Upcoming Product Life-Cycle Transitions

The following chart shows dates through 2006 on which selected Microsoft products will transition from one type of support to another.

The major support categories are as follows:

Mainstream: Free critical and important security and nonsecurity updates; customers can request design or feature changes; paid problem resolution and advisory services available. Covers all products. Any service packs are typically released during this phase.

Extended: Free critical and important security updates; paid problem resolution and advisory services available; noncritical/important security and hotfixes require Extended Hotfix Support Agreement. Covers selected business and developer software only.

Custom: Custom Support contract required for critical and important security and nonsecurity updates and for problem resolution and advisory services. Covers only specific products.

For a complete list of product support dates, consult Microsoft’s support life-cycle pages at support.microsoft.com/gp/lifeselect.