The slipstream version of Office SharePoint Server 2007 Service Pack 1 is available as a free download straight from Microsoft. The Redmond company is offering users both the 32-bit and the 64-bit versions of Office SharePoint Server 2007 for Standard and Enterprise editions in a trial variant. According to Ali Mazaheri, Senior Consultant with Microsoft Consulting (Communications Sector North America), the trial period extends to a total of 140 days, during which time customers will have the possibility of converting to a licensed installation.

"These bits can be used as trial to activate standard or enterprise edition. Note these should not be installed on existing SharePoint Server 2007. The separate stand alone SP1 should be used in cases of existing installations. These downloadable bits contain the full version of SharePoint Server 2007 along with a slipstreamed copy of service pack 1. This means the installation will automatically include Service pack 1 for WSS and MOSS. (Yes, the normal installation of MOSS RTM would require you to install WSS SP1, and then MOSS SP1," explained Joel Oleson, Microsoft Senior Technical Product Manager.

At this point in time, Microsoft is offering both OfficeServer.exe weighing in at 295.0 MB, along OfficeServerwithSP1.exe (409.2 MB). The reason for this is that while the OfficeServer executable is the complete version that was released to manufacturing, OfficeServerwithSp1 is essentially the slipstreamed build containing both SharePoint RTM and the integrated Service Pack 1. With these two releases, Microsoft comes to support the release of Windows Server 2008. The latest iteration of the Windows server operating system fails to play well with both SharePoint Server 2007 RTM and WSS 3.0. Windows Server 2008 simply needs SP1.

"We do think that this is what people should use the OfficeServerwithSP1.exe on all new deployments and upgrades, but we wanted to make sure that people who are running RTM and might be rebuilding a web front end or otherwise need the release version should have easy access to it. We apologize for any confusion on this," Oleson added.

Office SharePoint Server 2007 with SP1 32-bit and 64-bit can be downloaded from here.
WSS 3.0 with SP1 (slipstream) both x86 and x64 can be grabbed via this link.