Add as a preferred source on Google


News

Microsoft to Cut Visual Studio Prices for 2005 Versions

Microsoft this week unveiled pricing for its Visual Studio 2005 family of integrated development environment products.

The pricing announcements normally come at the release to manufacturing stage, which appears to be at least several months away. Early pricing was also announced last month for SQL Server 2005, which should be available at about the same time as Visual Studio 2005.

Microsoft says the new prices are reduced from Visual Studio .NET 2003 prices, and also opened promotions for MSDN subscriptions, the primary way most developers buy access to the Visual Studio toolset.

The estimated retail pricing for Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition and Visual Studio 2005 Tools for the Microsoft Office System will be $800 or $550 for an upgrade. A Visual Studio 2005 Standard Edition will retail for $300 and be available as an upgrade for $200. A new Express Edition, primarily for novice developers, will cost $50.

The key new addition to Visual Studio in the 2005 generation is the Visual Studio Team System, designed to support the application development lifecycle from development to deployment. The Team System will consist of three Team Editions, one each for Software Developers, Software Architects and Software Testers. Volume licenses for the Team System start at $3,191, including Software Assurance.

In advance of the availability of Visual Studio 2005, Microsoft is introducing an immediate pricing promotion for MSDN subscriptions, which will allow for an upgrade to various Visual Studio components, assuming the MSDN subscriptions don't expire before Visual Studio 2005 ships. The MSDN Universal subscription will be $2,500 new or $2,000 for an upgrade and include access to any one of the three Team System editions. An MSDN Enterprise subscription will cost $2,200 or $1,600 for an upgrade and include access to the Team Edition for Software Developers.

About the Author

Scott Bekker is editor in chief of Redmond Channel Partner magazine.

Featured

  • Microsoft Dismantles RedVDS Cybercrime Marketplace Linked to $40M in Phishing Fraud

    In a coordinated action spanning the United States and the United Kingdom, Microsoft’s Digital Crimes Unit (DCU) and international law enforcement collaborators have taken down RedVDS, a subscription based cybercrime platform tied to an estimated $40 million in fraud losses in the U.S. since March 2025.

  • Sound Wave Illustration

    CrowdStrike's Acquisition of SGNL Aims to Strengthen Identity Security

    CrowdStrike signs definitive agreement to purchase SGNL, an identity security specialist, in a deal valued at about $740 million.

  • Microsoft Acquires Osmos, Automating Data Engineering inside Fabric

    In a strategic move to reduce time-consuming manual data preparation, Microsoft has acquired Seattle-based startup Osmos, specializing in agentic AI for data engineering.

  • Linux Foundation Unites Major Tech Firms to Launch Agentic AI Foundation

    The Linux Foundation today announced the creation of a new collaborative initiative — the Agentic AI Foundation (AAIF) — bringing together major AI and cloud players such as Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic and other major tech companies.

Most   Popular