Microsoft Office 2007 Service Pack 2

Microsoft Office 2007 is a suite of productivity software titles for Window that are developed by Microsoft. It was released in late 2006 to volume license customers and then in early 2007 to retail customers. This was done to coincide with the release dates for Windows Vista. This suite was meant to replace Microsoft Office 2003. This suite is the first to use a new GUI system called Fluent User Interface, which replaced the old menu and toolbars. It was also the introduction to a slew of brand new applications and server-side tools that included Microsoft Office Groove. This program offers many new and exciting applications, but it is not without its fair share of problems and issues. To combat these issues, Service Pack 2 for Microsoft Office 2007 was made available sometime after the initial release of the main suite.

According to Microsoft, Service Pack 2 was meant to boost performances of all included programs, such as Outlook. Official channels were boasting performance enhancements as high as thirty-five percent. In addition, Service Pack 2 would support an even larger range of file formats. Of these newly included file formats, the Portable Document Format (PDF) is one of the most eagerly anticipated. With Service Pack 2, the business software suite, including Outlook, will gain a huge update in performance. Outlook in particular will see a noticeable increase in stability, especially when it comes to calendaring.

Service Pack 2 also features huge improvements in functionality for Excel, Microsoft Office's spreadsheet program. This update increases the ease with which charts are created and manipulated across the program. Additionally, there has been a boost in control of SmartArt graphics. With Service Pack 2, users will also be able to open and use Open Document Format (ODF) and Portable Document Format (PDF) files.

The Microsoft Office SharePoint Server software program will also see quite a bit of improvement as of Service Pack 2. In this update, SharePoint now includes greater security and performance. Additionally, the latest versions of the Firefox browser are now supported.

The productivity suite also sees hundreds of improvements and enhancements thanks to Service Pack 2. One of the biggest improvements is that OpenDocument format files will now be supported in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. All Office applications will also now have the ability to save files as PDF documents. Outlook has also been optimized and will now support IMAP and RSS. The Outlook program will also have a faster startup, syncing, and search capability. Overall, Service Pack 2 comes with patches and fixes for over six hundred bugs and glitches.

The inclusion of Service Pack 2 will provide for the ultimate Windows Office 2007 experience, but users must first experience the greatest hurdle: the large file size. At around 290 MB, Service Pack 2 is as beastly as it is useful. People with faster internet connections will find such a download size a mere inconvenience, but those with slow connections or metered internet are advised to plan accordingly.

PROS:

• Over 600 fixes
• Big improvements for business suite software like Outlook

CONS:

• Huge file size