Office 2008 For Mac Most Successful Microsoft Mac Launch Ever

Launched at MacWorld 2008 in January, Office 2008 for Mac has sold faster than any previous version of the software launched in its 19-year history.

"The response has been amazing -- since we launched in January, the velocity of sales for Office 2008 is nearly three times what we saw after the launch of Office 2004," said Craig Eisler, general manager of Microsoft's Mac Business Unit, in a statement. "As we set our course for future versions, we are working closely with customers and will also expand our staff to ensure that Office for Mac remains the most powerful and compatible productivity suite for Mac customers."

The Service Pack 1 (SP1) should increase stability, security and performance across the suite, Microsoft said, and the Redmond, Wash.-based company is bringing back Visual Basic for Applications in the next version of the software.

SP1 incorporates issues identified by users through the Microsoft Error Reporting Protocol and other forums and tools.

Updates to Microsoft Office Excel improve compatibility between Excel 2008 for Mac files and Excel 2003 and 2007 files for Windows. The formatting option on the Error Bars panel has returned and printing capabilities have been improved.

Entourage is receiving updates to the calendar, Exchange Server support and the ability to view images in Entourage from third-party tools.

Word has improved printing, document mapping and notebook layout features, and PowerPoint will now supposedly crash less often when users try to print to high-dpi printers.