Customer Reviews

Adobe Creative Suite Premium CS2 [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and Acrobat are the industry standard in their respective applications and purchasing Creative Suite is more cost effective than purchasing each component individually.

One point to pay close attention to is the RAM requirement for this software. If you want to run just one application at a time, you need a minimum of 384MB. To run more than one application, you need at least 512MB with 1GB recommended by Adobe. CS2 checks the RAM on installation and will not even install on a computer with less than 384MB.

Another point is that you are not buying the software. You are licensing it from Adobe and agreeing to their terms and conditions. Part of the agreement is that you can make a limited number of copies of your CD's and that you can install CS2 on a second computer such as a laptop as long as you don't run it at the same time as your primary computer. I had planned to do this, but ran into the RAM limitation on my laptop which is an older machine. It can run Photoshop 5.0 by itself, but not CS2. I tried to install Photoshop CS only instead of the entire CS2 package but it would not accept the registration number. Adobe support told me that installing individual components of CS2 is forbidden and will not work. You can only install the entire package. This will not affect your primary computer since it is what you are buying the software for in the first place. But in this case, I may have been better off just buying the parts that I need and can use on the laptop rather than paying to upgrade my RAM.

Once installed, Adobe CUE CS2 is programmed to start when you turn on your computer. However, you can stop it from doing so if you don't want it hogging all of your RAM when you are not using CS2.

As a graphic designer, I have to work with Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and Acrobat on a daily basis, and Adobe keeps coming out with better and more efficient products.

CS2 helps to streamline workflow with Adobe Bridge, and new features such as Live Trace and Live Paint in Illustrator CS2 have saved me a lot of time on multiple projects.

There is really no substitute for the Adobe Creative Suite. Photoshop and Illustrator are industry standard and InDesign is starting to become a front-runner against Quark Express for professional page layout design. Don't fool yourself by buying Microsoft or Corel graphic design programs, as they aren't industry standard, and you might run into more headaches finding a commercial printer or graphic designer who can utilize your files.

Also, take note that the Creative Suite is not for beginners or photo enthusiasts. If you are looking to begin your venture into the graphic design world, I would recommend downloading the 30-day trial versions from Adobe's web site before forking out $1100. Or if you just want to edit home photos, think about Photoshop Elements as a substitute.

And remember that with graphic design, the key is learning how to use basic design principles and design well. If you can do that, then you are ready to move onto using tools such as the Adobe Creative Suite.

Well it finally happened. My luck finally ran out with this newest version of Adobe's Creative Suite software. I'd read horror stories in the past about the software activation causing problems on certain user's machines, but I hadn't experienced any issues myself until I upgraded to the new CS2 version.

Everything was fine until my DVD-RW drive went bad and had to be replaced. That started what would be a long, irritating chain reaction of events that took me a couple of days to get resolved. Once the DVD-RW drive was replaced, I kept getting prompts to re-activate my software because "my system configuration had changed." The software couldn't do the repair activation automatically, so I had to call for assistance. I talked to a tech support representative and she gave me the activation code to supposedly fix the problem and it seemed to work until the next day.

When I arrived at the office the next day and launched Photoshop I was asked to re-activate the software again. I was shocked, but went ahead and clicked the activation button. It seemed to work, but I had to do the same thing when I launched InDesign and Acrobat as well. Then I noticed something strange. When I rebooted the machine after lunch I was prompted to re-activate all the software once again. I knew something wasn't right so I called Adobe's tech support. After talking with a few support agents, it was discovered that the RAID configuration on my workstation was causing a conflict with Adobe's activation software. I was issued a patch and so far the problem hasn't re-occurred.

I'm getting a little tired of all this activation crap. All it seems to do is cause problems for honest, legitimate users. The pirates aren't affected because they are running cracked versions with the activation taken out anyway.

As a professional web designer, I have used Adobe products for the last 8 years and dread every new upgrade. This is your usual annual money collecting drive from Adobe.

There are many minor improvements, but nothing earth shaking. To annoy you, Adobe put back the multiple layer selection but continues to deny thumbnail previews in Windows Explorer, which is outrageous. They want you to use Bridge, a clumsy memory hog with limited browsing capability. I have ordered the Macromedia suite for the first time this year. Perhaps it will be able to replace CS2.

If you're a professional, I recommend that you only get every second upgrade from Adobe. If you are an amateur, a copy of PaintShopPro and Xara will take care of most of your needs for a lot less then this overpriced behemoth.

If you have more than one hard drive and have them as a RAID drive, then you need to contact Adobe by phone (the number is on the registration page) and ask for the RAID patch.

Every time I ran any of the programs, I was asked to re-register until I was finally locked out. I simply called Adobe and the semi-helpful customer service person did finally ask if I was had a RAID drive.

By the way, with RAID 0 and 1GB of RAM you can run two or three applications very quickly. I have another two drives configured as RAID 1, where I store all of my important documents and files.

So I have four 160GB drives, two set to RAID 0, where all of the applications are stored, and two set to RAID 1, where all documents are automatically backed-up.

I agree with the last reviewer (J Yonk "J Dziner" in Washington) with all but one item: this package is great, it's industry standard, and you definately want it if you are going to be doing graphic design, digital publishing, etc. It's more than you need if you just want to tinker with home photos (but you can buy Photoshop - without the rest of the package - for $600. If you're just getting into digital imagery, but you think you're pretty serious about it, this might not be a bad way to go).

Where I disagree is re: illustration. Corel's Painter program is NOT worthless; in most cases, if your goal is illustration (note that the previous reviewer is a graphic designer), more often than not Painter - NOT Illustrator - is the program you want. I haven't experienced any file problems (Painter's files can be saved to various formats & can be opened in Photoshop no problem).

It isn't that these two programs do the same thing: they operate on drastically different principles. If your drawing skills are weak or nonexistent, or your work is very graphic in style, you might be happier with Illustrator. Personally I find its vector-based graphics annoying & time-consuming (though I do not do work that involves, say, animation). I was impressed with some of the recent improvements, though.

Corel's Painter is a tool that allows you to do darned near anything you could do at a drawing table, and then some (when combined with a Wacom tablet). The user makes selections - what sort of paper, brush or pen, paint or ink - and then it's just drawing, and the image you see on your screen will be remarkably like what it would look like if you were drawing with that type of brush on that type of paper with that type of paint. Except you can mix things that in real life wouldn't mix. It's very like "real" drawing and painting (unlike Illustrator, which involves learning how to create images the way Illustrator demands they be created). It's fast and you have total control, and the only learning curve involved is learning how to access the more advanced, more awesome features. I know there are people out there who prefer Illustrator, but I personally have a hard time understanding how anyone could.

If your goal is to draw/paint online, check out the Corel website - I haven't downloaded the trial version so I don't know what's disabled, but it's worth checking out before you sink $1200 here. If your end goal involves digital publishing, you might find you want Painter in addition to this suite. If you just want to create digital artwork, Painter is probably all that you need.

On the other hand, if you want to be an illustrator but you haven't yet learned to draw, you might prefer Illustrator (a program that doesn't really demand that you already know how to draw or paint). Illustrator also has some advantages in abilites & features relating to stuff like typography & scaling objects.

I've always been a HUGE fan of Adobe software, and the CS2 Suite is awesome and have been using it for almost a year now with much enjoyment and ZERO problems ...until I got a nasty virus and had to format my drive and reinstall Windows. Re-activated CS2 with no problems on the fresh install...and then the headaches started today! Supposedly I'll get an e-mail within 48-hours with some special patch to fix the problem because I run several drives. (Seems to me most serious CS2 users would use at least 1 other drive for a scratch disk -I have my OS on 1, swapfile on another, and the scratch on a third). I paid for my software and Adobe got their money.

At this point, it would be MUCH easier to install any one of the many cracks/hacks that simply "bypass" activation rather than wait for some magic patch from Adobe that I supposedly have to call them for EVERY time I re-build Windows (or upgrade my OS, add/replace a drive, a RAID, etc).

You've been forwarned. Good luck! (you'll need it!)

Activation is a BAD idea, it only harms the honest people, and Adobe's Activation is flawed. The hackers don't pay for software and have less headaches!

I have wanted the Adobe Creative Suite for many years; however, the price has always made it impossible for me to acquire. Even though the Adobe Creative Suite 2 is a very old suite in 2011, I was practically turning cartwheels when I saw that it was available at a price that I could afford. I made the mistake of purchasing other software with the same title without asking an important question: is this software the educational or retail version? I am no longer a student, so the educational version would not have been beneficial to me, and anyone purchasing Adobe educational versions should really check out their FAQs regarding academic software [...]. I did not want to finally get the software of my dreams and then have a problem with activation. I don't know if I would have experienced any problems, but I didn't want to take any chances.

I was able to install CS2 on a Windows Vista system, but since it is so old, the Adobe Acrobt Professional 7 has some glitches because my version of Adobe Reader is much newer than the software, but I won't really use that software much, so that wasn't a big deal to me. Also, I will take a look at GoLive since I have a training CD that will teach me about many of the features of each product included in the suite, but I am going to purchase the Dreamweaver CS5.5 Upgrade to learn the current web design software instead. Purchasing the CS2 software has made me eligible to upgrade to CS5, which makes it more affordable for me. In addition, purchasing this suite has enabled me to finally make my creations in industry standard software. I am very happy with my purchase, thus far, and I am looking forward to upgrading to a more current version as my budget permits.

Another thing to ask sellers when purchasing used software is about transfering the product license. [...]. I didn't do this, but it appears that the seller did what he/she had to do on their end before selling the software since I was able to activate it.

It takes some time to learn, but the investment really pays of. At the moment, I am only using Photoshop and Acrobat, still need to get to the other applications. I need to integrate a lot of picture elements into business presentations, and Photoshop does the trick just fine.

This program is gash not worth the £1000 odd pounds you would end up paying for it.