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• Reviewed on: AMD Athlon 64 X2 dual-core processor running Windows Vista.
• Pricing at the end of the review.

Rarely does a software package land with quite the seismic thud that's accompanying Adobe's new Creative Suite 4 — its sheer heft and complexity rival, or even exceed, the introduction of an operating system or even, for that matter, Microsoft Office. In fact, CS4, as it's called, with its 13 main software elements, has moved into the same class of software that includes customized enterprise tools cobbled together by system builders.

That's as should be — it's in keeping with Adobe's ambition to position itself to the large-organization market — but it might be a disappointment to hobbyists, amateurs and others who could afford to buy a copy of the venerable Photoshop and have fun putting their friends' faces on spectacular bodies harvested from the Internet. And although Adobe is making Photoshop CS4 available as a standalone product for these people, upgrading is not much of an option any more. Other products are available that will do the trick more cheaply — among them Corel's Paint Shop Pro Photo and Adobe's own Photoshop Elements, which has been increasing in sophistication with every new version. Moreover, third-party plug-in applications are available from the redoubtable Alien Skin and Corel's KPT tools to keep photo-manipulators happy.

But CS4 is not entirely for large corporations; it is a necessity for small design shops, which will eventually need to handle all the new collaborative features and integrated tools if they want to thrive and play in the big leagues. In fact, the entire design and illustrating landscape has become phenomenally more complex with the increasing sophistication of the Web as a graphic medium; CS4 must keep up with it, and individuals need to keep up with the Creative Suite.

Most of Adobe's efforts have been poured into the complex task of integrating all the tools, including those it bought from Macromedia three years ago, such as the animation software Flash and the Web-development tool Dreamweaver, for which Adobe dropped its own Web-development package called GoLive.

The entire effort behind this version is to streamline and expand the power of collaborative design creativity. Hence the arrival of ConnectNow, a desktop-sharing tool (out of the box, Adobe will allow up to three people to share a desktop in real time from anywhere in the world), which can also be used to allow designers to give their clients some hands-on input without having to call a meeting. There is also Kuler, a tool that allows designers to share colour harmonies without giving away what they're working on, Community Help, which will allow designers to ask others technical questions, and Resource Central, a media and tutorial library.

And just to make matters even harder to grasp — but more convenient to purchase — Adobe has put varying combinations of its 13 applications into six suites, or individually, such as Photoshop and Photoshop Extended, Illustrator, Flash Professional, After Effects, InDesign, Dreamweaver and Premiere Pro. And they're being offered to both Windows and Mac OS X platforms.

The big clue to Adobe's vision of the future lies in Photoshop, which now comes in two versions, for 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems. It isn't quite there yet — Photoshop needs an awful lot of RAM when it's working on really large graphics, say 5 or 6 gigabytes; professionals think nothing of working with image files captured in resolutions of 35 to 40 megapixels. Windows XP limits the user's access to RAM to less than 4 GB, which means when Photoshop is really busy, it has to do a lot of work with its disk-based swap file. Move to the 64-bit system, and a designer will be able to access as much RAM as you can stuff in your box. The problem is that in the 64-bit version of CS4, Photoshop can't automatically choose how much RAM it will use; the user must tell it first. No doubt this will be fixed by CS5, or whatever's to come next.

Individually, each suite has included a varying number of new features.

Photoshop, for instance, has an eye-popping new tool called context-sensitive scaling, with which a user can define an object in the foreground and have that object retain its correct proportions while the background is being resized or distorted. Another, which shows how sophisticated the program has become, allows a designer to photograph a complex subject with varying depth-of-field settings — such as one shot focusing on the closest part, another set a little farther back, and so on. Photoshop will absorb a series of these photographs, ponder on them for a while, and then select the sharpest elements of each to combine them into one photo with a depth of field that would be difficult (if not impossible) to do with a camera.

Another feature for owners of graphics cards that support the OpenGL standard allows designers to zoom in and out smoothly, instead of in graduated steps. OpenGL also allows the user to see the image without those jagged edges that bedevil extreme close-ups. You can also now rotate the canvas on which an image is located, and work on it from any angle, then turn it back again.

Another version of Photoshop, called Photoshop Extended, has improved 3D features; designers can wrap a two-dimensional image around a three-dimensional shape (say, a cube or sphere) and edit the wrapped image as though it were flat on the screen.

InDesign, Adobe's page-layout software, allows designers to manipulate images within a page while maintaining their position of the page. Designers can also create text variables that can change depending on which version of the document the creator wants to use (say, British spelling in one version and Canadian style in another). The layouts created with InDesign can also export elements into Flash for animated presentations. There has also been a series of improvements to InDesign's preflight system, which can detect and fix problems in pages on the fly.

InDesign drawbacks include murky menus — you should spend some time drilling down in them to see what's not immediately obvious from the desktop; it has an odd concept of the kind of default tools you want to use, and you have to be prepared to sacrifice some screen space to get a decent of tools visible.

Dreamweaver was once described as the easiest Website creation tool available, ideal for amateurs; although the CS4 version still seems to be looking at the casual Web-creator market, most of its improvements are geared to professionals. Site creation now assumes you have a grasp of not only HTML but also PHP, JavaScript and cascading style sheets, and their results are presented side-by-side with the visual representation of the design. Another development is a revamped user interface that now matches the rest of the Adobe suite; it will surely send a little shock to diehard Dreamweaver users who will have to learn the new look. It will also take a PSD file created by Photoshop and make a linked “smart object” out of it; change the object in Photoshop and then simply update the Web page in Dreamweaver.

Adobe Illustrator —would you believe this venerable warhorse of vector graphics is now 22 years old? — has introduced drag-and-drop to individual objects: Drag an object to a tool and the tool will kick right in for you to adjust. It's now easier to isolate any one vector for adjustment, and you can also work with several art boards at once within a single document.

Adobe CS4 is the way of the future in creating print, Web, interactive and mobile media, and remains the gold standard of imaging software tools. Though it's not aimed specifically at individual users, anyone with a desire to go into these professions will have to learn how to use CS4's complex and integrated approach.

And just learning it will be a seismic event of its own.

The packages:

• Adobe Creative Suite 4 Design Standard (with InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat): $1,399 (U.S.)
• Adobe Creative Suite 4 Design Premium (with InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop Extended, Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Acrobat Pro): $1,799 (U.S.)
• Adobe Creative Suite 4 Web Standard (with Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Contribute): $999 (U.S.)
• Adobe Creative Suite 4 Web Premium (with Dreamweaver, Flash, Photoshop Extended, Illustrator, Fireworks, Acrobat, Soundbooth, Contribute): $1,699 (U.S.)
• Adobe Creative Suite 4 Production Premium (with After Effects, Premiere Pro, Photoshop Extended, Flash, Illustrator, Soundbooth, OnLocation, Encore): $1,699 (U.S.)
• Adobe Creative Suite 4 Master Collection (with InDesign, Photoshop Extended, Illustrator, Acrobat Pro, Flash Pro, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Contribute, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Soundbooth, OnLocation, Encore): $2,499 (U.S.)