Plus, the installation 'progress' bar bears no relation to reality whatsoever, with its two steps forward and one step back movement. And as before with the updater, you'll get to relive this delightful close-your-apps-or-else experience on a regular basis. That's pretty appalling in and of itself, but in addition to wasting a large chunk of time installing, you can't do anything else but play Solitaire while it's happening. Adobe forces you to close your browser and all Microsoft Office applications, because many of the programs in the suite-primarily Acrobat-spread octopus-like tentacles throughout your working environment. Every Windows application installer suggests you close any running applications, but you can usually ignore it and 99 percent of the time everything works out fine. The Web abounds with complaints about Adobe's installer and updater, and most are justified. If so, don't make the mistake of paying full price for the applications individually. The five CS4 packages (see chart below) are a relative bargain if you regularly rely on at least three of the included applications.

Those on a budget who don't need so many tools might consider alternatives, such as CorelDraw graphics suite. Artists who access this software from their workplace or purchase it at an educational discount might skip more than a few meals to afford it. Prices for the individual applications haven't changed since CS3, but we wish that Adobe would lower the costs, or perhaps allow mix-and-match pricing for more flexibility. The charts below detail the contents of and pricing for this and other CS4 suites please click on the images of suites and their individual applications to learn what's new inside of each. Buying all Master Collection applications individually would set you back close to $6,290, or more than $2,000 if upgrading from CS3 versions. It costs $1,599 for users of other CS3 suites to upgrade, or $1,199 for users with two eligible older versions of the suite. The Master Collection will set you back about as much as, say, a Volvo from the 1990s: $2,499 for new or $899 to upgrade. The Flash-based panels within CS4 are more nimble than its predecessors, and handy pull-down menus with preset styles enable you to shift among work space layouts quickly.

With Creative Suite 4, Adobe has unified the interfaces of all the applications for a more seamless experience.

The release of Adobe Creative Suite 3 in 2007 was the first to incorporate former Macromedia products, such as Flash.

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