The latest suite of multimedia development applications are now available from Adobe. Including upgraded versions of the popular Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Premiere, Flash and many, many more you can choose to buy straight up or grab the trial versions for 30 days.
Be careful with the trial, there were issues with CS4 trials not being able to roll back to CS3, hopefully these have been resolved, but best to avoid using trials on a production machine.
Adobe CS5 upgrade pricing is essentially the same as it was from CS3 to CS4 Master Collection, A$1,503 inc GST, with the full version costing a massive A$4,344 inc GST. For that you do get Adobe Photoshop CS5 Extended, Illustrator CS5, InDesign CS5, Acrobat 9 Pro, Flash Catalyst CS5, Flash Professional CS5, Flash Builder 4, Dreamweaver CS5, Fireworks CS5, Contribute CS5, Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 (with Adobe OnLocation™ CS5 and Encore CS5), After Effects CS5, Soundbooth CS5.
A new requirement this time round is for a 64-bit Operating System. As we know the main benefit of running 64-bit is to access more RAM, the Adobe products will use all the resources you have to perform tasks faster, so if you weren’t already, it’s time to go 64-bit.
Personally, I’ll check out the trials before laying down the cash for the upgrade, but based on what I’ve seen there’s a good chance I’ll be making the move. The decision to upgrade is a very personal one, with the list of new features studied intently and weighed up using a cost benefits analysis in most businesses. It’s important to remember Adobe runs on a release cycle of around 18 months between versions, so holding off for a year will reduce the time you have to benefit from this version.
Individuals should look towards the Elements versions of the products. These are much more affordable for the home user, however functionality is reduced. These also run on a different release schedule than the CS5 suite, so you may have to wait a few months for new features.
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