We present the results of XMM-Newton survey of the northern part of the disk of M31 .
The results of a spectral and timing analysis of the thirty seven brightest sources are presented .
Combining the results of X-ray analysis with available data at other wavelengths , we were able to classify \sim 50 \% , or 19 out of 37 sources .

Two sources in our sample were previously unknown : the hard X-ray source XMMU J004415.8+413057 and a transient supersoft source XMMU J004414.1+412206 .
We report the discovery of possible X-ray pulsations from the source XMMU J004415.8+413057 with a period of 197 s. The spectral and timing properties of XMMU J004415.8+413057 make it first accreting X-ray pulsar candidate detected in M31 .

We found six X-ray sources to be coincident with M31 globular cluster ( GC ) candidates .
The spectral properties of GC sources were found to be similar to that of the bright Galactic low mass X-ray binaries located in the bulge and globular clusters .
The comparison of the X-ray properties of GC sources with optical properties of their host globular clusters has shown that the brightest sources with luminosity , L _ { X } 
above \sim 10 ^ { 38 } ergs s ^ { -1 } tend to reside in more metal poor clusters .

Three X-ray sources were identified with SNR based on their X-ray spectra and positional coincidence with SNR candidates from optical and radio surveys .
We found five bright X-ray sources to coincide with Galactic foreground stars .
Two of them demonstrate a remarkable variability of X-ray flux on a time scale of individual XMM-Newton observations .
Two X-ray sources coincide with radio sources and are probably distant radio galaxies/AGN .

The properties of the remaining 18 bright X-ray sources detected in our survey are consistent with AGN in the background of M31 and X-ray binaries belonging to M31 .
Many of them show high values of low-energy absorption , which combined with extreme faintness of their possible optical counterparts makes them an obscured AGN candidates .

We report on the first unambiguous detection of the soft unresolved X-ray emission from the disk of M31 .
The unresolved emission follows the pattern of the spiral arms and can be traced up to distance of \sim 0.5 \arcdeg ( \sim 7 kpc at 760 kpc ) from the center of the galaxy .
The spectrum of the unresolved emission shows dominant soft thermal component which can be fitted with a \sim 0.3 keV optically thin thermal plasma emission models .
We suggest that significant part of this diffuse soft X-ray component may represent hot diffuse gas in the spiral arms of M31 and emission from normal stars in the disk of M31 . Subject headings : galaxies : individual ( M31 ) — X-rays : galaxies — X-rays : stars