Adobe Introduces Creative Suite 5.5, Subscription Editions

[awesomebase]

Forget Adobe

Easiest solution is to skip Adobe... they've continually disregarded market "prices" for their products for years (even MS grew up to the fact that you can't charge end users $750 per license for Office when free alternatives exist). There are legitimately better applications produced by smaller companies as well as Apple without having to spend this kind of atrocious amount of money. Products from IMSI, Omni, etc. are cheap and very good. $650 for PS? Gimmie a break... it isn't worth 1/10 of that...

 

[webman2k]

I used to pirate then stopped. A responsible businessman should and in some cases has to when they use their software and hardware for legitimate purposes. It's a major tax write off at least.

I was still in college when I was using CS1 and CS2. Either way, I eventually grew up and purchased the EDU version of the software with my own cash. And at that time by the way, hacked versions were far more unstable. You couldn't update them, you had to run patching scripts ever so often, plugins wouldn't work or would crash the system etc. It was just better to have the legit copy and keep it moving instead of spending time troubleshooting your scripts.

I don't know how it is now, but I know that it was that way up until CS3 based on the students at my job that still pirated software.

I am sure said person (who doesn't work in the design field) would want to take up design and production as a part-time/tennis shoe money job to support their family yet doesn't have the money to get CS so they just steal it???????

This person wouldn't want to get a part-time job that doesn't need him to steal? Or he/she could just claim he's/she's a student/educator and pay for the EDU version . . . at the VERY LEAST.

Read the comment thoroughly. ANYONE can learn the apps, any goofball like you stated yourself in the bold. I didn't put any time restraint on this goofball. But I did mention that it take far more to be a good designer.

Yes it is IMHO. Far better than just taking it. At least you are paying something for someone's work. Using your student ID at the movies, camera shop for film and agitator, Apple store, etc is far better than just stealing from them out right.

No hard feelings bro.

All good points. Let's leave it as different people in different circumstances. For the record, it's not right for anyone to pirate software. However, there are some people, in some situations, that feel that doing the right thing at the time isn't always the best thing. Definitely no hard feelings - just discussion.

 

[Digital Skunk]

All good points. Let's leave it as different people in different circumstances. For the record, it's not right for anyone to pirate software. However, there are some people, in some situations, that feel that doing the right thing at the time isn't always the best thing. Definitely no hard feelings - just discussion.

Good discussion I might add. I agree that everyone is going to do what they feel at times. I also see that many of the older generation may have adopted this self-entitlement that the younger generation has.

If one can't afford something, you just won't have it, or have to get it through other means. If those means are illegal, then one will have to deal with the consequences of his/her actions.

 

[chaosbunny]

All this moral discussion about stealing a 1500,- bucks suite of software is pretty ridiculous if you put it into a relation to the billions of dollars/euros stolen from our tax money by the private central banks.

If a corporation steals billions that's ok, but if someone pirates a single piece of software that's theft.

The same rules should apply to everyone.

Btw, I have only legit software on my computer.

 

[gigi1701]

I hated Dreamweaver every single second I used it, and made the switch to RapidWeaver instead. A lot cheaper, a lot easier to pick up, and will grow with you as your knowledge deepens. There is a huge community of third party developers that make themes, plug-ins & extensions, and the community of users & developers are pretty open-source about sharing information and providing trouble shooting when things go awry. You can download a working demo for free...

I tried Rapidweaver, but it wasn't for me the template system seemed to get in the way when I tried it. I do a lot of CSS coding and work a lot with Wordpress. I can used other programs to write code for Wordpress, Espresso works well and I use CSSEdit for working exclusively with CSS, but there are times I want a good WYSIWYG editor for laying out pages quickly and not have to switch between a preview and code view. So far KomPozer is the one that is the closest, but it is buggy and unfinished, I always find myself going back to Dreamweaver and wishing for something else.

 

[the editor]

All this moral discussion about stealing a 1500,- bucks suite of software is pretty ridiculous if you put it into a relation to the billions of dollars/euros stolen from our tax money by the private central banks.

If a corporation steals billions that's ok, but if someone pirates a single piece of software that's theft.

The same rules should apply to everyone.

Btw, I have only legit software on my computer.

my point exactly...

I really don't get all the wankers here with all there high morals about downloading is steeling. It aint steeling, and if it was i wouldn't feel one single bit of guilt...i'm getting robed here everyday by the government, at work, hell i'm even getting robed buying grocery's...why should i be the idiot paying for something i can get for free...and don't start the "people are losing their jobs if you don't buy it" if they do than they should get in line. Here's an idea... maybe the CEO's could spare a few of their billions to help the staff out and make them keep their job...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGjSq4HqP9Y

 

[mlblacy]

I tried Rapidweaver, but it wasn't for me the template system seemed to get in the way when I tried it. I do a lot of CSS coding and work a lot with Wordpress. I can used other programs to write code for Wordpress, Espresso works well and I use CSSEdit for working exclusively with CSS, but there are times I want a good WYSIWYG editor for laying out pages quickly and not have to switch between a preview and code view. So far KomPozer is the one that is the closest, but it is buggy and unfinished, I always find myself going back to Dreamweaver and wishing for something else.

Actually i was going to mention Wordpress, but I don't use it, so...
If you are seasoned and comfortable to work in CSS, RW is probably not for you either.

The template part is what I actually love. They are malleable, and you can make your own. Coming from a magazine design background it just seemed very analogous to how I always worked and thought in print work...

 

[pdqgp]

$3,500?

No. Make that close to $1,500. Don't exaggerate.

No exaggeration here. You must not use much in the way of what I call "real" plugins and actions then. If you saw the full CS5 suite and the major plugins I use in my setup, they actually total more than $3,500. Nik's suites / packages, Topaz Suites / packages, OnOne, Andromedia, DCE Tools, Digital Anarchy, etc.....not small time dollars.

I never contemplated downloading a hacked version.

You don't have to. It involves downloading the full legit demo version and replacing one small file in the system folder. No different than any of the MS Office or Windows OS patches.

 

[pdqgp]

So if you are going to be a pirate why bother buying a student version at all?

I agree. Why buy it at all. No need. However, I wouldn't consider someone paying for a student version to be a pirate. There's a legitimate student paying money for the software. It's no business of anyone who ends up using it. The discount is offered to students, a student buys it, case closed.

 

[RebootD]

You all crack me up at least, thanks for the chuckles!

Conditional thievery is just something people do in order to justify whatever they are doing unlawfully. Downloading and cracking the Adobe suite? HIGH FIVE! Breaking into a car dealership and driving off with a car you didn't pay for? NO of course not! Because 'that's different' when it isn't. A company offers a product/service and you are using it/taking it without compensation for that item. Digital or physical it's the same thing.

In fact you may have some games that I don't own maybe I'll swing by later and take them from you free of charge. Of course you wouldn't be upset with that because hey it's only fair right?

And I know all the usual arguments "It's just a digital copy no one loses anything" and "Cars cost a lot more and you'd get arrested" The "Man" owes me, other people are idiots so I should have the right to be one too and on and on.

Humans are the only species capable of believing the lies we tell ourselves.

my point exactly...

I really don't get all the wankers here with all there high morals about downloading is steeling. It aint steeling, and if it was i wouldn't feel one single bit of guilt...i'm getting robed here everyday by the government, at work, hell i'm even getting robed buying grocery's...why should i be the idiot paying for something i can get for free...and don't start the "people are losing their jobs if you don't buy it" if they do than they should get in line. Here's an idea... maybe the CEO's could spare a few of their billions to help the staff out and make them keep their job...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGjSq4HqP9Y

 

[Steve121178]

Easiest solution is to skip Adobe... they've continually disregarded market "prices" for their products for years (even MS grew up to the fact that you can't charge end users $750 per license for Office when free alternatives exist). There are legitimately better applications produced by smaller companies as well as Apple without having to spend this kind of atrocious amount of money. Products from IMSI, Omni, etc. are cheap and very good. $650 for PS? Gimmie a break... it isn't worth 1/10 of that...

I'm using Adobe Photoshop Elements 9. For people like me it's an excellent product. It includes all the features someone like me (a keen amateur) needs and only costs £65.

Whilst Adobe's UK pricing is bordering on criminal, at least PSE is an affordable option.

 

[jlc1978]

Right. When you eat off of your gear you're always going to find ways to not spend SO MUCH on said gear so you can put more food in your mouth. Which is why I really don't have an issue claiming student-ship if I am able to. I personally don't do it with certain software titles, but I will do it with Apple hardware and others. AVID Media Composer is $2500 regular price give or take a few $100s. The EDU version is $295 . . . . . okay I am going to hop on that EDU bandwagon right now.

I agree, and am fortunate to have a legit edu connection. That said, companies vary on their proof requirements. Apple, in my experience, will give you the edu price by just saying you are a student/teacher/buying it for one. I've seen them sell a Mac at that price to grandparents, etc. Pretty decent policy. MS just requires a .edu email, but then again technet is so cheap that the edu discount pales. of course, with technet using the software in a production environment is a license violation.

Just as the lenses you acquire in still/video photography will cost more than your body, software will be the major cost in building any rig.

Oh ya. I have several pieces of glass that individually cost more than the body. People complain about software lock in; MS / APPLE ?Adobe et. al. have nothing on the camera manufacturers and their proprietary mounts.

Read the comment thoroughly. ANYONE can learn the apps, any goofball like you stated yourself in the bold. I didn't put any time restraint on this goofball. But I did mention that it take far more to be a good designer.

I agree - of course, just as digital cameras have put some sophisticated tools in the hands of amateurs, design software has done the same thing - which makes everyone with CS think they are now a "designer" just as everyone with a pro-grade dSLR thinks they are a "professional." In the end, it's the brain behind the eye that makes the difference.
Of course, the proliferation of "pros" willing to work cheap drives done prices - that's competition. Of course, when you go cheap, you often get cheap.

 

[jlc1978]

Easiest solution is to skip Adobe... they've continually disregarded market "prices" for their products for years (even MS grew up to the fact that you can't charge end users $750 per license for Office when free alternatives exist). There are legitimately better applications produced by smaller companies as well as Apple without having to spend this kind of atrocious amount of money. Products from IMSI, Omni, etc. are cheap and very good. $650 for PS? Gimmie a break... it isn't worth 1/10 of that...

While I agree Adobe is a bit pricy, they haven't ignored market pricing. They price at a level that produces sales volumes sufficient to meet profit goals. People find it worth $650 and buy it. Others don't. That's the market at work.

Could they price lower? Sure? Would the resulting increase in total profits (at a lower margin) be acceptable? Would the marginal increase in sales overcome the loss of revenue from lower prices? Don't know the answer to the latter, and it's up to Adobe to decide the answer to the former.

 

[jlc1978]

You all crack me up at least, thanks for the chuckles!

Conditional thievery is just something people do in order to justify whatever they are doing unlawfully. Downloading and cracking the Adobe suite? HIGH FIVE! Breaking into a car dealership and driving off with a car you didn't pay for? NO of course not! Because 'that's different' when it isn't. A company offers a product/service and you are using it/taking it without compensation for that item. Digital or physical it's the same thing.

The funniest are the OSS/Linux advocates who claim that "piracy isn't theft" and "it doesn't hurt anyone" and then whine like a baby when someone "violates" the GPL and call for stern measures (such as lawsuits) against the violater.

Hey, if no one is hurt when you do it then no one is hurt when someone does it to you.

 

[daceymathers]

So will this indicate CS6 end of the year?

I wonder how much Master Collection will be? $3k and your kidney

Really its too expensive.Estimated street price for the Creative Suites is expected to be Rs. 1,54,791 for CS5.5 Master Collection, Rs. 1,13,141 for CS5.5 Design Premium, Rs. 1,07,065 for CS5.5 Web Premium, Rs. 1,01,185 for CS5.5 Production Premium and Rs. 77,371 for CS5.5 Design Standard.

 

[dale223223]

If you can't pay for medical care then you should just suffer and die as well.

F ************ oxygen thieves. Survival of the fittest doesn't include the weak & poor.

Hitler knew it best.

Seriously... you all keep doing what you are doing... modern civilization will fall either way. We've been thieving from mother earth pretty heavily over the past 150 years so we'll get our's collectively as a species soon... no need to feel left out. In the meantime... I'll be keeping my $1500. Thanks.

 

[stringent]

Is this worth upgrading from CS5?

I see Adobe are doing what Quark used to do, upgrade and charge mega bucks for it. Despite Adobe saying they wouldn't do this (when they started out with InDesign) they have gotten greedy.

 

[Digital Skunk]

I agree, and am fortunate to have a legit edu connection. That said, companies vary on their proof requirements. Apple, in my experience, will give you the edu price by just saying you are a student/teacher/buying it for one. I've seen them sell a Mac at that price to grandparents, etc. Pretty decent policy. MS just requires a .edu email, but then again technet is so cheap that the edu discount pales. of course, with technet using the software in a production environment is a license violation.

Right, and 9 times out of 10 the Apple Specialist will just give you the discount just so he/she can attach Mobile Me and Applecare and whatever else . . . . . oh that was just me.

Seriously though the requirements for that EDU discount are just as you said, nothing more than mentioning it or purchasing it through an online store. At the end of the day, you will OWN your EDU copy of a software title rather than some garbled up binary from a torrent made to look like a piece of software.

Oh ya. I have several pieces of glass that individually cost more than the body. People complain about software lock in; MS / APPLE ?Adobe et. al. have nothing on the camera manufacturers and their proprietary mounts.

True! That Nikkor 85mm 1.4 I am drooling over is going for $2200, far more than the price of my $1200 D7000 (which trumps the D2xs it replaced in so many ways).

I agree - of course, just as digital cameras have put some sophisticated tools in the hands of amateurs, design software has done the same thing - which makes everyone with CS think they are now a "designer" just as everyone with a pro-grade dSLR thinks they are a "professional." In the end, it's the brain behind the eye that makes the difference.
Of course, the proliferation of "pros" willing to work cheap drives done prices - that's competition. Of course, when you go cheap, you often get cheap.

The difference here will always be just that, the final product. To a lesser but still kind of important extent it will also be turn around time. I see it every single day here at my uni job. . . students and amateurs will always be LATE. Even myself, now that I am out of the freelancing for the most part, can't get a fast turn around time on most projects.

The cheapskate amateur/pro may even do good work, but if it can't be in the clients hands on time and on budget because the Pro was busy working at his/her day job then the client will be pissed! If anything, the way the tech world is now should let the real pros know that you don't need a separate studio with $10k in lights $8k in a computer rig and another 5k in software.

Still Shooter Kit

A 17" Macbook Pro $3000
A Nikon D7000/Canon 7D $1300 ($5k in lenses still )
A 27" ACD $1000
A Drobo S for backup and scratch $1000
A Drobo FS for offsite $1000
A pack of Strobes and pocket wizards ($2000)

The world is your studio.

Videographers Kit

Take out the D7000 and replace it with or add to it a Canon XA10. $2000

 

[Ha1131ujah]

Well, I was considering purchasing from Adobe, for personal use, not business use. I don't want to use a pirated version though, and when I saw the prices they charge on their software, it floored me.

Unfortunately, they have broken down all their software into different packages, and I wanted an art program, a photo editing program, and dreamweaver...but by the time I purchase those, I may as well just purchase the master collection and get it all.

Only it's insane to think of spending that much just for personal use. Think I'll stick with my free downloads of Gimp and Paint.net. They don't cost me anything and work sufficiently well for the type of artwork I enjoy doing. Just disappointing to see that Adobe doesn't have something set up for the casual home user that doesn't cost nearly as much as their professional software. Their prices only encourage people to pirate their software.

 

[patent10021]

I upgraded to CS5 Master collection like less than a year ago for $1200...WTF? Now they want me to pay $500 for another upgrade??? WHAT TO THE F!!!???

And they wonder why people torrent their crap. Oh well, 5.5 in 5.5 minutes flat.

 

[bpaluzzi]

Only it's insane to think of spending that much just for personal use. Think I'll stick with my free downloads of Gimp and Paint.net. They don't cost me anything and work sufficiently well for the type of artwork I enjoy doing. Just disappointing to see that Adobe doesn't have something set up for the casual home user that doesn't cost nearly as much as their professional software. Their prices only encourage people to pirate their software.

They do. The "Elements" line of software.

 

[Ha1131ujah]

They do. The "Elements" line of software.

That's just strictly photo editing though, isn't it? You can't create your own images in it? At least that's what I can tell from Adobe's website, anyways. I wanted both a photo editing program as well as an art program.

 

[bpaluzzi]

That's just strictly photo editing though, isn't it? You can't create your own images in it? At least that's what I can tell from Adobe's website, anyways. I wanted both a photo editing program as well as an art program.

No, it's just a scaled down version of photoshop. The biggest issue I have with it is that it can't open grouped layers (the "folders" in layers) -- that makes it incompatible with most of the PSD work I do. Other than that, it's fine for most people's Photoshop use.

 

[Ha1131ujah]

No, it's just a scaled down version of photoshop. The biggest issue I have with it is that it can't open grouped layers (the "folders" in layers) -- that makes it incompatible with most of the PSD work I do. Other than that, it's fine for most people's Photoshop use.

I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean about not being able to 'open grouped layers'. I like to work in layers when I work on my graphics, so if it won't let me work in layers, then it's definitely not the program for me. But as for opening 'folders' in layers...I don't know anything about that.

 

[bpaluzzi]

I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean about not being able to 'open grouped layers'. I like to work in layers when I work on my graphics, so if it won't let me work in layers, then it's definitely not the program for me. But as for opening 'folders' in layers...I don't know anything about that.

You should be alright then -- the full version of Photoshop lets you organize layers into folders. YOu can then turn show or hide the entire "group" represented by the folder. In Elements, you can't open the folders to get to the individual layers contained inside. If you're not working with other people that are using the full version of Photoshop, it shouldn't be an issue.