Where is Visual Studio 2005 Express?

Question

I'm working on a project that requires Visual Studio 2005 and I've been trying to find a legitimate download site for Visual Studio 2005 Express, but it seems like Microsoft only wants people to download the 2008 version instead.

Anyone knows why it's like this and if there is some link somewhere where Visual Studio 2005 Express is available?

Answer 1

why don't you get VS 2008? and they say that your project is a .NET 2.0 project? or you are editing a .NET 1.x project?

With VS 2008 (express or not) you can target the projects to what framework you want!

Answer 2

I found the ISO Visual Studio VB 2005 Express at

http://apdubey.blogspot.com/2009/04/microsoft-visual-studio-2005-express.html

Answer 3

Incase anybody is looking for the Web Developer Express 2005 version CNET has it here:

http://download.cnet.com/Visual-Web-Developer-2005-Express-Edition/3000-10250_4-10421166.html

Believe this only works for windows 2000 and XP.

Answer 4

I belive that VS 2008 (all editions) will only work with .NET 2.0 to 3.5 just as VS 2005 (all editions) will only work with .NET 2.0. This is the reason that VS 2005 is no longer available, because its features are duplicated by VS 2008. The only difference is the solution file, so you could make a seperate solution file for VS 2008.

Answer 5

Here are more links: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/Vsexpressvcs/thread/290fb587-1447-466c-9149-a692fa5de34d They seem to point to the same files.

The direct download link: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=51411&clcid=0x409

Answer 6

In case anyone else needs the VS 2005 Express Editions for whatever reason (e.g. I needed this particular version a while ago to verify/reproduce a bug), this page: http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2006/03/28/563660.aspx has links to all versions (Visual Basic, C++, C#, J#) which still seem to be working.