Problems with finding a good compiler

Been looking around. I found some info to get me started coding C (I play Furcadia fairly regularly. Its odd how similar some of the coding basics are, which is helping me some), but I need to find a compiler that is simple to use. I have Cygwin, but it confuses me beyond belief (maybe because I don't see a help file or anything), but I'm hoping someone knows where to find a good, simple compiler I could use.


BTW, for anyone else having troubles, go to http://www.thefreecountry.com/compilers/cpp.shtml
and look through that site. It has alot of nice, FREE software from what I can tell

If you're looking to compile Smaug, you'll need either Cygwin (since Smaug was made for *nix) or get WinSmaug and somehow use that source with a compiler. Personally I've only worked under linux, using neither Cygwin or WinSmaug. But there are topics out there that can help you.

If you can, i would recommend to dual boot windows with linux rather than using cygwin, my reason is that you then get to use the Kdevelop IDE. Not being old school means i have a dislike to VI, JOE, VIM and all their friends.

I use Dev-C++ for everything except my mud. Its good, its free, its fantastic. You can find it at http://www.bloodshed.net. Another good compiler I used to use was lcc-win32. Anyways, Dev-C++ can handle basically anything you throw at it. I'm sure it could probably compile a window's distribution of SMAUG if you tried.