Dollars Saved passes $1,000 barrier

With a single post, our Dollars Saved counter has crossed not only the $100 threshold, but also the $1,000 threshold, thanks to the ludicrous price of Adobe's Creative Suite, and the availability of some great free alternatives.

There's still lots of pricey software out there to replace (MS Office, anyone?), so watch for this number to make another jump soon.

Assemble your own Adobe Creative Suite, sans Adobe and $1200 price tag

Before I begin, a caveat: Adobe products are excellent, and open-source alternatives have not reached Adobe's level of capability or refinement, and may never do so.

Now that I've gotten that out of the way, let's be real here: many users do not need all of the functionality available in Adobe's products. In fact, many users will never even know all of the functionality in Adobe's products, let alone need it. With that in mind, today we're going to assemble something at least recognizably similar to Adobe's Creative Suite Design Standard, which includes tools geared toward print design and creation, but is perfectly suitable for developing static documents, images and content for a variety of media, including the Web. Here's what's included in Adobe Creative Suite Design Standard:

• InDesign (desktop publishing)
• Photoshop (bitmap image creation/manipulation)
• Illustrator (vector image creation/manipulation)
• Acrobat (PDF creation/manipulation)
  

(Look for a future article where I tackle some of Adobe's other Creative Suite versions, which include Web development, animation, video and audio software.)

Here's my list of replacements:

Adobe Product	Free Alternative
InDesign	Scribus
Photoshop	GIMP
Illustrator	Inkscape
Acrobat	PDFCreator and PDFill PDF Tools

Let's take a quick look at how each of these free alternatives stacks up to its Adobe counterpart.

Scribus
Scribus (pronounced "scribe-us") is a desktop publishing application, and an alternative to Adobe's InDesign, which itself is an alternative to industry leader QuarkXpress. Scribus and other desktop publishing applications are used to create page page layouts mostly for print, but also for use on-line, especially when the output is saved as a PDF. Scribus is not compatible with the proprietary file formats used in either InDesign or QuarkXpress. You can see the Scribus team's explanation of this in their FAQ, which boils down to two things: the complexity of these file formats, and the potential legal ramifications. Scribus does support EPS, SVG, and PDF file formats, allowing import and export between the commercial products.

GIMP
The GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) is an alternative to the ubiquitous Photoshop, and can be used to retouch/manipulate photos and compose raster images. Of all of the programs we're featuring today, GIMP is the most mature, and includes a feature you won't find in either Scribus or Inkscape: the ability to open and save Adobe's proprietary file format. That's right: the GIMP can not only import PSD files, it can also save PSD files that will open in Photoshop. Obviously, compatibility may not be perfect, but it's better than nothing. Because of it's impressive functionality and interoperability, the GIMP has earned a large and loyal fan base, and comes highly recommended. Note: if you're familiar with Photoshop, be prepared for a steep learning curve figuring out how to use the GIMP, since while the program is very powerful, it is also very different from Photoshop, and will take some getting used to.

Inkscape
Inkscape is a vector graphics program, comparable to Adobe Illustrator, the undisputed leader in this category. For those unfamiliar with the difference between vector and bitmap graphics (the kind produced via Photoshop and GIMP), vector images are made up of mathematical descriptions, therefore allowing an image to scale smoothly, while bitmap images are composed of a grid of pixels of varying colours. For more info, check out the nice explanation available on Wikipedia.

Inkscape does not support Illustrator's proprietary AI files, but it does open and save a whack of vector file formats, including Web-standard SVG files, which it actually handles better than Illustrator. Inkscape also saves PDF files, so your creations can be easily shared.

PDFCreator and PDFill PDF Tools
The three other applications we've looked at all have their own "Save As PDF" functions, but what about for programs that don't offer that feature? Here's where PDFCreator comes in. PDFCreator allows you to create PDFs from any application that has Print functionality. Once PDFCreator is installed, a new entry is added to your list of installed printers. When you print, simply select this "PDFCreator" printer to create a PDF of whatever would have printed to paper.

Say you want to merge PDFs, split PDFs into multiple pages, reorder pages within a PDF, or reformat PDFs to different page dimensions. PDFill PDF Tools allow you to do all that, and a lot more. It even creates PDFs the via a PDF printer the same way PDFCreator does. I personally prefer PDFCreator, but if you prefer, you can get away with just the one install. One potential nag with this program is that when you install it, a trial version of the company's $20 PDF Editor is also installed, but you don't have to buy anything to use the free program.

A Final Word
These applications will give the average user most of the functionality they'd require from Adobe Creative Suite Design Standard. However, there are some drawbacks:

• Less polish when compared with Adobe's products
• Lack of all features found in the Adobe Suite
• Lack of the "integration" found in the Adobe Suite
• Incompatibility or imperfect compatibility with Adobe's proprietary file formats*
• No warranty and no professional support.
  

However, at the end of the day, the $1200 price tag difference should be more than enough to convince many people to check out this free "suite".

*Some would argue that this is more a drawback of Adobe products, the way they would argue that Microsoft's proprietary Office formats are a drawback. Most of the products we are going to examine use "open" file formats, meaning the file format is available to be incorporated into any application, commercial or otherwise, including Adobe's products, if they chose to do so.

Assemble your own System Utilities Suite

If you followed my series on assembling your own Internet security suite, you can feel confident that your computer is now protected about as well as it would be if you had installed one of the $40 Internet security suites available on the market.

With that done, what about Windows performance and maintainance? There are literally hundreds of little tweaks you can make to speed up Windows XP (I'm sure the same is true for Vista as well, but I am not a believer). Here are some guides to get you started:

• 99 Performance Tips for Windows XP
• Optimize XP
• 10 Simple Ways To Speed Up Windows XP
• Ten Ways To Make Windows XP Run Better
• Top 10 Windows XP Tips Of All Time

On top of the plethora of one-off config boosts you can try, there are some regular steps you can take to ensure your computer is in top shape. Enter the "system utilities" suites, which make these maintenance steps as simple as possible.

A "system utilities" suite can mean different things to different people, and the various commercial packages out there contain a wide range of integrated tools for optimizing and maintaining your computer. While the actual list of included tools will differ from vendor to vendor, these suites typically contain:

• A registry cleaner/cleaner
• A startup optimizer
• A disk cleaner
• A disk defragmenter
  
• A registry defragmenter
• A memory optimizer

There are several choices out there for this type of application, and most of them will set you back about $50. If you're willing to pay, I'd recommend either Tune-Up Utilities or System Mechanic (yes, both $50). However, I think you can get most of the benefit of these packages without paying anything.

Shall we begin?

Software to Install

1. CCleaner: CCleaner is a disk cleanup, registry cleanup, and startup optimization utility, so if used regularly, it can go a long way to maintain your computer all by itself.
2. NTRegopt: this program optimizes your NT-based registry (e.g. Windows NT, XP, and even Vista). It works by defragmenting your registry to minimize registry size and therefore improve registry access speed.
3. PageDefrag: Standard defragmentation programs (including JkDefrag, see below) cannot defragment Windows paging files. PageDefrag is able to defragment your paging file, and works nicely in tandem with NTRegopt and JkDefrag to ensure all of your files are defragmented. PageDefrag does not need to be installed. Just download it, unzip it where you'll remember (how about C:\Program Files\PageDefrag ?) and run it from there.
4. JkDefrag: JkDefrag is a disk defragmenter that does a better job than the built-in defragmentation utility that comes bundled with Windows. Once you have downloaded the program, there is no installation. Just unzip it to a folder where you'll remember where it is, like C:\Program Files\JkDefrag. From there, you can just double-click JkDefrag.exe, and the process from that point is totally automatic.
   

These programs give a good platform for optimizing your computer. You'll notice that I haven't included a memory optimizer on the list, and here's why: there's very little proof that memory optimizers actually do anything to improve performance. If you absolutely must have a memory optimizer, why not try out Microsoft's ClearMem, which is available as part of a free download in this package, which includes an additional 125+ utilities that I have no idea what they do. Once it is installed, ClearMem runs from the Windows Command Prompt.

In my next post, I'll outline a simple maintenance routine to follow to keep your computer firing on all cylinders.

Using your free System Utilities Suite

Once you've downloaded and installed everything to assemble our free System Utilities suite, it's time to put it to work. I recommend following these steps about once a week. There are benefits for performing the defragment actions on an even more frequent basis, so if you can do it more often, go for it!

Step 1: CCleaner


We're going to use CCleaner for 3 things:

1. Deleting "junk" files from the hard drive
2. Removing invalid entries from the Registry
3. Disabling unwanted startup items.

So fire up CCleaner, and let' get started...

1. From CCleaner's Cleaner view, click on "Analyze".
   
2. Once the analysis is complete, you're presented with a list of the files CCleaner has identified to delete. Chances are, these can all go, so hit the "Run Cleaner" button. This will clean out all of temporary and otherwise unnecessary files from your computer (cookies, anything in your Recycle Bin, etc.)
   
3. For good measure, go ahead and perform steps 1 and 2 again. You never know: CCleaner might actually find a few extra files that can be deleted.
   
4. In CCleaner's Registry view, click "Scan for Issues".
5. Once the scan is complete, you'll see a list of Registry entries that can be deleted. Click on "Fix selected issues..."
6. CCleaner will volunteer to back up your Registry, and you might as well do it, so click "Yes".
7. Once the Fix Issue dialogue appears, click on "Fix All Selected Issues"
8. You might as well repeat steps 4-7, since the first registry purge will often make new entries unnecessary as well, and if you run a new scan, CCleaner will find these new issues.
   
9. In CCleaner's Tools view, click on the Startup button. For any item listed you don't want to load automatically when your computer starts(qttask.exe, ituneshelper.exe, etc.), highlight the entry and click "Delete Entry".

Step 2: NTRegopt


NTRegopt will do one thing: defragment and shrink your Registry. This is a two-step process:

1. Start NTRegopt.
2. Once the program has completed optimizing the Registry, say "yes" at the prompt to restart your computer.

Step 3: PageDefrag


PageDefrag defrags another very specialized file that most defragmenting utilities will not fix: your paging file. Here's what to do:

1. Launch PageDefrag.
2. Browse down the list of files, and look for any one that has more than one fragment.
3. If some of the files have more than one fragment, click on the "Defrag at next boot" radio button. Otherwise, just click the "Cancel" button.
   

The next time your computer restarts, PageDefrag will take a few seconds to defragment those files.

Step 4: JkDefrag


JkDefrag is a general defragmentation utility that I think does a better job at defragmenting hard drives than Microsoft's built-in utility. Using JkDefrag is a one-click process:

1. Launch JkDefrag.exe.

The program will automatically defragment all hard drives. Warning: the first time you run JkDefrag, it's going to take a long time to do its work. We're talking like 2 hours. If, however, you keep in the habit of defragmenting at least once a week, you'll find that the process will take much less than half an hour. To help ensure you keep the defragmenting habit, you can easily use the Windows Scheduled Tasks utility to schedule regular maintenance. You can also use JkDefrag's screensaver mode, to get some defragmenting in every time you step away from the computer for a few minutes.