Entered CNET Catalog: 02/11/2006
SKU: CNETMICROSOFTOFFICELIVEBETA
Manufacturer: Microsoft Corp.
Editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 02/14/2006
Contrary to what its name might suggest, Microsoft Office Live is not an online version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Instead, this hosted suite provides businesses with a staff of 10 or fewer with tools to build and host a Web site, manage contacts, and share projects. For free, the Basic service provides a company with a domain name registration, hosting, and e-mail, along with Web design tools and reports on site traffic. (Our slide show of the beta version of Microsoft Office Live previewed the features.)
Why give away the store? Microsoft hopes to snag a large share of the market of small businesses still looking to develop a Web presence and manage operations via the Internet. Plus, its logo (linking to Office Live details, of course) will appear on your Web pages. Plans for keyword ads and online shopping are in the works. Google Apps, by comparison, doesn't offer a free Web site parking space, but it does let you brand online services with your own URL. Unlike Google Apps, Microsoft Office Live lacks a Web-based word processor and a spreadsheet application. Read here to see how Microsoft's and Google's office services compare.
The Microsoft Office Live comes in three flavors, starting with the free Basic, which offers site hosting and building, as well as e-mail support. The Essentials and Premium editions each provide a bundle of business apps, including AdManager, as well as mobile support. The $19.95/month Essentials edition adds more ways to analyze Web site traffic, along with 1GB of storage space, coordination with Outlook e-mail, and 50 e-mail accounts. For $39.95/month, Premium doubles the storage space.
Once you sign in and access the Microsoft Office Live Web page, it opens a screen that demands a domain name. There seems to be no way past this page, unfortunately, so you can't peek at any features without either registering a new domain name or transferring an existing one from your current host. Once you establish the domain name of your Web site, you reach a page loaded with options and tools presented in a two-pane interface that loosely resembles Microsoft Outlook.
You proceed with the Web Sites module by building a sample site using the Site Designer. The tool's drag-and-drop layout is straightforward and demands no coding, about as simple to figure out as other bare-bones page-building tools, such as those offered by Yahoo Small Business.
Beyond handling your Web site, Microsoft Office Live Essentials and Premium attempt to provide a one-stop shop for core business operations. We appreciated the sparse design of the Dashboard screen, which uses a two-pane layout and tabs to present a calendar and drop-down menus for Customers, Projects, Sales, Employees, and Company.
The 30 business apps included in the two paid packages can handle a sweeping array of chores, from keeping track of vendors to managing human resources. To attract customers, the AdManager service, similar to Google AdWords, lets you target keywords at Windows Live Search. Microsoft Office Live Essentials and Premium manage customer queries, competition, media attention, employees, sales leads, sales orders and estimates, and events. You can filter and customize data to suit your needs. For example, the Customers module lets you view accounts by territory, rating, or activity and export the data to a hard drive. You can import from and link business contacts to Outlook and even create your own FAQs section on the spot. We liked the way the Project Manager made it simple to create a new project. Additionally, Live throws in the Microsoft Office Small Business Accounting download, making it possible to share data with an accountant. Tech support is free via e-mail, and 24-7 telephone support is available to paid users of the Essentials and Premium editions. That compares favorably with Google Apps' free phone help for users of its $50 Premium edition.
We didn't run into any glitches while testing this service on Windows XP using Internet Explorer. Then again, we weren't able to make full use of the shared tasks in our brief tour. While Office Live was speedy overall, we experienced brief delays after clicking some links, a potential drawback for businesses. The business applications seem most helpful as a shared work space for a small firm with employees in multiple locations.
User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12out of 12 user reviews
Failure in every way.
Pros: huge POTENTIAL as an excellent way to store and retrieve my office documents
interaction with Office home button
Cons: Very frustrating to use. Attempted ot use on three machines. I literally couldn't get and I'm in IT. File directory in Word shows online folders with gobbly **** characters.
IE on a vanilla machine couldn't even connect to Office Live to browse.
Give Microsoft 5 years to catch up and maybe they'll have it figured out. IF they could make it work flawlessly with any browser, then it would be a useful tool. I want to access it on my PC, my Mac, my iPhone and my wife's Blackberry, like I can do with Google Apps.
out of 12 user reviews
Ok service can have many problems
Pros: Their site builder is good
Cons: The support sucks.
out of 12 user reviews
Domain name theft?
Pros: Free domain registration, easy to use tools
Cons: Can't change your DNS entries - no access to your DNS and they won't tell you your registry key.
This part is simply speculation, but Microsoft will know as soon as your domain expires. If you haven't been able to access it for months, it's possible that the company will be able to re-register your domain in their name, effectively stealing any traffic you had managed to drive there and setting up a parked page. This idea is not based on fact, but it's something to think about. The fact does remain, however, that Office Live will not allow you to transfer your page anywhere else. In the event that you find better, less expensive hosting, you will be stuck paying $30 a month in order to keep access to your OWN domain name.
out of 12 user reviews
Watch out for Surprises
Pros: It's great way to get into your own web site
Cons: There are things you don't find out until you start using.
out of 12 user reviews
Looks great More free stuff
Pros: More free stuff great
Cons: Is it only for US Will it available for everyone
www.slexperts.com
out of 12 user reviews
Simple to use for beginners
Pros: Easy to slap a site together and fairly easy to build extesnive sites with other tools like Sharepoint 2007 and FrontPage2003
Cons: Can look a little "stock", a better choice of looks and feels would be nice for the next version
Having built sites for both commercial and non-profits to try out this service, I found that largely, it to be quite acceptable, reasonable and rock solid reliability.
Everyone these days claim to be a web designer, with Office Live, this is one step closer to fact. If you are a web pro, then design your heart out. Either way an excellent choice for hosting and good built in tools for beginners to get started quickly with getting that site up and working for you quick!
out of 12 user reviews
Buggy, and proprietary.
Pros: Free domain registration
Cons: Difficult to use, buggy, and proprietary.
Signing up is a flash, and once you are there you can begin using their limited web design tool to build your own web-site. I didn't see any area where people with advanced skills could upload a site they themselves designed, or had designed.
Most every thing I tried to do was difficult, and the help screens were not helpful. They were there more to tout the strengths of Office Live, and not assist you in setting up.
The e-mail is a big scam. Instead of allowing Pop access or dedicated web access, you are required to use Microsoft Hotmail. Though a download is available to access the mail through Outlook, it requires Outlook and shuts out other e-mail programs you may be using.
Overall this is a buggy and hard to use set of tools. They are very limited, and I find it hard to believe that any business will benefit from this clunky suite. Especially that it will cost $30 after the Beta. I for one will not pay that, and if they decide to charge me after the beta, I will cancel.
out of 12 user reviews
A simple and very good place to start a website.
Pros: Basic is a good website starter - really simple; no coding knowledge needed; free and plans to stay that way; help is very specific to page/task; lots of feedback opportunities.
Cons: Occasionally crashes - be sure to save work often; some limits on design; some Help speaks geek.
The whole thing is very much geared to business use and is not really a good place to publish "personal" web pages, although you could.
It comes with 5 email "slots" which is a good start & accessing the email is fairly easy.
On occasion it has crashed while I was editing a page, but I expected a bug or two, and I'm learning to save work often.
The Help features are very specific to the component you're working on, but some Help items speak geek & assume knowledge one may not have.
I wish I could use some personal backgrounds and the functionality in the pages is somewhat limited - no java scripts. Also, I haven't found a way to link within a page,and I don't think you could add your own code if you knew how. Layout options are also limited & unimaginative, but I used the General layout for most of my pages.
Uploading images is easy and you can edit some before uploading.
All in all, for a person just starting to put a business on the web and unfamiliar with web publishing, Basic is a good bargain and a good start. And you really can't beat the price for a space and a domain name.
out of 12 user reviews
Works for what it is supposed to do
Pros: Easy to use, attractive pages. Can't beat the cost.
Cons: A little buggy. I would loose whole pages if I don't keep my work units small. The page would disappear after I made some changes to the pages- frustrating, but I am sticking with it.
I am building the site to work as the only web site for our small business and the initial reviews from w/in our office are good.
out of 12 user reviews
bad design
Pros: Don't use this version
Cons: Big bug inside
The same thing happened on many PCs. Big bug!!
out of 12 user reviews
Basic design
Pros: runs in background
Cons: must be running IE
out of 12 user reviews
Free domain registration
Pros: Free domain registration and hosting
Cons: Basic package has no support for front page
