Where and which one to buy

[wickedinhere]

I decided to go ahead and get corel drawx5 but which one do i get? They range from 99.00 to 500.00 wheres the best place?

[iou]

I bought mine right here from PlasmaSpider. Don't know if they still have it available.

[wickedinhere]

I dont think they are still selling it. I found it on ebay for 99.00 but dont know how legit that is.

[trucks1948]

Mine came from ebay .works great there are different versions,student,ect.

[SignTorch Vector Art]

amazon seems to have the best price at the moment

Corel DRAW X5 $195

Limited Edition $396 (with wacom small tablet)

Education Edition $86

the LE was on sale at newegg for $300

I recommend a retail version, education versions don't have VBA macros, can't be upgraded, not for commercial use.

I avoid eBay for software, full-version usually means full-education-version, or equivalent serials, 4 out of 5 deals are probably not real bargains.

I also see that corel has a new corel cad product, I'm tempted to try it, but if it doesn't have improved dxf (with polylines arcs and arc fitting) that will be sad.

[wickedinhere]

I bought it off of ebay for 79.99 full version. I see that alot of people have bought from this person and it gets good feedback. We shall see i will post back when i get it.

[aicomp]

I bought it off of ebay for 79.99 full version. I see that alot of people have bought from this person and it gets good feedback. We shall see i will post back when i get it.

I bought my full version on ebay in the box and it works great. $79.99.

[wickedinhere]

I got it in today and it works great, the join curves feature is great i have been cleaning up dxf's with it all morning.

[jmusser15]

Who was the ebay seller if you don't mind me asking? Just so I don't end up with an educational version.

[wickedinhere]

Here is the item number 170751325632 i bought one and they have 6 left.

[trucks1948]

That join curves is the reason i bought x5 because my x4 didn't have it.Jim

[rottenleonard]

I'm pretty green to this, reading the discription it says it will convert a bitmap to vector, but can I convert jpgs to vector or do I need something to convert jpgs to bitmaps first?

[SignTorch Vector Art]

bitmap doesn't necessarily mean .bmp format, it can mean any raster image, .jpg included, corel opens just about any bitmap (raster) format there is

I'm curious if the software from ebay has the tools/macros menu item like below, if so I think that means it is the full retail version, if not I think it means it's not a full retail version

[rottenleonard]

Well I was going to pull the trigger on the e-pay version but I'd like to know it was the full version. so does the 300-500 dollar versions have things I would actually use for metal art or is it mostly for other things?

BTW thanks

[muzza]

I'm curious if the software from ebay has the tools/macros menu item like below, if so I think that means it is the full retail version, if not I think it means it's not a full retail version

I recently purchased Corel DRAW X5 from an Australian ebay vendor for $250 and was guaranteed by them in a reply message that it was the full and authorised Corel Draw version. It was an OEM version (wrapped and sealed DVD in DVD cover, not boxed version). Comparing screen shots to yours Gary, the tools on the side tool bar are the same down as far as the "Interactive fill tool" ie the last 6 are not there and in the drop down from the "Tools" the only difference is "Vista Editor" is greyed out which I assume is because I run XP on the computer where I have it installed.
Can you please tell me what the last 6 tool are on your screen shot and if they are something I'll need?
As a side note I have also subscribed to Scott Georgeson,s (who is the official training provider to Corel Draw) Click n Learn tutorial series and on his tutorials his screen is the same as mine in that there are no tools below the Interactive fill tool.

Thanks
Murray

[SignTorch Vector Art]

that's good to know, there is an oem edition and it does have macros, interesting....

my only other concern would be whether it is upgradeable, so far I only update on odd numbered versions, and still using X3 for production, so that's no biggy, although for x3 or x4 the upgrade option is nice to get x5 for the join nodes tool and non-spline dxf output options

the 6 buttons in the lower left of my screen shot are custom command buttons, explained in this tutorial

the very first one is the button to actuate macros, hopefully will be able to make more tuts to show how macros (can) work, I posted a corel draw macro on here somewhere that saves the current file to 2 or 3 image formats at once, they can be huge time savers

VSTA stands for visual studio for applications, it is supposed to be a more advanced macro language than visual basic, but it doesn't seem to work or have any documentation, so you're not missing anything there, it is optional during install, that's probably why it is greyed out

[muzza]

Thanks Gary,
The guys I bought it from assured me it was fully upgradable, if I didn't think I would need to upgrade I could purchase the education version for much less.
After I installed and registered it I received a message that upgrade was now available so I clicked on that and all proceeded fine.
Thanks for clarifying the other tools via your tutorial.
Murray

[rottenleonard]

bitmap doesn't necessarily mean .bmp format, it can mean any raster image, .jpg included, corel opens just about any bitmap (raster) format there is

I'm curious if the software from ebay has the tools/macros menu item like below, if so I think that means it is the full retail version, if not I think it means it's not a full retail version

I went ahead a purchased the e-pay corel 5 from the same guy above, it has the macro's just like your screen shot.
Now I just need to find all of your tutorials for coral, although I just recieved my sign torch cd and i see there is a couple of them on there,wasn't expecting that...thank you!

[SignTorch Vector Art]

you're welcome, last year was a fiasco, this year everything is set, just running WAY behind on publishing 2011 series (among other things), then will make some videos, can't wait, I love doing that,

[Dawgonhawg]

Gary, I am ready for your 2011 art. When will it be up for sale?
Dawg

[SignTorch Vector Art]

can't believe I didn't do it already, but now I'm aiming for by valentines,

thanks for asking....

[Sampson Jones]

Gary , enjoyed your tutorials and product .I have a suggestion though , you slow the next tutorials way down , and repeat the same moves over a few times ,so dummies like me can grasp some of it .

[Groth]

I see that their is also a CorelDRAW Premium Suite, does anyone have any experience with this? Wondering if this is worth the extra $$.
Thanks

[SignTorch Vector Art]

at corel.com premium is priced $699, X5 is $349 (marked down from $499)

premium includes these extras

website creator $49.99

video studio pro $49.99

swish max $149.99

winzip pro $59.95

at current prices it's slightly cheaper to buy those products separately

whether you need all those is the big question

if you don't have winzip, it's worth buying

I'm picky when it comes to video and web page software, there are so many choices, I'd look around for that type of software

I like swish max, I used it to make the flash animations at my web site, but for most people, designing and using flash animations can be very complicated, so not sure you'd really need that

I'd just buy x5 (and winzip) and look into the other applications separately as I needed them

[Groth]

Thanks for the information, it would defiantly not be worth the extra money for me to spend on he preimum addition. I'm new to these programs and have one more question, is corel a good program to use with a drawing tablet/digitalized tracing tool.
Thanks again for all your input, learning a lot here.