I recently bought myself a new 64-Bit computer. Although this was going to be my main work computer, I took a risk and loaded Office 2010 Beta. Here’s why I decided to load the 32-Bit version of Office 2010 although I was running the 64-Bit version of Windows 7.
Some background first…
- If you are running a 64-Bit version of Windows then you can choose to install either the 32-Bit Version or the 64-Bit Version of Office 2010 (this is the first version of Office with a 64-Bit implementation as well).
- If you have a 64-Bit computer but you are running 32-Bit Windows then you can only install the 32-Bit version of Office 2010.
- You cannot run part of Office in 64-Bit and other parts in 32-Bit (e.g. you cannot run 32-Bit Excel with 64-bit Excel. The installer will not allow it!)
My primary reason for sticking to the 32 Bit Version of Office 2010 was:
- I use many other applications that interface with or work inside Office, particularly with Outlook.
- If you use 64-Bit Office then these application will need to be rewritten as 64-bit applications before they can talk to each other.
- At the current time very few software vendors are releasing 64-bit version of their software.
It is highly likely that your favourite Outlook addons will not work with 64-Bit Windows!
Summary… if you are using ANY Office addons or applications that need to communicate with Outlook, Word, Excel or PowerPoint then INSTALL THE 32-BIT VERSION OF 2010.
For more background information, you can also refer to this article on Microsoft’s website on Understanding 64-Bit Office.