Free MS Software (Legal) - DreamSpark

[zZanthraXx]

Hello all, I wanted to help out this community a little by telling you about a free service provided by Microsoft, known as Microsoft DreamSpark. The basic idea of the program is to allow students utilize professional, full version, Microsoft products free of charge. It’s pretty easy to set up, all you need is your grade card.

So what all can you get? – A LOT
• Visual Studio 2008 Pro Edition
• Visual Studio 2005 Pro Edition
• Expression Studio 2
• Windows Server 2008
• Windows Server 2003
• Xna Game Studio 2.0 (year subscription)
• MS IT Academy Student Pass (Free training)
• SQL Server 2008 (Developer)

-_-_-_-

I enjoy designing websites and web graphics, and I happen to fall in love with Expression Studio. Well studio 2 quickly came out, and now it’s completely free! You can build web pages, tweek/create graphics, render silver light applications and other WPF applications using Expression Blend. Expression Studio directly competes with what used to be Macromedia (now adobe) Flash, Fireworks, Dreamweaver set.

Using visual studio and xna, you can create rich game experiences basically free. You can develop for windows for free anyway, normally you have to pay a yearly subscription to develop for the Xbox 360- but you get a year free with dream spark (I believe it’s a $100 value). Of course you can do many other neat things with Visual Studio!
Windows Server is also a great freebie, one of the most robust OS’s out there. I currently use it to webhost and as a local host for media, there’s a lot you can do with it so start learning now!

If you plan on becoming MS certified, the Academy Free Training pass will help you out, supposedly has 22 hours of training- I have not tried it yet but am excited to.

_-_-_-_

Enough rambling- DreamSpark is to get you to learn MS products, and I suggest that you do since they are free. It costs nothing, and you can get started here:
https://www.dreamspark.com/default.aspx


You need:
Some student verification- a grade card works fine
A Microsoft passport (such as windows live, hotmail, xbox, and MS service really)
And of course you need a windows OS to run the stuff, that’s it!


**Note these are not trial versions, only the xna and training service are timed base, have fun with it!

Contact me here if you need any help! (I’m not in any way related to Microsoft, I just love this program)

 

[yogi365]

great.thanks

 

[Joe]

Great info. Thanks for the post.

 

[johngalt]

FWIW, I wrote about this over at the Vista x64 forums several months back.

Since I am a student at a college, I used my college email - I had no verification to send in, they approved me based upon my email address.

And the school I attend is pretty small (3000 students) - if that gives you an idea....

 

[zZanthraXx]

Yea, a lot of colleges work with it. I'm currently in high school still so some other form of identification was needed. It does seem a LOT easier if you're in college.

 

[darkassain]

yeah darn i why didnt i think of posting it...lol

i had it as my sig.....

i came in the days where you had to email your id to the academic superstore if you want know how long ive been in dreamspark....

they didnt have the the infrastructure and had a few universities at that time....

@well edu sites are not usually bought or given online to anyone....

 

[zZanthraXx]

me too I believe i used it the day it came out because i received an email about it.

 

[Mike]

I just finished checking out of Journey Ed as my "other form of Verification" for us United States folk. I'm excited about this

 

[darkassain]

they still do journey ed???

wow....
never thought that there still using that system still as a fallback...

 

[Mike]

Yeah, right now it's "making sure I'm eligible." Hopefully that will go through.

 

[thegr8anand]

Thanks for this man. Ill be starting in Feb and this will just perfect for my degree. Thanks again.

 

[deinseins]

My first post so hi to all.
Just wanted to let you know that it even works for universities outside the US. I just registered with them and am studying in Munich, Germany. Works perfectly, thanx alot.
deinseins

 

[garysgold]

Welcome to the Seven Forums, deinseins.

Hope you enjoy your stay.

Gary

 

[cj119]

thanxx broo

 

[xyfeihua]

great , thanks very much

 

[Win7User512]

I've been using Dreamspark, now if I can only find a good tutorial on Expression Web 2...I'm used to coding web pages by hand and this IDE is not as simple as it looks. I never used FrontPage...