The 2005 Express Edition is very good, I use it myself and I'd highly recommend it. Your free alternatives that I'm aware of are Dev-C++ and Code::Blocks, both of which also make a perfectly fine development environment for a beginner. If you're planning on shelling out the cash for the Visual Studio Standard Edition at some point I'd definately say you might as well go with the Express Edition for now so that at least you'll be working with a similar environment.

Some beginners do seem to find Dev-C++ a little easier to set up for basic learning projects judging from a few of the comments I've seen though.

Well, I don't consider myself a newbie with C/C++, and I'm almost intermediately skilled in C# now. But I'd still consider myself semi-newbie with DirectX.

I started C/C++ using Dev-C++ 4. I liked it. It's a nice environment, and I found it very easy to use. But then I decided I wanted to get into more "hardcore" programming. LoL. I really wanted to learn MFC. So I purchased Visual Studio 6.0 Pro, because I found it for really cheap. =P I liked it.

LoL, I used VS 6 up until about 6-7 months ago, when I found a fairly cheap copy of VS .NET 2003 Pro. Then, I downloaded VC++/VC# 2005 Express from MS's website. I liked them even better, and I wanted to start getting into .NET development even more, and be up-to-date. =P

About 2 months ago, I purchased VS .NET 2005 Pro. And I'm loving every minute of it. LoL. I mainly do C# programming now, whether it's Windows Forms applications, Database applications (MS Access/SQL), or MDX. It just depends on the mood I'm in when I get that urge to program. =)

But I'd recommend VS 2005 Standard if you're a hobbyist programmer. I am a hobbyist programmer myself. But the "Professional" package was actually a gift from my family, for my b-day in April. So I guess it was ALMOST 2 months ago. =P That's the only package they could find -- the first one they could find. So they got it for me. They know how much I love programming.

As long as you have the money. It's not too expensive. But it's not the cheapest either. I apologize for such a long post. But I thought I'd give you my feedback, because I started with Dev-C++, and moved my way up to VS 2005 now. =) Sorry!

-- Matt U.

I was using Visual Studio 2005 Beta until about a month ago when the evaluation period expired (it lasted a good year or so at least). Currently using Express and am very happy with it =)

2k5 express for windows or if I have a choice in the matter.

Visual Studio 2005 Academic Version
Cost of admission: student id and $49.99 . . .

I feel guilty, as if I'm supposed to be using the GCC or DevC++ as it seems to be the elitist programmer's choice.
Honestly, I used DevC++ during my early days doing C++ and tried an evaluation of Borland, but from Visual C++ 6 to .Net 2003 to this new one, the Microsoft IDE is simply my favorite.

Codeblocks for me although I would use VS200X for anything DirectX related.