ActiveSync 3.7 Installation & Outlook 2003 Beta

[Newsboy]

Came across a little blip in ActiveSync intallation here, thought I'd share it with the rest of you in case you come across it yourselves.

I'm running WinXP Pro and Outlook/Office 2003 Beta. When I went to download and install ActiveSync 3.7, it would hang on the installation. I finally figured out that Outlook must be CLOSED before AS 3.7 will run InstallShield. This had me baffled for a good 10 minutes.

[madbart]

Have you had an issues with Outlook being non responsive whilst activesyncing?

[Newsboy]

Not really, no. Outlook 2003 has been very good to me so far, and I love the new user interface. Much more functional than the previous version.

[PetiteFlower]

Hm I have the office 2003 beta and I've been afraid to install it....is it worth it?

[darrylb]

Yes it is worth it. I have been using it for a couple of months now. Earlier I was getting some stability problems which were annoying, but then my hard drive crashed :evil: , so I had to replace it and rebuild from scratch. Since then everything has been great!

The UI changes are very nice - but the new reading layout in word is annoying. :pukeface2:

[PetiteFlower]

So you think the stability problems were caused by your hard drive being about to die rather then the software itself?

[Newsboy]

I haven't used Word/Excel/PP enough to notice huge changes, but Outlook has been revamped. My favorite feature has to be the little "new mail" window. Instead of an annoying "you have new mail..." window, there's a semi-transparent window that fades in by the taskbar, displaying the sender and subject line. It stays in place for about 10 seconds and then fades away, unless you click on it, which makes the window opaque and opens the email in Outlook.

I would have installed it sooner, but decided to do it this past week as I rebuilt XP Pro myself. Couldn't keep the system running for more than a few minutes before it would lock up, turns out the hard drive tables were corrupted. Smooth as butter now!

[darrylb]

So you think the stability problems were caused by your hard drive being about to die rather then the software itself?

I have had far fewer problems since then, but there are still a couple of bugs to iron out. All in all though, I am reasonably happy to live with them (although I expect them to be fixed before I buy it). I would rate its stability to be like Office 95 at the moment. It is not perfect, but it is still reasonable, and the UI changes are worth a little bit of pain to me.

[darrylb]

My favorite feature has to be the little "new mail" window. ... It stays in place for about 10 seconds and then fades away, unless you click on it, which makes the window opaque and opens the email in Outlook.

I agree - looks like MS have been paying the right research guys with this feature.... :)