No more VC6 versions of PHP 5.3.x?

Question

I need to install PHP 5.3.x (preferably x >= 4) on Windows box running Apache. Unfortunately, in the PHP downloads page, I cannot find any PHP 5.3.x compiled with VC6. So...

• Can I use the VC9 binaries on Apache?
• If so, how? Do I have to do anything special?

Answer 1

From the release announcement:

Windows users: please mind that we do no longer provide builds created with Visual Studio C++ 6. It is impossible to maintain a high quality and safe build of PHP for Windows using this unmaintained compiler.

For Apache SAPIs (php5_apache2_2.dll), be sure that you use a Visual Studio C++ 9 version of Apache. We recommend the PHP builds as provided by ApacheLounge. For any other SAPI (CLI, FastCGI via mod_fcgi, FastCGI with IIS or other FastCGI capable server), everything works as before. Third party extension providers must rebuild their extensions to make them compatible and loadable with the Visual Studio C++9 builds that we no longer provide.

http://www.apachelounge.com/download/

Answer 2

http://www.apachelounge.com/viewtopic.php?t=2743 - In this thread, they say that using VC9 PHP is not recommended at all with VC6 Apache, even though it might work at first. They don't say why.

http://windows.php.net/qa/ - Here, they also state not to use PHP5.3 VC9 with Apache compiled with VC6 (and also don't state why).

I think it might be best to upgrade your Apache to the VC9 version: http://www.apachelounge.com/download/