I have been using Fireworks for a good while now and have suddenly got both due to having a software update. Although I don't know all the ins and outs of photoshop yet, I do think it is better for the design side, I agree with, I can't remember who said it but they said Fireworks felt a little more clunky. I think Photoshop seems to be easier to get a professional finish with. I like the blur and history buttons on the left amongst other things I certainly don't think that you could create an extremely good graphic from scratch in Fireworks. Then again I did go from a rather old version of Fireworks to Photoshop CS3
Elise