Alternative to Visual Studio?

[Aletheia]

Hi, everyone. I'm taking my first programming class this year, using Microsoft Visual Studio. As a self-respecting Microsoft hater... I actually kind of like it. Anyway, I got the opportunity through the class to get Visual Studio at home for free (or for $35 if I decide to order the cds). I really want to do this, so I can practice programming at home, but I know that Visual Studio is going to completely kill my rather cheap laptop. Are there any other good visual programming, err, programs? What do you all use to program?

[Midori]

I just use a terminal and a text editor. Of course, I program mostly in Perl...

[Warrior4Christ]

I normally use a command line compiler + text editor too. But not Perl.

Do you mean 'visual programming' as in drag and drop layout of windowing component? Or do you mean IDE? Eclipse is a good open source IDE that covers a few languages.