IDEs can help in many ways. Visual Studio does put a LOT of stuff into the IDE, including the ability to manage servers (Databases, Event Logs, etc.).
If youre evaluating what IDEs have, it could be a LONG list. The simple text editing features alone could cover a few pages. Integration with other tools - either automatically or through "Add-Ins" - could be another few pages. Is this for school or just for you to compare what YOU might like? If its a specific set of features youre looking for, Id concentrate on those. What I mean is, if youre "just" programming, look for an IDE that has a lot of text editing/searching features. If youre looking to list out the importance of an IDE in a business environment, then youd concentrate more on the integration with a "business" developer (database integration, server integration, etc.).
Some IDEs only handle windows programming while others only do Web. Some are, more or less, specific to a language or two while others are mainly JUST text editors with some config files to make it look like an "IDE". If you include those "text editors", the list could get big quick. Look at UltraEdit, TextEdit, MultiEdit, JEdit, and more - they all can do programming (compiling), integration with source control tools, and more.
-nerseus