Drawing programmes

[Firebird]

Hi

Probably 15 years or so ago Julian and I invested in a drawing programme called CorelDraw. I must add a legitimate retail boxed version with serial No. I don't know the exact price but CorelDraw ain't cheap. Over the years many drawings/plans/sketches were produced and saved and backed up. Also much school homework and projects, letterheads, business cards and general printing work was carried out.

All was well until about 3 years ago my old computer  on windows XP just had to be replaced. Along came the new one with flat screen, 1 terrabite of storage, built in wireless, bluetooth all the bells and whistles 

Unfortunately CorelDraw won't work on on Windows 10 

Now Julian is a bit of a whizz on the old PC and he tried everything to get it to work all to no avail 

Speaking to Coreldraw via their help page they inform us that no it won't work you must upgrade to the latest version at a cost of several hundred pounds

To put it bluntly up yours was the answer.

We managed to get hold of a copy of a later version of CorelDraw which installed and worked .

But hold your horses, life ain't that simple. The new version won't open the older versions files, its not backward compatible So the hundreds of files we have saved will not work and CorelDraw has its own file system that no other programme will open To access the old files we have an old computer with windows XP installed as a backup, not ideal but works. Incidentally the old version won't open files created on the newer version 

If you go on Google their are thousands of people all with the same complaint.

To add insult to injury CorelDraw have now accessed our computers and disabled the version we have installed and are sending us messages offering their latest version at a ridiculous price and I'm sure that won't open existing files either.

To summarise, DON'T BUY CORELDRAW.

Out of all this frutration though their is an answer. Its a programme called   Inkscape  It doe's everything that CorelDraw did and here's the best bit   ITS FREE 

Heres a link

https://inkscape.org/en/

Happy doodling

Cheers

Rich

[Brian Rupnow]

Rich--the companies that sell 3D cad programs seem to make up the rules as they go along. I have used Solidworks, a mega-expensive 3D software for many years. It is a really great program, with all the bells and whistles you could imagine. When I first started using it many years ago, you got two "seats" with a subscription. One "seat" went on your desktop home computer and one went on your laptop. This was really handy for me, as some of the companies I consulted to kept an office and a computer exclusively for my use. I installed one of my "seats" on the computer at home and one on the computer at whatever office I was consulting to. Imagine my surprise last year when I went to install one of my licenses  on a new customer computer and was refused service. A call to my Solidworks provider informed me that two "seats" on a single license was no longer issued. You get one "seat" and that's it. Now whenever I go out to a consulting job, I have to suspend my "seat" at home and initialize the "seat" at the customers office, then do the opposite at the end of the day when I return home. I can't say enough good things about the software, but it appears that the company that owns the software has found a really easy way to double their money.

[Firebird]

Hi Brian

We recently had to suffer Photsuckit trying to blackmail us. It seems they are all trying to squeeze us

Cheers

Rich

[kvom]

I get SolidWorks for $20/yr as a veteran, so even though I have to install the latest version once a year I can't complain.  Draftsight, for 2D CAD is free, although I now do almost all 2D work now as SW sketches.

[b.lindsey]

After AutoCAD started upping their prices I went to Draftsight too . Great program, free, and I still prefer 2D for shop drawings, though I can do 3D as well, for A few more days at least 

Bill

[Brian Rupnow]

Bill--I had to get off a drafting board and into computer world about 20 years ago. I learned with Autocad 13---probably the most horrible piece of software that Autodesk ever sold. It may even have been their first program that didn't require the stylus and special pallet. I can remember sweating bullets learning to use it, and getting the "blue screen of death" about 3 times a day and losing the whole frickin drawing.