I agree with Brian.  In my case, it will take at least 6 months to test, wait for a service pack, test again and then get management buy in.  By that time, it will end up being more of a 2006 implementation. 

We were able to upgrade from SQL 7 to 2000 in a very shore time frame due to the smaller amount of changes.  I just don't see how that would be possible here, unless this is one of the few times when Microsoft get's it right the first time.  Their track record on first releases is not good.

As Steve Brett said: rant over