Has anyone managed to get Visual Studio 2003 running on Windows 7?

Question

Yes, I know... I could set up a virtual machine running XP. Unfortunately our build environment is such that we need to be running VC2003, 2005 and 2008 concurrently and it

Answer 1

PATCH NOW AVAILABLE
After some reverse-engineering, I found the incorrectly refcounted COM object responsible for the leak (it was off by 1) and developed a stable patch and corresponding article describing the fix. This addresses problems encountered while using Windows 7 thru Windows 10. Details and download available at:

http://bytepointer.com/articles/vs7.1_2003_on_win7_pdb_handle_leak_bug_unofficial_fix.htm

If you want to perform the patch manually, those details are also included.

NOTE: The SysInternals Handle tool workaround did not work for files on a network-share. The .PDB was not completely unlocked although the Handle tool claimed it was closed. My fix eliminates the problem once and for all and avoids any side effects.

Answer 2

I wrote a blog entry about this a while back that you can check out - http://technikhil.wordpress.com/2010/01/12/visual-studio-2003-and-windows-7-can-get-along-really/

The only thing I am stuck on right now is the global search functionality of VS 2003 - it hangs the application. My workaround is to use windows 7 search :-). Other than that - so far so good...

Update: I got the search to work as well by disabling the Aero functionality - I have updated my blog post with the details...

Answer 3

I have attempted to install VS2003 on Windows 7 64-bit using the Virtual Windows XP feature. I'm reasonably certain that this will be successful. The issue I ran into is that the installer wants IIS installed, and the XP installation provided by the Virtual XP doesn't have that enabled by default.

If you go to Add/Remove components, and try to add it, it will ask for the disc, which I didn't have on hand. Once I get my hands on the disc, I'm pretty sure that it will run fine.

If you haven't tried it for other apps, the Virtual XP feature is really neat...

Answer 4

Solution i found on the web which helped: For your visual studio, use application compatibility = windows vista SP2, and NOT WinXP SP3

Answer 5

I've been using Visual studio 2003 on win7 since the very first RC edition was released :S why do people have issues?

Answer 6

I am experiencing the same issue; devenv.exe is leaving pdb files open after running the project. I have made a batch file to work around it, it closes all .pdb files open by devenv.exe:

handle.exe .pdb | awk "/devenv.exe/ { split($4, fd, \":\"); system(\"handle.exe -c \" fd[1] \" -y -p \" $3)}"

You will need to have handle.exe by sysinternals and awk by gnu in your path to make it work.

Use at your own risk. Closing handles can cause application or system instability.