You can do anything in VB Express that you can do in VS Pro. You just might ahve to do some more of the work yourself. VB Express includes no Windows Service project template by default, but you can either create your own or else download one that someone else has made. I did the latter and now I provide the same template here for you. In Windows Explorer, navigate to your Projects folder. Now navigate up one level and then down to "Templates\ProjectTemplates\Visual Basic" and copy the attached ZIP file to that folder. DO NOT extract the files from the archive. Just copy the file as is. Now when you start a new project in VB Express you will have the option of a Windows Service. Please note that I have not used this template myself, so I cannot speak for its correctness.