MacDesign

Hi Charlotte
 
Hope you're doing fine. Having business partners can be tricky and it's a sensitive situation. I have friends who entered into a partnership but later ended up in a sour and bitter separations. Most cases it was a conflict between money matters. Your mom is right in a way. About 80% of the partnerships I've known did not end well.
 
Sorry if my opinion might not be favorable to you. Also the length of time you've known your business partner doesn't help too. My friend's partner have been high school buddies and have been business partners for 15 long years and he found out his partner was secretly transferring the earnings to his other "secret" company. They parted ways after that.
 
My boss used to tell me, when someone has worked for you for many years doesn't mean he/she is loyal to your company. I had a client from my freelancing, when I visited his office he had dozens of video cameras in every part of the office, He complained to me about his tenured employees ( those having worked for him for 10+ years) stealing the chocolate products his company sells.
 
Maybe for now the best thing is taking an employee and from there maybe you can foresee and decide your options. Hope this enlightened you in a way.
 
Spencer

Hi Traxor,
 
eBay and Amazon.Com are good sources of second hand Adobe softwares as mentioned in this thread. Just would like to add some details. You mentioned Photoshop CS2, I am assuming you're buying an Intel Based iMac and not the old PPC iMac? Because Photoshop CS2 is native to the old PPC iMac and runs SLOW in an Intel Based Mac. CS2 is processor dependent. CS3 or CS4 is the better choice as it runs well both on either an Intel Based mac or the old PPC iMac. Would be better if you get the Intel Based Mac because this year the new Mac OS will be launched, The Snow Leopard. The down side is this new OS will no longer run on old PPC Macs.
 
Just a short history, before 2005 Apple uses the IBM Velocity Processors known as PPC or PowerPC. Apple wanted a much cooler, faster processor and more compact and that can run windows too. Intel can deliver these requirements as they can produce cooler, quieter processors and cheaper than the IBM counterpart. Being able to run Windows and Mac OS in one machine changed the lifestyle of most people and the market share of Apple.
 
Make sure to ask the seller of the second hand photoshop if the software is registered under his name which needs a transfer of ownership. I once saw a seller in ebay selling a second hand Adobe Creative Suite 3 Premium for only $300 dollars.
 
Thanks
MacDesign

Hi Traxor,
 
The 20" iMac you mentioned is a good choice and its specs are good to last for 3-5 years without the need to upgrade. I am using a 2.4Ghz iMac and adequate to handle all the graphics for both print and web. Photoshop only uses 1-2 cores as of now. Most softwares are still not "written" for multi-core processors like Octo cores. And for ram, I use a third party brand like Kingston and not the Apple branded ram. They are 40 percent cheaper. With the current economic recession, we need to save as much money as we can.
 
 
I bought my Adobe Creative Suite CS4 Web Premium (brand new, sealed) at www.softwaremedia.com This is the retail version. They are based in Utah, USA. They sell it for about $750 US dollars. I don't know how to convert the amount to British Pounds as I live outside UK to determine if it's cheap or not. You can also check out www.resellerratings.com It's a website that compiles all the online stores and rates their customer service. In their search box, just type "Adobe Photoshop CS3 or cS4. Just avoid buying at ecost.com as they have poor customer ratings.
 
Student editions are cheap but not upgradeable to the next version. Better get the retail version. Adobe is very business minded because they have a ruling. Like if you have CS3 and want to upgrade to the new CS5 which is 2 versions higher, you would have to pay more than someone who has CS4. This way Adobe wants people to keep on upgrading regularly.
 
MacDesign