Adobe's Creative Suite 4, Flash 10 Both Released

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
From our front-page news:
Adobe announced their latest Creative Suite release just over three weeks ago, and fans sure didn't have to wait long before the "Add to Cart" buttons were enabled on the official site. As always, each new application is available as an individual purchase, although the best values are found with the collections, which offer multiple applications at a nice discount.

For the ultimate in media design, the Master Collection includes pretty-well everything you could ever need for your content creation, for the healthy sum of $2,499 ($899). Seems expensive, but it's not in the grand scheme of things. If you actually have a use for all the applications included, it's a safe bet that the cost eats itself very quickly. For those who don't need quite that many tools, the Web Premium and Design Premium collections are a bit more affordable, at $1,699 and $1,799, respectively.

Prices of the other software hasn't changed much, with Photoshop Extended coming in at $999 ($349 upgrade), and Dreamweaver at $399 ($199 upgrade). For the full list of prices, you can hop over to the official store. In other news, Flash 10 has finally been released as well, for Windows, Apple and Linux. It's not so important for the end-user right now, but could be in the future, when developers begin to take full advantage of all that's new. To grab the latest version, you can go straight to the download page.

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Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced the immediate availability of the Adobe Creative Suite 4 product family, the highly-anticipated release of industry-leading design and development software for virtually every creative workflow. Delivering radical breakthroughs in workflow efficiency - and packed with hundreds of innovative, time saving features - the new Creative Suite 4 product line advances the creative process across print, Web, interactive, film, video and mobile.


Source: Adobe Press Release
 

Merlin

The Tech Wizard
I have had Photoshop since 3.5 and upgraded so far to Photoshop unlimited, that's about as far as I will go
Unlimited does everything I need for the time being, I don't think I will be going any higher

Merlin
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
Photoshop 3.5? Damn, that is OLD SCHOOL. The first version I used was PS 6, although it wasn't mine so I didn't use it too often. The first version I used on a regular basis was PS 7, which is what got me addicted to the software. That version could do things easily that I can't even figure out how to do with CS3... it's whacked.

What the heck is Photoshop Unlimited though? I've never heard of it.
 

Merlin

The Tech Wizard
Photoshop 3.5? Damn, that is OLD SCHOOL. The first version I used was PS 6, although it wasn't mine so I didn't use it too often. The first version I used on a regular basis was PS 7, which is what got me addicted to the software. That version could do things easily that I can't even figure out how to do with CS3... it's whacked.

What the heck is Photoshop Unlimited though? I've never heard of it.
( Old Merlin rubs his head..... )

I meant to say Photoshop Extended instead of extreme ( although it WAS an extreme upgrade price

Merlin
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Photoshop 3.5? Damn, that is OLD SCHOOL. The first version I used was PS 6, although it wasn't mine so I didn't use it too often. The first version I used on a regular basis was PS 7, which is what got me addicted to the software. That version could do things easily that I can't even figure out how to do with CS3... it's whacked.

What the heck is Photoshop Unlimited though? I've never heard of it.

First Photoshop I used was Photoshop Elements 4. Eventually I got my hands on an affordable copy of Photoshop CS3... and to my horror not only was the entire menu system changed, but they even changed, modified, or removed words and menu options to something else in CS3. Almost nothing was left alone.

Basically Elements was a dumbed down Photoshop with a menu system anyone could quickly get used to and figure out. Photoshop CS3's menu system is almost if they decided to make the menu system exactly as they wanted it, leaving it to the user to learn it.

I'm interested in trying CS4 though... native 64bit and full GPU hardware support for a change... and some of the new tools are simply incredible to see. Link It's even cooler once you can see the size of the image and the detail...
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
I agree... some of the simplest things change from version to version, and it's needless. As I mentioned above, I used to be able to do a few things in PS7 that were simple, but when CS came out, I was lost. I still haven't figured out how to accomplish the same thing (I admit I didn't look that hard though).

Elements is wicked though, depending on what you need done. I think the last version I used was 3, and I was impressed by how simple it was to use. I think they are up to 7 now... I wouldn't mind checking it out again.

That link is awesome... good to see that's possible. I don't immediately have a need for something like that, but it's cool to know it's possible. I think that feature alone is accredited to a few coders Adobe picked up in the past year, so they really put them to work fast.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Just remember Elements has many of the advanced background masking/removal tools removed. So if ya plan to check it out, make sure to double-check they didn't remove the tools you are looking for!

That was the only reason I ugpraded at all, something like 3 of the 5 different tools you'd use to easily remove backgrounds in photos were removed from Elements 4. Photo retouching/fixing tools also weren't nearly as extensive, but I don't remember anything beyond the background masking tools as I was the most peeved about that. ;)

A friend of mine pointed out that link. He told me the guy who wrote the algorithm required for that to work did it as a thesis or something, and Adobe hired him outright to build it into CS4 for some big bucks.
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
Well, I have a slew of CS3 programs here, so I don't plan to "downgrade", but I like the fact that Elements is just a lot easier to use... it's something I could get my mom to use to edit her own photos with. Photoshop to most people is just a little over-the-top, and understandably so. Even I don't know how to do a few simple things with it... things that even the GIMP can do without issue.

Kudos on actually purchasing the software, by the way. I hate the mindset that it's fine to just download something because it's too expensive. Photoshop is actually worth the cash as long as you want to take things a little seriously. If not, then it's undoubtedly a hefty investment.

As for that algorithm... your friend is right. I read about it a while ago and remember being impressed then... so it was good to see Adobe put that cool work into their own product.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Well, it pays to be a student *cough*. They only have CS3 though, might be a long while before they get CS4 around.

As for Elements 4, I found it for $40 at a Costco. Elements 7 is supposed to be $100 now, but I bet someone has some discounts on it... or at least some hefty discounts on Elements 6.
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
From what I remember Elements being able to do, even $100 seems like a wicked price. After all, it can do a lot that Photoshop can (within reason), but that costs around $700 outside of a bundle. I'm sure they have a trial though... I'll have to give it a go soon, whenever I find myself in Windows for reasons other than to just make graphs for our reviews, hah.
 

Merlin

The Tech Wizard
You have me curious, so I got the demo.
I must say I'm impressed with the way they all link together from start to finish of a project, yet 1,600.00 USD or 599.00 Upgrade would have to warrant, to what the project would render in profit.
I just do a few of my own projects, just for fun, so that kind of cash in these economic times is just not feasable.
Now if I won the Mega Millions Lottery...hey...no sweat

Merlin
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
You must be talking about one of the suites, not Photoshop Elements :p

For the suites to be of real use, you have to be well-versed in a variety of applications, because though it might seem like the perfect solution for a small team, it's not. It can only be registered on one PC at a time, and I know this well because I have one, and it's aggravating to deactivate all the time just to use it on a secondary PC.

So... for someone to be able to take full-advantage of everyone inside one of these collections, they really have to be using them for a living, or at least a serious hobby. I'd love to know how to use half of the applications Adobe has... especially Adobe Acrobat. Some of them are so daunting for a user who has no idea where to start.

Course that's no excuse, given there are thousands of tutorials out there (and even a few on the included DVD).
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
anyone know if the 800 to upgrade is worth it?

Upgrade from what? If you have CS3 then it's "only" $200 to upgrade.

If you are talking about upgrading from elements... probably not. You'd need to be a photograph buff, web publisher, or some such, otherwise I'd say just keep the 800 and Elements. ;)
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Honestly I'm not sure, I've not had a chance to try CS4 and spot the differences. Native 64bit support, full GPU hardware acceleration, and some of the newer advanced tools (that I'd probably never use) are all very nice incentives... but not sure if they're worth 200 quid.
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
CS4 has some cool new features (I haven't use any yet), but I'm not sure it'd be worth the upgrade price from CS3. Waiting two generations will add even more value to that upgrade $.
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
Each of their products have different eligibilities for upgrading, and there is a cut-off. Photoshop CS, CS2 and CS3 can all be upgraded to CS4 for $199. The Extended version is a little more expensive to upgrade to... $349.
 
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