getting MSVC out of debug mode.

when i go into the project>settings dialog and change the 'settings for' combo box to 'Win32 Release' it changes all the project settings to get a exe without the debug info, but when i push ok, and go back and check it again everything is still like it was before. no changes?

What you are doing is changing the project settings for debug or release. What you want to do is from the menu select Build then Set active configuration then select one of the configurations available.