Unable to open a Microsoft Office 2007 file

If you have ever come across an Excel file or a Word file from someone in an e-mail and you were unable to open it.  A good reason for this is that you do not have Microsoft Office 2007 (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) installed on your system and you have an old version like Microsoft Office 2003 or earlier.

You can do 1 of 3 things to be able to open the file:
      1) Ask the sender of the e-mail to resend the file in an older format.  You can tell if a file is saved with the
          new format because an extra "x" will be attached at the end of the file.  (e.x. Excel2007.xlsx versus
          Excel2003.xls)
     2) Get a copy of Microsoft Office 2007 and install it
     3) Install the Microsoft Compatibility Pack from Microsoft

If you don't want to have someone reformat an Excel or Word file every time or you don't have the money to get a copy of Microsoft Office 2007, then the third option would be your best option.

The Microsoft Compatibility Pack can be downloaded here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=941b3470-3ae9-4aee-8f43-c6bb74cd1466&displaylang=en.  This gives you the ability to open Microsoft Office 2007 files while having an older version of Office, like Office XP or Office 2003.  Click on the Download button after clicking on the link at the installation will follow you through it.