PC to Mac and Back
If you need to create presentations on the Mac and move them to the PC (or vice versa), this is a good place to start. And this is just a start. We'll add more info as we learn more. Your suggestions and corrections are very welcome.
PowerPoint Versions
Before we start, consider that you'll be dealing with different versions of PowerPoint as well as different platforms. This is mainly about PC/Mac issues, so we won't take PowerPoint version differences into account here other than this general set of rules:
We'll ignore versions of PowerPoint prior to 98 (Mac) and 97 (Windows).
- PowerPoint 97 (Windows) is very much like PowerPoint 98 (Mac).
- PowerPoint 2000 (Windows) has no equivalent on Mac, but it only added a few new features to PowerPoint 97. For all practical purposes, you can consider PowerPoint 97 and 2000 (Windows) and PowerPoint 98 (Mac) pretty much the same.
- PowerPoint 2002 (Windows) and PowerPoint 2001 (Mac) both added multiple masters and a lot of other new features and bring the Mac and PC versions into rough equivalence again. 2002/2003 also have motion path animation, supported by the PowerPoint 2003 viewer. Mac PowerPoint versions can't create motion path animations but beginning with PowerPoint 2004 for Mac, presentations with motion path animations created on Windows can be viewed properly on the Mac.
- PowerPoint X (Mac) is roughly equivalent to PowerPoint 2002 (Windows) again. It's the first PowerPoint version that's fully compatible with OS X.
- PowerPoint 2004 (Mac) adds a few new features and better support for the multiple masters and animations on the equivalent Windows versions (PPT 2002 and 2003).
- PowerPoint 2008 (Mac) and PowerPoint 2007 (Windows) are again approximate equivalents. Both use the new Office XML file formats.
See this for more cross-platform info specific to 2008/2007.
PowerPoint Viewers
- The PowerPoint 97 Viewer for Windows is effectively the same as PowerPoint 97 (Windows) without VBA.
- The PowerPoint 2003 Viewer for Windows is effectively the same as PowerPoint 2003 (Windows) without VBA.
- The PowerPoint 2007 Viewer for Windows is the same as the PowerPoint 2003 Viewer plus additional compatibility software that allows it to convert PowerPoint 2007 files to 2003 format and open them.
- The Mac Viewer is effectively the same as PowerPoint 98 (Mac) without VBA, so the PowerPoint 97 (Windows) and PowerPoint 98 (Mac) viewers are roughly identical. The Mac Viewer runs only under Mac OS 9 and earlier or in Classic mode. There's no later Mac viewer version.
File Formats
PowerPoint 97 through 2003 (Windows) and PowerPoint 98 through 2004 (Mac) share the same file format. They can all open one another's files.
PowerPoint 2007 (Windows) and 2008 (Mac) introduced a new file format based on XML. PowerPoint 2007/2008 can open files from earlier versions and save back to the earlier formats (but it's wise to test this before assuming it'll work with any particular presentation).
File compatibility exceptions:
- Windows versions since 2002 can apply password protection to files. Mac versions cannot open password-protected files.
- All Windows versions can embed fonts. Mac versions can open files that contain embedded fonts but cannot use the fonts.
PowerPoint 2004 for Mac includes a new feature that is designed to alleviate many of the common headaches in optimizing presentations for other versions and other platforms. This new Office-wide feature is called Compatibility Report, and can be accessed easily from PowerPoint from the Tools menu.
Learn more about Compatibility Report here
If you create on Mac, then move to PC
- Save your files in PC 8.3 filename style, using PPT (for PowerPoint presentations) or PPS (for PowerPoint shows) as the extension ... the part after the period. Your filenames should look like XXXXXXXX.PPT or YYYYYYYY.PPS
- Uppercase/lowercase doesn't matter, but don't use punctuation characters or spaces in your filenames. Some punctuation marks are PC-safe but may cause problems in email or web applications if files are converted. Dashes (-) and underscores (_) are safe, though.
- Quicktime-compressed images won't work on the PC. Don't copy/paste images into PowerPoint. Use Insert, Picture, From File instead. Use JPG or PNG formats for images.
- Quictime movies seldom work on PCs. Use MPEG or AVI instead.
- Links to external graphics files will break. Embed all graphics.
- Links to most media files will break UNLESS you copy the media file to the folder where the PowerPoint file is, and only then insert it. See Links break when I move presentation for more information.
- Check Format, Replace Fonts to see what fonts are used in your presentation. You can safely count on Arial, Times New Roman, Courier and Symbol being present on every PC. Tahoma and Verdana will probably be present on any PC with Office 97 or later, but may not be there if the PC has only the free PowerPoint Viewer. Remember, Mac versions of PowerPoint can't embed fonts or use embedded fonts.
- Use only RGB color for your PowerPoint graphics. PowerPoint will convert CMYK or Pantone colors to RGB anyway. It's better to do it yourself so you can control the conversion. In case that's not a convincing argument, try this: PowerPoint may substitute a red X for CMYK graphics. Ouch. Stick with RGB.
- Ungroup, then regroup imported graphics to convert them to PowerPoint shapes. Do the same to inserted charts if you don't need them to be editable on the other platform.
- Don't squeeze your text too tightly into placeholders. Font substitution and slight differences in text rendering on Mac vs PC can cause your text to get truncated or spill out of too-tight text boxes.
There are more Mac to PC tips here on Microsoft.com
If you create on PC then move to Mac
- Save your files in PC 8.3 filename style, using PPT (for PowerPoint presentations) or PPS (for PowerPoint shows) as the extension ... the part after the period. Your filenames should look like XXXXXXXX.PPT or YYYYYYYY.PPS
- Don't use punctuation characters or spaces in your filenames. Some punctuation marks are Mac-safe but may cause problems in email or web applications if files are converted.
- Ungroup, then regroup imported graphics to convert them to PowerPoint shapes. Do the same to charts if you don't need them to be editable on the other platform.
- Links to external graphics files will break. Embed all graphics.
- Links to most media files will break UNLESS you copy the media file to the folder where the PowerPoint file is, and only then insert it. See Links break when I move presentation for more information.
- Don't use WMV (Windows Media Player) files for movies or sounds. AVI or MPEG are better choices. WMP9 for Mac FAQ explains why and offers some workarounds. Several knowledgeable Mac users have suggested third party products such as Flip4Mac to enable Windows Media Player files on Mac.
- Watch your fonts. Check Format, Replace Fonts to see what fonts are used in your presentation. You can safely count on Arial, Times New Roman, Courier and Symbol being present on most Macs. Tahoma and Verdana will probably be present on any PC with Office installed, but may not be present if the Mac has only the free PowerPoint Viewer. Mac versions of PowerPoint can't use embedded fonts.
- Don't squeeze your text too tightly into placeholders. Font substitution and slight differences in text rendering on Mac vs PC can cause your text to get truncated or spill out of too-tight text boxes.
X-Platform in either direction, PC to Mac or Mac to PC
- Embedded objects (Word tables, Excel charts/sheets, graphs, etc.) may not translate well. Wherever possible, use the tools built into PowerPoint (ie, PowerPoint's table editor in PPT2000 and up on PC, PPT-X and up on Mac) rather than objects created in external programs.
- If you must use objects from external apps, ungroup then immediately regroup them before you send them to the other platform. This converts them to PowerPoint shapes. If they don't ungroup cleanly, it's a near-sure thing that they'd have caused problems on the other platform anyhow. Treat ungrouping as an Early Warning System.
- Whereas PowerPoint for Mac uses QuickTime to handle audio and video, the Windows version uses built-in Windows functions (MCI) to do so, which greatly limits the amount of file types that can be viewed on both platforms (only a few, like MPEG and AVI can be handled on both). More information on this here
- Fonts are "encoded" differently on PCs and Macs. That can cause some characters to change or disappear when your files move between platforms. See Mac vs. PC Character Encoding for more information and a PDF that includes a chart comparing the two encoding systems.
- Slide Shows - when you view a Kiosk Mode slide show on the PC, you can use the Tab key to move from one hyperlink to the next and the Enter key to activate the hyperlink. This doesn't work on Mac.
