What Software Do You Purchase?

What software do you all use that you cannot replace with freeware? You might be surprised that much of the best commercial software nowadays (with a few exceptions) can be replaced with freeware (legally free software). There's that HUGE thread in this forum which gives you a taste of that.

The only things I find difficult to replace are:

-Windows (Vista Home Basic and XP flavors) - It's all but required since I can't get myself to leap to linux.
-Office 2007 - It's only $60.00 for a student with at least 0.5 credits and a .edu email, and it's got more to it than OpenOffice.

P.S. I'm not referring to stuff you illegally download and don't pay for... I'm curious about what you find irreplaceable in terms of paid software.

 

Games. A bunch of games.

 

Microsoft Visual Studio

 

I bought my first piece of software in a few years just recently. It was Kapersky Internet Security. I just like the piece of mind hourly updates give me.

 

OSX, and Kaspersky AV. I like Linux (though I'm still early in the process of learning) and even on occasion still use XP (Kaspersky), but can't give up my Mac or OSX.

 

Photoshop! I use Elements, and I've tried GIMP but with a learning curb like that I couldn't figure out how to do a lot of things.

 

In my case, I'd say Visual Studios 2005 Pro....

 

OK, trick question....can it be used/old?

For example: I bought an old sealed Photoshop 7 off ebay, but I could not push myself to order it new.
I bought a program called spacemonger (great little utility) this year
I bought a program called Acronis True Image
Games
Windows XP
Microsoft Office 2003 (I will not get 2007--I tend to skip every other version)

 

Antenna - Web Design Studio

The best lesser know Web Site creators.

 

Software for me that freeware just can't replace?

Microsoft Office 2007
Adobe Photoshop
Video editing software
Games

 

Are you kidding? Open Office!

 

GIMP 2.4 is a major improvement but, you can't replace Photoshop.
Anyways MS Office also. OpenOffice is still a good alternative though.

 

I'd have to say MS Office 2007, and Vista.

 

I get my OS'es for free through my school.
Other stuff:
Photoshop for my DSLR
Telescope autoguiding software (insanely overpriced but necessary)
Games
Office '03, tried '07 and wasnt impressed enough to switch

 

I purchase graphics software (just for hobby purposes) - CorelDRAW X3 (including Photo-Paint), Carrara, Poser, Painter and a few others over the years.

My HTML editor (AceHTML Pro) - today though I just found what looks to be an equally powerful freeware alternative (PSPad).

Occasional utilities, scripts etc. used on or during creation of some of my websites.

Games.

But there is definately a ton of fantastic freeware for just about any task - often (but not always) just or almost as good as paid alternatives.

 

Never had to buy any software since my mom gets MS office for free. Beyond that, everything I use is freeware.

 

Office 2007 -> Never be replaced by Openoffice.
Vista -> Until Linux gets better and greater (sorry )
The rest of the software i'm using are freewares.

 

Vista
Office 2007
Nod32
eTrust PestPatrol

Combine Nod32 and PestPatrol and you're secured against anything

 

MS Office
Zone Alarm security suite
SRS Sandbox
HL1 + TFC
HL2 + TF2

 

Also, for anyone who is looking to record music relatively seriously, some form of Protools/Cakewalk/Adobe Audition (among a few others) is probably in order; Audacity isn't bad, particuarly for open-source freeware, but those have some features that can't be ignored if you want to do some serious recording.

 

Expression Web... although, I've used dozens of open source and paid (Dreamweaver, etc), I keep going back to EW.

Fireworks... I have photoshop as well, but FW is what I use the most... paint.net (getpaint.net) is a great alternative....

Xara... several open source alternatives, and paid alternatives, but I keep on using this software... right mix of ease of use and it simply works...


Far as videos and audio, I like Audacity... but it can't hold a string to Camtasia Studio. http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp .

And several other programs:

MS streets and trips
pdanet
Indigorose's AMS 7 and setup factory
Roxio 7.5 (for xp) or Nero 8 (for xp or vista) [I have both, use both... I like both...]

etc, etc.... I could go on and on.... lots of software that does not have a good free or paid alternative