Office System (2003) SP3 Slipstreaming

Published: Jan 07, 2009

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How can I slipstream service packs into Office System (2003)?


Like in previous versions of Office and their corresponding Service Packs, SP3 can be slipstreamed into an administrative installation point of Office 2003, in order to allow for a fully integrated installation. This scenario explains how to create an integrated installation of Office System (2003) and the corresponding service pack in a shared distribution folder on a network or on your local computer. To complete this procedure, you must have the original Office 2003 CD media.

Note: This explanation is based upon usage of Office System (2003) and SP3, but will also work for any future service packs. For Office XP integrated installations see “Office XP SP1/2/3 Slipstreaming“.

Prerequisites for slipstreaming


Before we begin anything, you’ll need to have a few things:

  1. Office System (2003) CD
  2. You will need the Administrative Update of Service Pack 3. It can be downloaded from HERE (117mb)
    No, the regular SP won’t do.
    Note: For languages other than English you’ll need the Office 2003 Multilanguage SP which is available HERE
  3. Around 650MB of free space on one of your hard drives.
  4. A CDR/CDRW drive, CD burning software and (This is actually only optional, but if you want to burn the resulting slipstreamed Office 2003 then you’ll need it).

Step 1: Perform an administrative installation


Do NOT just copy your CD to your HD! Doing so will cause the setup files to grow to more than 900mb, and you will not be able to burn them to CD.

Instead, use the following steps:

  1. Insert the Office System (2003) CD into your drive, from the “Start” button select “Run” and type

    Lamer Note: X: is the physical drive your CD drive is assigned. Notice there is a space between the “setup.exe” and the “/”.
    This is going to start the install process of Office 2003. You’ll be presented with the option of where you want the files to go (I chose “G:\Office2003”), and you’ll be asked to enter your CD key.
    slip1 small1

    Network Installation Note: If you plan to use this installation point to install Office 2003 from the network of via Group Policy (GPO) you must first create a folder on your server, share it, and then browse to that share via the network path, NOT the local path.
  2. After entering the CD key, you’ll be presented with the End User License Agreement. Accept it then continue.
    slip2 small1
  3. It’s going to appear to be installing, but in fact your files are being copied over to your hard drive.
    slip3 small1 slip4 small1
  4. The completion window will pop up and the entire Office 2003 CD is now copied to your hard drive.
  5. Take a look at the folder’s properties, it should be approximately 624mb in size (that’s for Office Professional Enterprise Edition 2003).
    slip5 small1

Step 2: Extract the Service Pack files


The next step is to decompress the Administrative Update into a folder on your hard drive.

Read my lips: You need the administrative version of SP3 to perform the slipstreaming process. The regular SP won’t do. Download it from the link at the Prerequisites section above.

  1. Locate the SP3 file (see the Prerequisites section above). The file name should be
    Office2003SP2-KB887616-FullFile-ENU.exe
  2. Extract the .MSP files from within the SP3 download. You can do so by using a 3rd party extraction tool such as WinZip or WinRAR, or, if you want, you can use this command:

    (where folder is the path to where you’ve downloaded SP3 and D:\Office2003SP3 is the folder to where you’ll extract the SP3 files. Use your own path if necessary)
    Lamer Note: The above command is ONE line. Just copy and paste.
    Note: If you double-click the downloaded EXE file, installation of the SP3 patch begins automatically. You DO NOT want to do that. So DO NOT double-click the file. Run the above command instead.
    After extracting the SP3 files you’ll end up with a few files:
    office 2003 sp3 3 small

Step 3: Apply SP to the installation files


Start the “Run” command from your “Start” menu again. Enter the following command:




Where D:\Office2003SP2 is the path where the SP3 files are located, and D:\Office2003 is the folder where the Office 2003 files were copied during step #1. Just copy the above line and change the folder locations to ease your typing and reduce spelling mistakes.

Lamer note: Please, please use your OWN drive letters and folder names…

This will update the core components.

office 2003 sp3 1 small

Note that you will not receive any message telling you that the process was indeed successful.

Once that is done, you’ll need to update the web components. Start the “Run” command from your “Start” menu again. Enter the following command:



Where D:\Office2003SP3 is the path where the SP3 files are located, and D:\Office2003 is the folder where the Office 2003 files were copied. Just copy the above line and change the folder locations to ease your typing and reduce spelling mistakes.

Lamer note: Duh…

Again, note that you will not receive any message telling you that the process was indeed successful.

Step 4: Burn the files to a CD (optional)


Use your favorite CD-Burning software and burn the D:\Office2003 folder to a CD. You don’t need instructions for that, do you?

Note that after slipstreaming SP3 the D:\Office2003 folder is approximately 646mb in size:

office 2003 sp3 2 small

Lamer note: Do NOT e-mail me with complaints that the CD-key I gave you doesn’t work. I never gave you any CD-key, the keys listed on my site are all samples, not true keys.

Another Lamer note: Do NOT e-mail me with complaints about the size of the Office 2003 folder and that it cannot fit into one CD. It can, and if you don’t know how to follow these simple instructions then you’d better go and find yourself another job.

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