Microsoft Word vs. Pages..?

Question

I'm in need of some feedback of Apple user experience in using Word vs. Pages?
I was used to AppleWorks until it was discontinued and been trying to use Word
as many people (PC/MAC users) use it as a standard word processing program.
But I'm not really grasping Word as it comes across as a comprehensive program to work through.
Hence classes are being taught on how to use this program.
I would love to use Pages instead but I'm concerned about cross compatibiltiy when saving Page documents
into Word. Are there any issues that could arise when saving files from Pages to Word?
I'm a photographer and would mainly use Word for invoicing and creating a spreadsheet but that has proven
difficult for me. I'm too much of a visually oriented person to sort the logic out in Word.
Look forward to hearing your experience with both programs. thanks in advance ~A~

Answer 1

I am a longtime user of both programs. I am a writer and use word for my book work and pages for a couple of teaching guides I prepare for a magazine. I wish there was a compelling reason to move to pages 09 just because I would like to support apple products, but for me with my regular writing work, there are no real reasons to switch. Word works fine, and even better in some ways: I prefer its spell checking and grammar suggestions and the way it handles them; it has autosave, which pages doesn't (a third party freeware program called Eversave works fine though); it does a much better job of remembering window size; adding headers and footers is easy or not that much more difficult than pages does it to make a difference. Word generally works, and the type looks fine on the screen.
The big difference, of course, is expense, but I already own word. If I were considering whether to buy one or the other, I'd give them both a try and see. I think Pages full screen option works better (although the black on the sides is pretty intense), but while I'm generally not a Microsoft fan, I have to say that for someone who uses the latest version of Word hours a day, it does just fine and looks good too.