In the past few years, Adobe has released CS updates at intervals ranging from 12 to 24 months, so one upgrade would arrive over a typical three-year period. In all of them, there were two cases to compare: (1) a subscription that includes the lower first-year promotional pricing Adobe offers, and (2) perpetual license purchases based on CS products today and the one upgrade at the price Adobe charged to upgrade from CS5 to CS6 products. But it's clear Adobe is hoping to lure people into paying the somewhat higher price and delve into software they might not have been able to justify buying through the traditional perpetual-license model.įor our analysis, we looked at three situations with costs over three years. Adobe offers subscriptions to individual programs, such as Photoshop and Premiere Pro, too, for $20 a month. The more active a customer is with Adobe products, the more compelling the Creative Cloud is. For details about what's coming in the big update in June, check my colleague Lori Grunin's Creative Cloud coverage.

Adobe plans to sell CS6 products 'indefinitely,' but all the new action is with the new Creative Cloud product line.

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