Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic product
Review: ... This is a fantastic product. It's perfect for someone who's developing more than just brochureware, but isn't a programmer. I've used Frontpage before, and I much prefer Dreamweaver, for its power, stability and relative ease of use. Macromedia has an "exchange" where you can go to get "extensions" which are 3rd party functions that you can use to add to Dreamweaver's functionality. The only con I would see is that it does take a little time to learn how to use its more advanced features. A 5-star product.
Rating:
Summary: As a web designer...
Review: ...no piece of software makes my job easier than Dreamweaver MX. Managing multiple large sites is a breeze, and allows me to all but give up hand coding (and focus more on design). Older versions required much more tweaking of the code in order to get some results, but with the latest version, Macromedia has succeeded in making DW generate such good code, that I rarely have to fiddle with it. The features and ease of use are top of the line, and out do GoLive and other competing software in many areas. Especially with all of the new database and serverside scripting features, which allow you to add dynamic elements, user login scripts, and more to your static sites. It took me a while to get used to the new interface (you can still use the interface from 3.0/4.0 if you are more comfortable with it), but once I did, it is much more efficient, and speeds up my work more than most interface overhauls in OTHER software does.IF YOU ARE A BEGINNER: I HIGHLY reccomend purchasing Dreamweaver MX, as you will be creating semi-complex sites in no time. While it helps to know HTML/JavaScript, you don't need to know much about them with this software. IF YOU A PROFESSIONAL: Whether you are still hand coding (waiting for WYSIWYG editors to write better code), or using a competing product like GoLive, you must get your hands on MX. It is the best in the industry, and is a must have. Especially for designers/developers who work alone or in a small crew and are responsible for multiple sites and need to make updates quickly. Software rarely is made this well.
Rating: 
Summary: You can do better
Review: As a professional web designer and the web lead for my company, I chose DreamWeaver MX for our primary Web-IDE. It is a decision I have come to regret.
DreamWeaver makes many fine promises, but like a presidential candidate, once it's in the office, it fails to keep those promises. Let me give you some idea what I'm talking about:
Version control:
DreamWeaver's version control is very simplistic, and to be fair, DreamWeaver integrates with MS VSS and Macromedia's own versioning system, but using the built in version control with DreamWeaver can easily lead to overwritten code and lost files (as in lost forever). DreamWeaver does not play well with CVS or Subversion.
Stability:
DreamWeaver crashes at least once daily, sometimes with a warning, but usually without. Javascript errors abound. I upgraded my operating system from Windows 2000 to XP Professional in the hopes that I was seeing integration problems, but alas, the crashes continue unabated.
Templates:
The real reason I chose DreamWeaver was its sophisticated templating system, which would allow me to write parts of the code and farm out the content management to my colleagues, who use either DreamWeaver or Contribute (a WYSIWYG content-management partner for DreamWeaver). Unfortunately, DreamWeaver doesn't have a clear grasp of what is editable and what is not. We have noticed that DreamWeaver and Contribute both sometimes will prevent legitimate edits. What's worse, however, is that DreamWeaver will lose changes to regions that it incorrectly deems uneditable. Depending on the particular situation, DreamWeaver may or may not tell you that it has refused your change.
WYSIWYG/Contribute:
It's difficult enough to write code that works in more than one web browser, but if you want your standards-compliant, tableless code to look good in DreamWeaver and Contribute, you had better be prepared to spend a few more hours on each page.
Consumer: You can do better. You probably would save yourself an ulcer writing code in a text-editor.
Macromedia: You can do better. Fix the bugs. Make DreamWeaver standards compliant and integrate CVS and Subversion support into it.
Rating:
Summary: Great learning tool
Review: At first glance, the Dreamweaver [DW] interface seems very complicated but after using it for a while, the interface is very intuitative. I was using FrontPage [FP] for web design, but I couldn't control the layout of the tables on the page. I am not a pro. With DW I could! The properties of each element can be shown in a little box on the screen [a improvement over R mouse clicking on then clicking on the properties tag in FP]. The eye dropper icon works anywhere on the the open program - I could grab colors off the menu bar! Not all was rosy at first.........I installed a demo on two different computers and both computers locked up when using ...it seemed to be very instable. So I looked to tech support and could not find anyone to call.....so I entered the support forum and posted what happened. My answer came within 24 hours in a dialogue with another user. After that the program ran flawless. A note.....this program can consume a lot of resources on a Win 9.x/Me system and anti-virus software will cause it to crash - SOLUTION: turn your anti-virus software off and make sure you don't have a lot of unnecessary background programs running........give it lots of breathing room! FP is used a lot because it has a relatively easy look and feel but once you get used to FP, the quirks and limitations begin to show. In DW if you are interesting in seeing how code is formed, just switch to the Code/view and 2 windows open - your WYSIWYG window and the HTML code above! Great! Conclusion: Download the Demo from Macromedia - don't be put off by the seemingly complicated interface, play around and see for yourself. Then buy it.
Rating:
Summary: Sonner or later, you're going to need Dreamweaver
Review: Dreamweaver is quite simply the de facto standard for WYSIWYG web development. If you are still stuck with Frontpage, GoLive or any other tool, it is time to seriously think of switching. Reason being that the HTML as we know it today is a lot more than the tag soup people are used to (attn: Frontpage and GoLive users) -- it includes a good knowledge of CSS, XHTML, quite frequently even intermediate to advanced levels of JavaScript. Having used and tried a bunch of alternatives, because DW is sometimes a memory hog (my only quibble with the tool), I am now convinced there is NO HTML tool that comes even close in terms of sheer functionality, period. The only real contender really was GoLive but the code that is generated by GL is nothing to write home about. DW's siteupload and maintenance features, the incredibly optimized JavaScript, the XHTML 1.0 support built in (and what a treat this is!), the choice of your familiar DW4 interface or the new MX suite look and feel etc etc -- in almost every department, DW is a clear winner. Speaking of the new interface, you'll find after a bit that the MX interface is actually quite efficient -- dockable panels, the new tabbed Insert toolbar, integrated file browsing and the revamped context-sensitive Properties panel. But where DW really shines, and serious web developers listen up, is its ability to encourage people to be comfortable with advanced code editing within the tool. Features such as "code hinting" which automatically displays appropriate options as you type (usually found among text based code editing tools such as Ultraedit and Homesite), a Snippets panel for storing common pieces of code and some greatly expanded reference material -- the new emphasis is on the tag-based nature of web authoring with a HomeSite-inspired Tag Inspector for viewing an editable list of all tags and their attributes in the current document, and a Tag Chooser and Tag Editor to help you add new ones. Users of UltraDev 6 (which I was never a fan of) will be happy to note that it is now a seamless part of the core DW program with features such as the new Site Setup wizard and dedicated Database, Bindings and Server Behaviour panels making it relatively straightforward for users to move from creating static HTML to producing server-generated dynamic pages. What is particularly impressive about the Dreamweaver MX implementation is how broad its server-side support is. As well as ASP and JSP, new support has been added for PHP, ASP.NET, and ColdFusion. Users of the last two server platforms or JSP can also take advantage of the exciting new area of XML-based Web services. Thanks to Dreamweaver MX's dedicated Components panel this becomes a simple task of drag, drop and customize. All told, this is a top-notch tool and will be coin well-spent one way or another. If you are serious about your work, you could get "TopStyle 3" (a fantastic CSS editor) and "HTML Tidy" and "A Real Validator" for making sure your code is squeaky clean.
Rating:
Summary: Macromedia comes through with Dreamweaver MX
Review: Dreamweaver MX is a convergence product. It is the next stage of making a truly common interface/userspace between the related and interacting macromedia products and expecially the great interaction/tie-in with fireworks mx and flash mx. While resource intensive it provides a professional level of web tools from source coding for client and server side dynamic coding and wysiwyg design of presentation. Truly a great tool with lots of cool.
Rating:
Summary: Dreamweaver MX is the industry standard.
Review: Dreamweaver MX is a powerful application that puts every necessary tool right at your fingertips. Many other programs bury access to essential functions deep within layer upon layer of menus, thus leaving you searching through clunky interfaces to perform even the simplest functions. If you want a TRUE WYSIWYG program then Dreamweaver is what you need. If you want something that gives you total control over every aspect of your site then Dreamweaver is what you need. But if you want something that has the interface (and power) of a word processor then get Frontpage or something else. Dreamweaver is intuitive and easy to learn, but its for professionals. There's no excuse for buying this and then complaining about it, because there's a free demo that's available from Macromedia. Be a smart consumer. Download it. Try it. If you like it, buy it. Dreamweaver is the industry standard and rightly so.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent in it's Niche
Review: Dreamweaver MX is significantly easier to use than previous versions, and is probably the best general-purpose site manager out there. However, for professional, commercial web application development, Microsoft's Visual Studio 7 (featuring .Net) beats Dreamweaver hands down. There are considerations however- VS7 costs 2-5 times as much as Dreamweaver (depending on the version), and requires much more user knowledge and training. I found the learning curve for Dreamweaver MX to be insignicant. The first time I used it, I was comfortable with it in a couple of hours, and proficient by the end of a week. If you are an entry-level to mid-level web site developer with limited programming knowledge, the HTML editor and site management tools should suit your needs. If you wish to do larger scale web application development, you may also do so using Dreamweaver's built in support for different technologies. If you want to go high-end, definitely consider Visual Studio 7 instead. Overall, a solid application, and pretty comprehensive package.
Rating:
Summary: n00b prog
Review: DW MX is a WYSIMOLWIG (what you see is more or less what you get) program, for n00bs who want to make a website. I'm a proffesional coder (html, php, asp, js, cgi, perl, css and i can also wark with c(++), vbs and pascal), and this program sux. If you want to make a website, go get yourself a book about html, later php and asp. If you make a website yourself in pure html, you exactly know what you're doing opposite to dreamweaver. I only use dreamweaver sometimes, to look up a tag, testing a php script or testing something on my html pages.
Conclusion: dreamweaver is defenetly NOT worth its price actually, it would be a nice program for quick testing if it was free.
Rating: 
Summary: Good bad and ugly
Review: First off, it is a great tool for websites weather you hand code or use the WYSIWYG style development. I have been using it since it came out and have mixed reviews. The good: It shares the same style of all Macromedia MX releases so the interface wont throw you off too much if you are used to Flash or Fireworks, both of which I use very frequently. You can incorporate SWF files, images, CSS, CGI and other backend very easily. The bad: Bugs, and lots of em. It can crash in an instant while performing simple tasks such as linking hotspots. Saving can be an issue and cause crashes or incomplete saves. These are generally infrequent but should have been solved before release. The ugly: Whatta memory hog! If you have a high end system(at least 256k)you will notice it performig a little slower than you would like, even on my dual P3 w/512 rambus it has annoying slowdown. The verdict: Get the MX 2004 package that was just released. Macromedia has fixed thousands of bugs in all of thier software and they will be inherently more reliable.
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