I'd say "jump in" and start using VFP9. While there are probably some issues (not that I'm aware of any) that might get fixed in an SP, I really doubt that there are any showstoppers. For me the new features are really great. And it's such a drag to have to be coding in a previous version and writing kludged code that in the next version would be very simple and elegant.

And, as you said, VFP9 has some fixes that has helped you already.

And this is not like the "bad old days", if anyone remembers when the first FoxPro shipped and we'd be jumping back and forth between releases like the August release. No, no, don't use the August release. Use the March release. Wait, huge problems in March release. Use August.