public static function stripMicrosoftChars($str)
    {

        $chars=array(

            chr(133) => '...', //dot dot dot elipsis
            chr(145) => "'", //curly left single quotes
            chr(146) => "'", //curly right single quotes
            chr(147) => '"', //curly left double quotes
            chr(148) => '"', //curly right double quotes
            chr(149) => '*', //bullet char
            chr(150) => '-', //en dash
            chr(151) => '-', //em dash,

            //mac word roman charset
            chr(165) => '*', //bullet char
            chr(201) => '...', //elipsis
            chr(208) => '-', //en-dash
            chr(209) => '-', //em-dash
            chr(210) => '"', //curly left double quotes
            chr(211) => '"', //curly right double quotes
            chr(212) => '\'', //curly left single quote
            chr(213) => '\'', //curly right single quotes

        );

        return strtr($str, $chars);
    }