I have just read a post from Scott Wiltamuth (C# Product Unit Manager) where he states the following;

We have plans for two service pack releases for the first part of 2006:

• VS 2003 SP1 is scheduled for April 2006.  We have done much of the work for this release already, and are anxious to get it to you.
  • VS 2005 SP1 is scheduled for the first half of 2006.  We will be more specific about the date in a few months, once we have more customer data.</ul> </blockquote> I think it is great to get advanced notice about the estimated release schedule for service packs as it helps us in our planning. Thanks for the notice Scott.