Office Mobile 6.1 priced at $50

Filed under: Windows Mobile, Office, Microsoft, Commercial, Mobile Minute

Office Mobile 6.1 priced at $50

by Brad Linder Nov 30th 2007

Microsoft finally released an updated version of Office Mobile with support for Office 2007 documents yesterday. That means Windows Mobile 5.0/6 users can finally open and edit DOCX, PPTX, and XLSX files. Office Mobile 6.1 is a free upgrade for some users, but others will have to fork out some cash if they want the latest and greatest. This is the first time Microsoft has sold a version of Office Mobile directly to consumers.

Up until now it was unclear how much Microsoft would be charging. But now that you can pick up a copy of Office Mobile 6.1 at Handango, we finally know the price: $50. And we're a bit ambivalent. On the one hand, this is a bargain basement price compared to Office 2007 for the desktop. On the other hand, nobody would ever mistakes Office Mobile for Office 2007. It's a stripped down version of the application meant for working on the go.

So how do you know if you need to pay for Office Mobile 6.1 or if it's a free upgrade?

If you have a version of Windows Mobile 6 that includes Office Mobile, you can upgrade for free.
If you have a version of Windows Mobile 6 that did not ship with Office Mobile, say goodbye to $50.
If you have a version of Windows Mobile 5.0 that came with Office Mobile, you may be able to upgrade for free, but some users with older devices have reported that they are unable to install the upgrade.
If you have a version of Windows Mobile 5.0 that does not include Office Mobile, you're out of luck.
If you're using Windows Mobile 2003SE or earlier, Microsoft would ~~prefer to think you don't exist~~ recommend upgrading to a newer unit.

[via Jason Langridge]

Tags: handango, office-mobile, office-mobile-6.1

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Todd said 1:24PM on 11-30-2007

"...If you're using Windows Mobile 2003SE or earlier, Microsoft would prefer to think you don't exist recommend upgrading to a newer unit."

Another user hostile "end of life" forced upgrade by Microsoft! Nice to see the mobile division hates their customers as much as the OS product managers.

I invite all Windows mobile users to end their suffering and switch to any of the currently available Linux phones ( Trolltech or OpenMoko ) or wait a month or two for the Gphone

http://www.engadget.com/2007/11/30/android-fever-catch-it-verizon-joining-open-handset-alliance/

Mysterius said 9:29AM on 12-01-2007

It's no more "forced" than Mozilla ending support for Firefox 1.0 or add-on developers that only support 2.0 and later.

John said 2:59PM on 11-30-2007

Apparently my T-mobile Shadow has a newer version of Office Mobile than what this download is...

chrisaroz said 8:45PM on 11-30-2007

I got WinMo6 for the Sprint 6700 and it's saying the same thing.

michael said 6:21PM on 11-30-2007

@Todd : Butt out of the WinMo posts. You obviously are just trolling around. Your words and link have nothing to do with mobile office suites.

Office 03' is getting kind of old, so it doesn't hurt upgrading to a newer one. I was suffering a few problems on my old one, and upgrading to WinMo 6 with a new Office is really better, and I get a free update :)

Hopefully, MS can give free updates more often.

someaudioguy said 9:30AM on 12-01-2007

SERIOUSLY!?!?!
Bag this crap and go get Softmaker's Textmaker and PlanMaker. Have real document and spreadsheet editing (I'd say it rivals OpenOffice). For that price why deal with anything "stripped down"?

http://www.softmaker.com/english/ofp_en.htm

philosopherdog said 9:36AM on 12-01-2007

Though it's true that Textmaker is a better option, they, from what I understand, are not yet supporting Office 07 file formats, and users using the latest release are reporting problems with saving and using earlier file formats from within Office 07. But Office mobile is terrible. Not worth an upgrade price. The fact that it strips your formatting away makes it unusable to most people.

Joel Ivory Johnson said 6:10PM on 12-01-2007

Success on the 8125/HTC Wizard!

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