Install Now’, go ahead and click it.
    – However, if the top button says ‘Upgrade Now’, you still have some matching Office 2010 programs that need to be uninstalled. If so, cancel out of this installation, and uninstall any remaining Office 2010 related programs. Then repeat this section.
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  3. Installation will take about 15 minutes, and you will be required to reboot your computer.

Step 3 – Activate your Product

  1. This section will vary depending on how you purchased or obtained your copy of Microsoft Office 2013.
  2. By default, they will expect you to enter an email address associated with a Microsoft Live account that was used to order Office 2013.
  3. However, in my case, I was installing a copy from my Microsoft Action Pack, so I clicked on the “enter a product key instead’ option, and typed in my 25 character product key.
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That’s it!

Open up Outlook, and there’s nothing you need to do (generally speaking). All of your email accounts – whether Exchange, POP3 or IMAP – will show up automatically. All of your settings, such as your signature file, will load immediately.

By default, any add-ins that are not compatible with Office 2013 will be automatically disabled. You will be informaed as to which add-in modules are causing issues. Here’s an example:

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