I have VC++ 2005 and VC++ 2003. The 2003 one is much better for such stuff than 2005. In 2005 MS try to import their own standart witch I don't like. I think that VC++ 2003 fits the C++ standarts perfect and you will not have problems running you app on differend Windows OS's because it use the standart dll binaries.
Btw STL have most of the power in C++. You can do some things very easy with already predefined functions.