Information from here: http://social.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/genuineoffice/thread/39cee7a1-b5f8-4c91-8223-c661e9361496/ How to troubleshoot problems that you may experience when you try to activate a 2007 Office product @: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/919895, and http://support.microsoft.com/kb/903275/en-us for Office Suites 2003 and below. The links will provide resolutions supporting Office Suites. However if the issue persists I would recommend you contact Microsoft Office support at http://support.microsoft.com/gp/assistsupport and choosing your product to create a support incident. There are two methods for activating Office; telephone and the Internet which is the easier of the two methods. To activate the product by using the Internet, follow these steps: For Microsoft Office 2007, follow these steps: Start any office program. 2) In the Office Activation Wizard, click the "Activate by using Internet" option, and then click "Next". 3) Click "Submit" to send your information to the Microsoft licensing servers. NOTE: When your information is validated, the "Activation Complete" page appears. Then, you can use the Office programs. You will not have to activate Office in the future. 4) Click "Finish" Please follow the below guidance for telephone activation for your version of Office: 1) Start any Office program. 2) In the "Office Activation Wizard", click the "Activate by using the telephone" option, and then click Next 3) Read the "Microsoft Office Privacy Policy" page, and then click "Next". Note You are not required to read the Microsoft Office Privacy Policy to continue these steps in Microsoft Office 2007. A link to the Microsoft Office Privacy Policy is provided so that you can read it at any time. 4) In the "Select your location" list, select a country or region. Call the telephone number that is listed on line 2. The customer service agent will ask you for the installation ID and will give you a confirmation ID in return. Type the confirmation ID in the boxes provided. 5) Click "Next". 6) On the "Activation Complete" page, click "Finish".

Is this computer YOUR OWN PERSONAL COMPUTER owned by YOU, or does it belong to your employer? If it belongs to the employer or is connected to the employers network, then your company's IT department may have rules about what CAN and CANNOT be installed on their network and on computers owned by them or used on their network. If this is the case, your should talk to whoever in your building is responsible for computer services and find out if they can assist. It may be that the network doesn't recognize you as someone authorized to install new programs.

While it's a good idea not to run windows with administrator rights while browsing the web because it just makes it easier for malware to secretly dowload and install, unfortunately, I believe running as a limited user will not permit some windows updates to install. So when you tried to install windows updates, was it as administrator or limited user? Below is a support page from Microsoft. You also may want to make sure you are virus free. There are many online scans available that you can run without going through the bother of installing as evidenced by this article: http://blogs.computerworld.com/battling_antivirus_programs Also, you may want to run an online scan at secunia to see if you have all patches needed for installed applications: http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/online/ Here is a link that might be useful: Microsoft support page regarding updates not installing

I would think that LibreOffice and Apache Open Office would be "mostly" compatible. Or at least compatible enough that I wouldn't notice the difference. (Except maybe the appearance) But I haven't tested so I don't know. (https://www.libreoffice.org/discover/libreoffice-vs-openoffice/) If LibreOffice hangs on startup, this might be something quick and easy to try: (source: https://ask.libreoffice.org/en/question/207036/win10-64bit-liboff-630-hangs-at-start-up/) To start in safe mode: "If your problem is that LibreOffice does not start at all, launch it from the command line with libreoffice --safe-mode or use the start menu entry "LibreOffice (Safe Mode)" on Windows" (source: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Faq/General/110) Of course that assumes hardware acceleration is turned on by default. In my Linux installs, it is not.