From basic math to precalculus, Microsoft Mathematics includes tools and features to help you achieve a better understanding of fundamental concepts and visualize mathematical concepts in new ways. Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 makes it easy to create graphs in 2D and 3D, calculate numerical results, solve equations or inequalities, and simplify algebraic expressions.
This document lists system requirements and known issues for this version of Microsoft Mathematics. Workarounds, if available, are provided for known issues.
The following table lists the system requirements to install and use Microsoft Mathematics.
| Operating systems |
The following operating systems are supported: Windows 7 Windows Vista with Service Pack 2 (SP2) Windows XP (32-bit) with Service Pack 3 (SP3) Windows Server 2008 R2 (64-bit) Windows Server 2008 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) Windows Server 2003 (32-bit) with Service Pack 2 (SP2) |
| .NET Framework | Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 Free download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=ab99342f-5d1a-413d-8319-81da479ab0d7 |
| Computer processor | 500 MHz Pentium processor or equivalent (minimum) 1 GHz Pentium processor or equivalent (recommended) |
| Memory | 256 MB of RAM (minimum) 512 MB or more (recommended) |
| Display resolution | 800 x 600, 256 colors (minimum) 1024 x 768, 32-bit (recommended) |
| Video | Video card with 64 MB of video RAM |
| Disk space | 65 MB available disk space |
In Microsoft Math 3.0, the show and plot functions were used to plot 2D graphs. In this version of the program, you must specify show2d and plot2d instead. If you open a worksheet file from a previous version of the product, any expressions that use show or plot will need to be updated.
You can use the backspace key or the left arrow key to move left so you can edit an expression in the worksheet input pane. However, if you press these keys repeatedly, the input pane may stop accepting input in some cases. To fix this, press the right arrow key once, and then you can type again.
If your computer display is set to High Contrast mode, some areas of the workspace may become unreadable when you change color schemes in Microsoft Mathematics. To fix this problem, turn High Contrast off and then turn it back on again.
In many cases, Microsoft Mathematics displays inline error messages to explain syntax errors or to describe a problem. To give screen readers access to this information, you can change your options to show these messages as popup dialogs instead. On the File tab, click Options, and then click Display inline error messages as popup messages.
Installation of Microsoft DirectX is recommended because it takes advantage of hardware acceleration options, such as video cards. By default, Microsoft Mathematics opens the DirectX Setup wizard when the Mathematics Setup Wizard is complete. However, if your computer does not have DirectX installed or cannot use the technology, Microsoft Mathematics uses an alternative rendering format for 3D graphs.