You sound like the "one guy"
As in, there's "one guy" in IT who knows what he's doing. That's been my experience, and I've been getting work done for 25+ years in various small- to mid-size companies. Most of the IT drones I've dealt with have been paper MCSEs or even out-and-out Mordacs (see Dilbert); neither of those types are going to give two tin toots about what the users want or need. [Obviously, there are also plenty of BOFHs in these departments who know their stuff but are usually kept well away from the "public" so they can keep critical services (e.g. PeopleSoft) running.]
«If you think your IT department will dismiss your problems, it's probably a symptom of inept past - or current - user experience management. And if you expect that computers are always slow and unreliable it is a reflection of the industry's pervasive lack of user experience management.»
I don't expect my problems to be dismissed by IT, simply because I've learned that depending on IT when you need stuff done is a mug's game. I don't take my problems to them, I just get stuff done and share the results with the rest of the department. I don't expect computers to be slow and unreliable because I've gotten used to making them do what I want them to do (and I don't depend on whatever version of Windows that IT is forcing on everyone else). Being able to do the work of three people gives me that luxury. :-)
I wonder, though, why your office is "standardizing" on Office 2010 if you're not using docx — hey, if you're using the old formats, one version is good as the other, right? In broader terms, I think homogeneity is far overrated. It's all well and good when everything is running right, but one problem can have the entire office dead in the water.
Anon for obvious reasons.