Rating: 
Summary: Nice, but....
Review: When I bought Photoshop CS, I was pleasantly surprised with the enhancements on it: improved file browser, expanded filter gallery, integrated camera RAW among others. It allows you to program your own "How to" and include that in the help file. A nice touch for teaching the younger ones. It provides a way for getting your images corrected for export to video- an important issue for me since I edit video as well.However, the more I explore CS, the more I realize I didn't really need these enhancements, my use of it being more "enthusiast" and family-related than business. My Photoshop Version 7 has all I needed. In my older 900Mhz Pentium 3 Class computer with 512MB RAM and with dedicated hard disk for data and Photoshop scratch disk, Version 7 happily zips along with a 100MB file while CS stutters a little. I believe that CS has been beefed up at the cost of more processor power and RAM- the newest types being Pentium 4/HTs, AMD XPs and RD/DDR RAM. My advice for first time buyers, you'll probably get CS as it's the latest. A sensible choice given that software got updated every year or so. Just be aware of it's system requirements, among them: On Microsoft operating system, it will only run on Windows XP, it will require activation, and surprise (!), it will not allow you to scan money! For details just go to Adobe Photoshop and Image Ready forums and product Webpage. Be aware that although a lot of people there had valid complaints against CS, many others who were happy with it just kept quiet. If you already have Photoshop Version 7 running well on an older machine that you don't plan on upgrading anytime soon, you don't really need Photoshop CS. Photoshop Version 7 is still so powerful and rock-stable. I have Version 7 for almost a year now and I am pleased to say I have a lot more to learn from it. Photoshop CS can never make Version 7 obsolete. But that's just my opinion- easy to say when you got CS on standby. In a nutshell, if I were stuck on an island with a computer (this is the part where you roll your eyes) and given a choice between Photoshop CS, Photoshop Version 7 and PaintShop Pro 8.1... I will pick, seriously now, Photoshop Version 7.
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