Microsoft has withdrawn VS2008 in favor of VS2010. The express version is also unavailable for download. We can still get a VC++ 2008 compiler required to build extensions for the official Python 2.6 and 2.7 binary installers here (Windows 7 SDK for .NET 3.5 SP1): http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=71DEB800-C591-4F97-A900-BEA146E4FAE1&displaylang=en <http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=71DEB800-C591-4F97-A900-BEA146E4FAE1&displaylang=en> Download today, before it goes away! It is possible to build C and Fortran extensions for Python 2.6/2.7 on x86 using mingw. Microsoft's compiler is required for C++ or amd64 though. (Intel's C/C++ compiler requires VS2008, which has now perished.) Microsoft has now published a download for Windows 7 SDK for .NET 4. It has the VC++ 2010 compiler. It can be a matter of days before the VC++ 2008 compiler is totally unavailable. Sturla Molden