No comments about Adobe Creative Suite 4 Web Standard Upsell from Studio (intro price) [Mac].

No comments about Adobe Creative Suite 4 Web Standard Upsell from Dreamweaver/Flash.

No comments about Adobe Fireworks CS3 [Mac] [OLD VERSION].

1 comments about Adobe Creative Suite CS3 Web Premium [Mac] [OLD VERSION].

1. The main points about the creative suites are that the latest ones are usually not necessary - once you have one, it usually suffices for all that you need and upgrading is not a top priority. They are excellent, but IMO far too expensive - unfortunately if you need Illustrator, Photoshop, and Flash - the Creative Suite is the way to go since it is at least less expensive than buying them each individually.
   I think they are great products, but I also feel they are very pricey. They are worth it in that there is little else in terms of option (yes, gimp is a free Photoshop replacement - but I still prefer Photoshop in ease of use, and Illustrator is my preference for vector graphics regardless of any other option so far, and I don't know of any other way to make interactive Flash movies/games without owning Flash itself).
   
   Personally, the other stuff that comes in the Creative Suite is useless. Especially Acrobat on a Mac - perhaps I am just not a PDF power user since just using Mac's built in PDF creation ability works just fine for me.

No comments about Bling! It.

No comments about Web Easy Professional 6 Complete Web Design Studio.

5 comments about McAfee Internet Security Suite 2007 [Old Version].

1. I am a Comcast customer like some others here and downloaded this product as an upgrade to the McAfee I already had through them. BIG Mistake. I just hung up after being on the phone with their tech support for 1/2 hour trying to uninstall it. My computer had been badly messed up for several days before I came here and saw that I was not the only one suffering these problems. I realized that it was the McAfee program after reading the other reviews here. Trying to get assistance from them was quite painful too. What a mess!



2. I purchased McAfee Internet Security Suite for 2 years in a row and had no problems. Hopefully I'll make it through the year so I can buy another brand when my subscription is up! It took me 2 hours to figure out that all 70 some items disappeared from my Outlook Express inbox because of bugs in McAfee. (It was a quick fix though.)



3. I am able to install and use the McAfee suite as a free download from my ISP Comcast. On two machines running XP, this new version installed fine and has not caused any issues. We recently bought 2 new identical Dell laptops running Vista Home Premium. I installed the McAfee suite on both. On my wife's machine, it has run fine although it does slow the machine down considerably when it is doing something. These machines are no slouches - 2GB RAM and Core Duo processors. On my machine, it constantly churns and reduces the PC to unusable it is so slow, CPU usage runs near 100%.
   I have put both machines side by side and verified the settings, programs, hardware etc. are IDENTICAL on both so I have no explanation for this behavior on one machine and not the other. I have uninstalled and reinstalled it 3 times now, and run the McAfee removal tool (available as a download from McAfee) to ensure a clean install. Using the Process Explorer program (similar to Task Manager), I watch as various parts of the McAfee suite kick in and gobble from 40-100% CPU time even when the machine is sitting idle.
   The bottom line is that if you are running Vista, you should probably look elsewhere for your security needs- as you can see many others have experienced slowdowns to the point of reducing the machine to an unusable paperweight with this product. Luckily I have no expense incurred!
   Update 12/28/07: I finally gave up on this product, uninstalled it and went to the AVG free antivirus. The McAfee suite would not hog the cpu if I would hibernate the machine and brought it back up, but if it was powered off or restarted the same old behavior returned. I tried to run the manual virus scan, it ran for nearly 4 hours! And this is on a new machine with relatively few files. Once I uninstalled it, I ran a full scan with AVG which took 39 minutes. Maybe the 2008 version of McAfee will be improved......??



4. Have been with either McAfee or Symantic/Norton for probably 15 years or more. Overall I have had more problems with McAfee, but have had most of them resolved via their IM support (Real person? Get real!!)- it can take a couple of hours as the response times can be incredibly s-l-o-w, but we did get there eventually.
   I bought a new PC a couple of months ago which came with a 90 day trial for Symantic, and it expired yesterday. I had an unused copy of McAfee which I had purchased just before my old PC expired, causing me to buy the new one, so I thought that I would install that and save me a trip down the shops and me spending more of my hard earned money.
   Once the install started it did warn me that there were known incompatibility issues with Vista, so part of it is my own fault I suppose, but I have seen that warning before with installing other software and had experienced no major problems.
   Anyway, once it had completed installation and I double clicked on the desktop icon, the system crashed and started to shut down - it stalled at this point and the hard drive was running continuously. After 5 minutes I got bored and turned the PC off, counted to 10 and then restarted it.
   All looked well, until I tried to sign in, when explorer.exe crashed and none of the buttons/icons on the user sign in screen did what they should. Could not get it to start, stop or restart and ended up having to turn the power off. Tried a couple of more times to see if the problems would resolve themselves, but they didn't and so resorted to a system restore - thank goodness for system restore is all I can say!!!
   The result is that i will be going back to Symantic as I know that works with my PC



5. McAfee Security Suite has computer-jacked my computer! I totally hate this product and I've used McAfee for years. Terrible, terrible. When it is scanning or checking my computer, it slows everything else down to a snail's pace. Opening other websites or writing email is extremely frustrating when McAfee is doing its thing. Quite frequently, it knocks me off the internet. It's like someone else has taken control of my computer. I am going to get this nightmare off of my computer. I want my money back!

3 comments about Adobe Flash CS3 Professional Upgrade [Mac].

1. This is a warning to anyone looking to upgrade to Flash CS3. If you are upgrading from a version of Flash that came in a software bundle such as Studio 8, THIS UPGRADE WILL NOT WORK. It will install completely, rather than upgrade the previous software, and will not activate with a Studio 8 serial number. You'll have to buy one of the Creative Suites to upgrade.
   
   I'm giving this product a low rating because the most challenging thing about Flash shouldn't be the installation. This information is not on any website that I have found, including Adobe's own site. I only hope Amazon will let me return my opened software and exchange it for the proper software.



2. In response to the previous review, it took me all of 3 minutes to go to the Adobe website and find a nifty little interactive module where you select what Flash version or Bundle version you have and it tells you your upgrade path. Adobe does state clearly what your upgrade path is and I would recommend to all to go any developer's website first to find that information then to Amazon if they offer a better deal.



3. This new iteration of flash is very stable on Leopard and is exceptionally quick on my Macbook Pro. Its much cheaper than buying a whole CS package and get software I don't work in very long like Dreamweaver(I use Visual Studio) or newer versions of software that hasn't really changed in years (I'm talking to you Photoshop).

5 comments about CA Internet Security Suite 2007.

1. As soon as I install this software. Most of the Ajax website won't work anymore, yahoo, netflix. And it only have safe and restricted zone on NIC interface instead of network zone, which is very inconvenient for laptop user. And they want to charge for support. I will never buy any product from CA.



2. I found too many problems with the CA Internet Security Suite 2007 for me to trust my computer to it. Some of the problems I had:
   
   * too intrusive
   
   I found the firewall to be much too intrusive. I chose the default installation, but once installed, I found that Windows Update would not work. Even though I had WU configured for automatic updates, WU could not connect to find or install updates. Manually running WU from the Microsoft site via Internet Explorer also failed. I tried to configure the firewall to allow such connections to the MS sites, but the only way I could run Windows Update would be to shut down the firewall.
   
   I had other applications that showed similar problems. We run Windows XP Home, and use Mozilla Thunderbird as our mail client. Although most users had no trouble, my wife would consistently get timeouts from the mail server when the firewall was running (everyone else uses the same POP3 mail server, just with different user ids.) But if we shut down the firewall, Thunderbird downloads mail fine.
   
   * buggy
   
   I recently had a serious problem with the firewall - it was constantly turning the protection level on my cable internet connection to LOW (meaning it was not really protecting me from outside connections). However, whenever I tried to change the settings to either MEDIUM or HIGH or a custom setting, it would revert automatically to LOW. This persisted across shutdown/reboot.
   
   * slow user interface
   
   I found the UI to be unbearably slow. I have a 2.1GHz PC with 1GB RAM, but most UI operation (switching tabs, initializing a view) would take many seconds.
   
   * insufficient help
   
   I found the help to be too limited and superficial. The online support is not much better.
   
   * poor customer service
   
   I tried the live tech support chat with my serious problem, but after waiting 20 minutes for my turn, my position the queue only went from 17 down to 14... but then increased back up to 16. On line resources did not cover this problem. I submitted a ticket to CA technical support and it took more than two weeks to get a response (which merely told me to reinstall.) Which leads to the final issue:
   
   * uninstall fails
   
   Since the firewall was not working (although I had applied all updates), I decided on my own (CA techsupport had not yet replied) to uninstall/reinstall. However, it turns out that a mere mortal cannot uninstall. Even though I am an Administrator user, the uninstall fails when trying to remove registry keys and the uninstall tells me that I must be an Administrator - but I am! I had to write a script that walked through several dozen CA registry entries and change the permissions on them so that the uninstall could finally remove the suite.
   
   I found the whole experience to be much too negative and risky.
   Once I finally uninstalled CA, I was able to install Norton Internet Security 2008 and I find it a much smoother and more reliable product.



3. I installed this software, then uninstalled it less than a week later. It slowed my computer down so much I felt like I had dial up internet service. Just starting the computer took so long that I would walk away and come back later to see if it was up yet. Everything took SO long. I couldn't stand it!
   I did leave the e-mail filter portion of the software on my computer when I uninstalled though because it does a very nice job of filtering out all the junk mail I get. That's the only good thing I can say about this software!



4. WARNING!!! NEVER USE THIS SOFTWARE UNLESS YOU REALLY WANT TO REBUILD YOUR COMPUTER!! I installed this CA Security Suite on three machines; two FAST desktops and a moderately fast laptop, all running Windows XP Home edition. The product made EACH computer crawl on the Internet. When I tried to uninstall the products so I could replace it with my ISP's newly provided AV solution, the uninstalls promptly FAILED on all three machines. CA technical support wants to charge $29.95 to provide support to FIX the broken uninstall. The Windows Installer tries to run each time the computers are booted TO REINSTALL THIS CRAPPY software!!! And worse, NOTHING ELSE can be successfully installed!! CA will not help me resolve the problem. The only solution that I have found is to RENSTALL WINDOWS XP.



5. This product will cause more harm than good to your computer. The firewall totally blocks you off from the internet, it slows down the computer, it uses up way too much resources, it cannot be properly uninstalled, and the customer service is poor. This product is highly un-recommended. It not even worth the time or money. Do not buy this software, you will regret your decision of investing in this product.

5 comments about Trend Micro pc-Cillin Internet Security 2007 - 3 User [OLD VERSION].

1. NO SUPPORT AT ALL! This company doesn't seem to be able to afford any support people! Are they even still in business? The online support page doesn't respond for DAYS and the email support just answers with automated BS. I think they are already out of business and just keep on selling their stuff until the bitter end. I got a fully legal 3PCs authorization on eBay for 2.99 plus $2 shipping. Go figure! It's definitely not worth more! Even worse than Norton, if you can believe that!



2. I purchased this particular package because it allows me to monitor my WIFI. That, as it turns out, is a bit cumbersome, since the monitoring window pops up frequently. However, installation was a breeze, not only for me, but both of my kids who did it on their own. Both times I received an email to let me know they had successfully installed the software. Ultimately, I think this is an excellent deal.



3. Do not buy this product. If you feel you must, buy it from Trend Micro website or you will not have a warranty. I bought Trend Micro Internet Security Pro 2008 from Best Buy. It would lock up during a scan. After many attempts at getting service I ask for my money back. Trend Micro said they would not refund on a store product. Best Buy would not refund an opened product. So I am out $70.00. And they are still sending emails with no solution to the problem. I have ask them to stop sending emails but they are still comming. Worse than a virus.



4. I want to give it a zero rating but Amazon won't let me.
   
   PC-Cillin was pre-installed on a Dell XPS Laptop I just recently purchased and it offers to protect up to 2 other computers in your home network for free for the duration of your 1yr membership. Well, 1 month, and about 10 emails to Trend Micro tech support later, I still can't get the thing installed on my 2nd computer. The additional serial numbers that came with my initial copy won't register. The first thing Trend Micro tech support told me to do was to reinstall and to download another copy. Well, buyers BEWARE when uninstalling Trend Micro using the Add/Remove funcion in Control Panel it may corrupt your drivers. I had to reformat my computer and reinstall Win XP because of it.
   
   Also, if you ever have the misfortune of having to deal with their email tech support, your problem will be passed around constantly to different tech support agent and answers and solution will most likely be repeated...even though they didn't work the 1st or the 2nd time around. You will find yourself having to re-explain what the situation is over and over again. Trust me, Trend Micro belongs in the trash where I ended up throwing it. I will be uninstalling it from my XPS laptop just to make sure I don't have this garbage on my computer.



5. Purchased 3-years of PC-Cillin with my Dell desktop. Useless and non-functioning (compliments the Dell quite nicely, actually). With two years of paid coverage remaining, I deleted this nightmare of a program entirely and went with Comcast's McAfee freebie.