Well it’s been out for a while, but I’ve not seen a lot about it in the Excel community. So what do you think to the new version?

I have uninstalled it on my mechanics; it was way too much of a pain. I couldn’t open files by default in an earlier version and that was a massive problem, because I couldn’t really do any work with 2007.

Downers about 2007

Ribbons.
Ok hard to use to start off with, fair play, that’s a learning curve but I found that I really missed toolbars I could call up and float in the work space. The Toolbox toolbar for example. I tend to have fixed toolbars with really common buttons, then call up specific toolbars when I need them. I found I was forever having to change the tab to get top the tool set I wanted – I might as well use menus.

VBA.
If you’ve done anything with toolbars or menus your in trouble! Also much other code seems to be a bit hit or miss, which is hard to believe.

Interface colour.
Is it just me or does anyone else hate, hate, hate that bloody washed out blue colour MS insist on using? It was the same in 2003. In the 2007 beta blues the default and I can change that to a “Visa” grey (Vista grey is in fact black and all but unusable), More importantly the blue makes it really difficult to make out some of the tool buttons in the VBE. (I wonder if you could use the toolbars from the VBE, which are the same as ever, in the new Excel interface?)

The “Office Button”
That big round button in the top right”¦ Didn’t really win me over, the popup looks naff, it feels like a bit of a catch all where MS can stick stuff that doesn’t really go anywhere else.

The Zoom Bar
Anyone with a scroll mouse will have no need for this, not that it’s that much of a feature anyway.

The Good Things.

Charts look much nicer (although I’m lead to belie they are hard to customise).

Formatting is much improved.

Colours seem better.

so what’s your take on the new version?????