Adobe Debuts Creative Suite 3
Creative apps revamped; new collections launched
Adobe today took the wraps off its all-new lineup of creative apps with the formal debut of Adobe Creative Suite 3. Most of new versions will launch in April, with some stragglers holding out until the third quarter. What does it all mean for Campus IT folk?
Big changes, a flurry of demands from your users, and, unexpectedly, some potential savings along the way.
The new suite and editions
In the new Creative Suite 3, almost every Adobe application receives significant changes, including the applications Adobe acquired through the Macromedia buyout. The only exceptions to this are Acrobat Professional, which remains at version 8 but is included in some of the editions of the suite; GoLive, whose future Adobe is not commenting on; and Director, whose future Adobe also is not commenting on, except to say that many of Director's features have been adopted by Flash and that, no, Dave, you shouldn't conclude that Adobe is going to drop your favorite former Macromedia application. We'll see about that.
In the meantime, all the other applications have been revised, updated, Universal Binarified, and otherwise updated for Intel-based Mac consumption (Mac OS X 10.4.8 or higher, including 10.5) and compatibility with Windows Vista.
Of course, this will help ease the transition to Intel-based Macs for those of you who administer Macs on your campus, as Adobe's slow transition to Intel-native support draws to a conclusion.
And while this means you might be spending the next year of your life sorting through the upgrade requests from all areas of creative on your campus--from film and video to Web design to graphic design and publishing--it doesn't necessarily mean over the top expenditures. All of the applications have been consolidated into one or more Creative Suite 3 editions.
The editions consist of the following:
Design Premium: InDesign CS3, Photoshop CS3 Extended, Illustrator CS3, Flash CS3 Professional, Dreamweaver CS3, and Acrobat 8 Professional. It will be available in April for $1,799 for a single license.
Design Standard: InDesign CS3, Photoshop CS3, Illustrator CS3, and Acrobat 8 Professional. It will sell for $1,199.
Web Premium: Dreamweaver CS3, Flash CS3 Professional, Fireworks CS3, Contribute CS3, Photoshop CS3 Extended, Illustrator CS3, and Acrobat 8 Professional. It will be available in April for $1,599.