Quark Announce QuarkXPress 8

QuarkXPress 8 is nearly complete and will be available within the next two months. Already Quark are promising to provide a free upgrade to folks who purchase and register QuarkXPress 7 in the next couple of months. XPress 8 includes new pen and picture tools, new drag and drop features, better file handling of Illustrator files, and better control over typography and layout. For more information on what's new in XPress 8 visit Quark.

Corel Launch - X4

Last night I attended a release party for Corel DRAW GRAPHICS SUITE X4. Talk about impressive, the new suite features a great many improvements. I was one of a large group of journalists who were wowed by the new features and shown them in true Corel style. The Corel X4 Suite includes the latest incarnation of CorelDRAW X4, Corel PHOTO-PAINT X4, PowerTRACE X4 and Corel CAPTURE X4. New features include: A new interface with improvements designed to maximise its use under Vista including support for the large thumbnails offered by Vista. A dedicated Save As Template feature which will make lots of user very happy, especially corporate users. Vastly improved file format support which offers support for Adobe CS3 formats. Acrobat 8, Microsoft Word 2007 files and great support for Publisher PUB files. Colour management based on Adobes Color Management Module (CMM). New powerful drawing and autotracing options which include CAD friendly Centerline tracing. A whole bunch of free Fonts, Templates, Images and Clipart. Supporting apps and features like Bitstreams Font Navigator 2006, embedded font identification with MyFonts "WhatTheFont?!" capability. It works great ... The biggest visible improvement comes in the use and implimentation of Tables for use in layouts. Other improvements include the ability to be able to use and assignement of non printing of master elements and guidelines on layers. The new ConceptShare feature is awesome in that as an included feature in the application you can share, collaborate and get feedback on design projects with clients and colleagues alike. I can see non diesigners using this feature as designers have been using Acrobat for this purpose for many years now... All told Corel DRAW X4 is an excellent tool which will appeal to many users designer and non designer alike. Oh and cheers, thanks for an excellent evening Corel... Look for a more indepth review later next month, Corel DRAW GRAPHICS SUITE X4 will retail for £386.58 inc. VAT and an upgrade will be available for £175.08 inc. VAT.

Apple Says ...

Apple today announced that iPhone will deliver significantly longer battery life when it ships on June 29 than was originally estimated when iPhone was unveiled in January. iPhone will feature up to 8 hours of talk time, 6 hours of Internet use, 7 hours of video playback or 24 hours of audio playback.* In addition, iPhone will feature up to 250 hours-more than 10 days-of standby time. Apple also announced that the entire top surface of iPhone, including its stunning 3.5-inch display, has been upgraded from plastic to optical-quality glass to achieve a superior level of scratch resistance and optical clarity. So I might have jumped the gun a bit, if these figures prove correct on the playback and usage times ... I still think that Apple screwed up what could have possibly been their best product to date by not allowing users the capability to switch power packs with ease...

Adobe CS3 Bundles

Adobe announced their new CS3 configurations. The will consist of the Adobe CS3 Design Standard Collection and also the Adobe CS3 Design Premium Collection. The Adobe CS3 Design Standard collection collects the essentials for print production. The collection includes: InDesign CS3, Photoshop CS3 Standard, and Illustrator CS3, Adobe Acrobat® 8 Professional, and a new CS3 version of Adobe Bridge®, with support for Adobe Version Cue® CS3, Adobe Stock Photos, Adobe Device Central CS3, and Adobe Acrobat Connect™. The Adobe CS3 Design Premium collection is the version for designers who want that extra power. This includes new versions of InDesign® CS3, Illustrator® CS3, and the new Photoshop® CS3 Extended. For Web desing you have the newly Adobefied Dreamweaver® CS3 which supports XHTML. Adobe Flash® CS3 Professional, Which has also been completely rebranded with an interface to match. Prices are estimated at US$1799 for the Premium edition, with upgrade licenses from CS or CS2 for US$599. The Standard edition is expected to be priced at US$1199, with upgrades from earlier CS licenses at US$399. Both editions of the CS 3 Design Collection will require Microsoft® Windows® XP or Windows Vista,™ and a full Universal Binary for Mac OS X running on either the Power PC or Intel® processors. In addition to the bundles, Adobe Photoshop CS3 will ship in two versions and included many new features. The new "Extended" version has all of the features of the standard version of Photoshop CS3, but also features capabilities for 3-D, motion graphics, image measurement and analysis. Both editions are available as stand-alone applications or as part of the Creative Suite 3 Production bundles.Adobe Photoshop CS3 and Photoshop CS3 Extended will begin shipping in April 2007 for estimated prices of $649 and $999, respectively. For more info visit this page at Adobe.