a l e x f a l k e n b e r g

Service Pack 1 (SP1) for Office 2007 has finally gone live. Download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/office/

If you use Microsoft Update, you should see it your list if updates soon if you haven’t already.

You’ll also find links there for MS Visio 2007 Service Pack 1 and MS Project 2007 Service Pack 1, if you’ve not done those already.

Details on what SP1 addresses and fixes, and any other related issues, are here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/936982

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From the Excel Team:

Two weeks ago, we posted about an issue involving the calculation of numbers around 65,535 and 65,536. As of today, fixes for this issue in Excel 2007 and Excel Services 2007 are available for download from the following locations:

Excel 2007: link
64-bit Excel Services 2007: link
32-bit Excel Services 2007: link

KB Articles have been posted as well:

Excel 2007: link
Excel Services 2007: link

We are in the process of adding this fix to Microsoft Update so that it will get automatically pushed to users running Excel 2007 or Excel Services 2007. Additionally, the fix will also be contained in the first service pack of Office 2007 when it is released (the release date for SP1 of Office 2007 has not been finalized).

Thank you for your patience,

The Excel Team

We still have a few machines running Office 2003 around here. If you do too, then by all means, get updated!

It’s quite possible the Microsoft Update service has already pushed these updates out to you earlier this week. Otherwise, you’ll need to go through Office Update or hit the Microsoft website and grab the update directly yourself (as linked below). Regular Windows Update does not check for updates to Microsoft Office; we recommend you upgrade to the more advanced and inclusive (and still free) Microsoft Update service.

Customers that retain us for software updates and security audits should have received these updates already, automatically.

[...] The Microsoft Office division has just released Service Pack 3 for 2003, and it is available for download through Office Update or directly from Microsoft’s web site.

The update includes a number of hotfixes that were released post-SP2, as well as some new tweaks. New fixes in Excel include performance improvements for loading files over slow networks and updates to the error-reporting service. Word gets fixes for many formatting errors, as well as for the problem some users had copying and pasting text from web pages. Powerpoint gets attention for problems with the “Package for CD” feature. In addition to bug fixes, SP3 contains numerous security patches to close recently-discovered holes.

[...]

(Snippet from ArsTechnica. Image from Microsoft.)

You’ve long been able to go to a local retailer for some time and pick up a “student” edition of Office for around $150 (often on sale for less after instant or mail-in rebates). You’ve never had to prove your student status for those items, and it became a relatively inexpensive way to obtain a “standard” version of Office for pretty cheap.

Plenty of college campuses have done deals with Microsoft as well, offering Office and other MS products for ridiculously low prices (realizing, of course, that student tuition and fees are subsidizing that to some degree). $10 copies of Windows, $20 copies of Office, etc weren’t unheard of.

Microsoft is trying something new; it may or may not be for you, though (keep reading).

Starting today, they’re offering Office Ultimate 2007 for $60. Early word is it will be download-only. The program goes live later today (around 1pm US-Central time, although the site’s countdown clock has been a little wonky), and runs through April of next year. The website for it is here:

[LINK: theultimatesteal.com]

The exact licensing terms are still unavailable. I strongly recommend you review the license terms (once the site goes live and those terms are posted), of course. In the cases of university programs that have offered MS software in the past, sometimes students were granted perpetual licenses for any software they still owned at graduation time. Other agreements called for license suspension at graduation, or terminated licenses if you never graduated at all. Pricing has also varied wildly. No idea yet if the installation will be limited to a single PC or allow a few installs (as other “student” editions have in the past) so you end up with the home PC, the laptop, etc, all covered.

Bottom line, though: for the money, even if the license expires upon graduation, $60 through this new program is a pretty darn good deal. The suite has a retail value of $679.

ALL THAT SAID, you should still check with your university (probably your campus bookstore) and see what they’re offering. You may well get a better deal from them than this one, still.

ArsTechnica has more details on MS’ TheUltimateSteal program here:

[LINK: arstechnica.com]