Do you run Microsoft Office 2003 and can’t read files created by Office 2007? it isn’t necessary to update to Office 2007 to be able to read these files.

Microsoft has a “Compatibility Pack” which makes it so Office 2003 users can read and write to Office 2007 created files. It is a pretty simple install and works quite well.

This will work for files created with MS Office 2007 products Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.

You can tell a file created with an Office 2007 flavor as it will have an “x” added to the file extension; for example, a Word document will show .docx, while a file created in Word XP/2003 will have a regular .doc extension, such as .doc. This is due to the XML extensions now part of Office 2007 files.

Find the download here.

Do note that you will need to have your system fully patched through Windows Update.