CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X4 [DVD]
![CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X4 [DVD]](/Images/B0012KZKZC/medium.jpg) | Average Customer Rating: Recommend Bring together the worlds of layout, photo editing, illustration and bitmap-to-vector tracing with CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X4. It's easy to collaborate with its market-leading file compatibility. New content and tutorials get you started fast. This Suite gives you the tools and resources to create a wide variety of projects. Speed up the design process with easy online access to font identification and client feedback. Upload scanned images… Product details and pricing info |
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70 Customer Reviews Posted
- Startlingly Good
- Long-time Photoshop user here, and I have to tell you that I am impressed with how far Corel has brought its suite of graphics software in the few years since I've used it. In spite of it being a suite, it isn't bloated with a lot of specialized applications. You get a good, solid image handling program, a vector-based drawing program and a screen cap one. No website builders, 3D stuff or video applications which are likely to take up a ton of space on your hard drive and never be used.
In many ways I find the drawing program better than anything I've seen from Adobe. The controls are far more intuitive. And in fact, since one of the ways I judge how well a program performs is by how easy it is to get it up and running at a basic level without reading any of the manuals, I'd have to say that in many ways the whole suite is as good or better than Adobe's offerings in the intuition department. If you can handle Photoshop, you can certainly learn Corel fairly quickly.
There's a lot I could say, but I'd prefer to recommend that you check the program info on this page and see if it sounds like something you can use. I don't think you'll be disappointed in the quality, nor do I believe you'll be defeated by the learning curve. I think you'll find this suite well worth having either on its own or as an addition to the graphics programs you already use. - 2008-09-02, 0 of 0 people found this review helpful, Rated:
- A great program
- CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X4 is an amazing thing - it can get someone like me, computer challenged, where the creative, graphics and visual aspects are needed - I can visualize what I want, but have found it hard to put those thoughts in a file like I want them.
This product helps to just that - with remarkable ease.
This is a must for anyone who does a lot of visual creations with the computer, and Corel is one of the premier names in computer quality products.
An excellent product. - 2008-08-28, 0 of 0 people found this review helpful, Rated:
- A great solution for non-professional designers
- CorelDraw Graphics Suite X4 is a very solid program. It does most of what Adobe Illustrator does (vector-based graphic design) and much of what Adobe InDesign does (desktop publishing) in one handy application.
CorelDraw would be an ideal solution for a small business or organization that does a fair amount of advertising-creation and publication design in-house. With one application (well-priced when compared to buying both Illustrator and InDesign), the content creator can achieve very professional results.
The app is also friendly to first-time users. It offers more than 80 customizable document templates that will be useful to newbies. While there is still a learning curve for new users, the app has an intuitive interface that will help get the user up and running relatively quickly.
The problem for CorelDraw is that Illustrator has become the default vector app in the design/pre-press community. Professionals should still start with Illustrator and Quark and/or InDesign -- they're the industry standards. While CorelDraw is very good, it would need to be awesome to unseat Illustrator, and that isn't going to happen anytime soon.
CorelDraw has new file formats that enable docs to be shared between CorelDraw and Adobe apps. This is handy, but also shows which format and apps are the most common -- Adobe's. If you're in a design situation where you're going to have to worry about your files working in Adobe formats, you should just go ahead and use Adobe products.
Another thing: Because the Adobe products are the standard, there are numerous training DVDs and books to purchase that can help you get the most out of your apps. With CorelDraw, not so much.
I feel bad for good apps like CorelDraw. I wish I could talk just about the app itself and not bring in a discussion about Adobe's competitive products, but given the way the design industry works -- or any technology-based industry, for that matter -- you always have to bring the front-running application into the mix.
That being said, if you're not a graphic designer or a pre-press operator but are instead a multitasking, Windows-based employee at a company or organization who has been put in charge of creating brochures, pamphlets and the like, CorelDraw will answer your needs very well. If you're someone who doesn't need to share files often with design colleagues, publishing clients or service bureaus (who are most likely using Adobe apps almost exclusively), then you have no worries.
BTW, if you're already using CoreDraw, it's worth the upgrade. The font-identifying tool alone makes it worth it, at least for me. - 2008-08-28, 0 of 0 people found this review helpful, Rated:
- Way more than I need - but a great product for professionals
- This review has been long in the making as I've struggled to find reasons to delve deeper into this massive software suite. I have no complaints about the user-friendliness of the programs. Corel is not hard to figure out and there are plenty of tutorials and help resources included. I've never attempted to use a graphics programs before, let alone the previous edition of CorelDRAW, so this was all new - and intimidating - to me. But I needn't be intimidated by anything other than the sheer volume of applications, because the drag-and-drop for formatting and such made things fairly easy to handle.
I wish I could say I was a business owner, because in that case I would have many more uses for this program. Fooling around with the program for review purposes, I was able to create mock-ups of webpage layouts that looked pretty good. With more motivation (i.e. practical reason for using this) I am confident that I could do pretty well with DRAW. There are a lot of photos, clipart, and templates included - you can tinker around with this stuff for hours and hours. Not to keep driving at the same point, as much as I like this software I would love it if I had more I could apply it to. Perhaps in the future.
It takes up quite a bit of room to install - it requires a DVD-ROM drive (which should be pretty obvious from the product name that includes DVD in brackets) - and it took a long, long time to actually install. Not that I am complaining, I don't have the greatest system in the world. It is a fairly new computer though, so if you are working with a computer that you have been planning to upgrade -- I recommend doing so before trying to put this on your computer. I have no point of reference to compare this to, having never used a similar product. But I certainly have no complaints and no reason to bother with anything similar - this does it all. - 2008-08-22, 0 of 0 people found this review helpful, Rated:
- Somewhat of a competitor to Photoshop...
- If you do any kind of graphics creation at all on a regular basis, there is one reason why you MUST have this program: Converting images to vector graphics on a budget. In a nutshell, this means that you can infinitely reduce or enlarge an image with NO distortion, and still have money in your pocket. Other reasons? I have about 2500 fonts, and the font navigator is fantastic for finding just the right typeface. The screen capture software is of little use to me, but for folks who need screencaps from games, movies, etc., it might prove very useful. For fontaholics, obsessive clip art collectors, and beginners, the program comes with fonts and a nice starter pack of clip art so you'll be ready to start playing right away.
I have to admit, I'm not crazy about the interface. It's about on the same level as Photoshop for confusion, but there seems to be a trade-off in graphics programs: The more a program can do, the more complicated the buttons and menus. I only caught on as quickly as I did because I have used other programs for years, and knew to keep looking when I couldn't find or duplicate a certain function. Fortunately you'll never really be on your own.
What's great about Corel is that they have so many tutorials and great product support. Even if you've familiar with other graphics programs, you'll find new features to explore, and if you're unsure of something, you can always find help for it. You won't find the plethora of third-party books, classes and online tutorials like with Photoshop, but with Corel's resources and/or a rudimentary knowledge of other programs, you probably won't need them. This will require more effort, but for me the end results were worth it.
While I don't feel that this program is a serious competitor for Photoshop, it's a GREAT, less expensive alternative. If you want something more than Corel's Paint Shop Pro (another great product), but you don't have an Adobe budget, you should seriously look at this program. - 2008-08-16, 3 of 3 people found this review helpful, Rated:
