Comments on: Yes, CS3 can be tested cross-platform

By: Graham Robinson

Graham Robinson — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 10:27:30 +0000

John
I guess this issue is just not going to lie down and die.
I’m a PC user moving to Mac but keeping a PC laptop.
I’m willing to upgrade LR1 and PS CS2 to current versions. But this nonsense that I cannot use PS on a MacPro and a PC laptop is driving lots of people nuts.
Best Regards
/Graham

By: Casey

Casey — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 09:08:09 +0000

I am in the exact same situation… please help. Agter shelling out 4 grand for the CS2 web and video premium… I should be able to use it on any new platform I choose. 4 GRAND… that isn’t chump change people…

By: Rory

Rory — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 13:10:49 +0000

Hi John
Any progress on this issue yet? I have a pc desktop and a macbook pro for field work. I can use lightroom natively on both machines, but not photoshop, which is a tad frustrating.
I have been impressed with adobe’s general ethical, fair practises, so I am wondering what is the roadblock on this issue.
BTW, thanks for your blog. It is a great communication outlet and reminder that adobe is made up of people that care.
Regards
Rory

By: Paul Stone

Paul Stone — Sat, 23 May 2009 11:28:43 +0000

I agree with the others here - the products purchased should be cross platform compatible. I mean I paid for a licence to use the software and i can use it on my mac, its just WAY slower doing it through vmware fusion than using the native software on my mac. more efficient for everyone.. perhaps i should go back to piracy.. hrmm ["Hmm"... yes, "Hmm." Such food for thought. Maybe you should instead read the info I've posted. --J.]

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 12:12:08 +0000

Hi. I am in the same situation as Ian. I bought the Student Edition of CS3 Web Premium a while ago, and have now upgraded to a Mac. I simply want to move/copy my licence to my Mac. I still use my Windows machine, so I would preferably like to use both. I did read several places that said the licence allowed use on 2 machines.
Oh, I received a letter not too long ago (from Adobe), saying that Adobe had made my personal information (posibly not excluding Credit Card information) available via a loophole in their website. I would be grateful if, as in a way of appology, Adobe allow me to install my licence on my mac.
Thanks,
Chris.

By: Ian Read

Ian Read — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 11:03:43 +0000

I have recently invested in Production Premium CS3 Student Edition for my college work at the beginning of the year. As I knew that I would eventually be moving to Mac, I asked if I could transfer to software across. I received a reply saying yes (and I even found within this blog that it states that Student License products can be transferred to Mac) however when I rang the customer services department, they declined to accept a cross platform transfer request because of the type of license I have purchased.
As you can now see, I feel a little cheated in this – my PC broke on me half way through a project (which inevitably led to the PC’s death). Luckily I have my project files backed up. However, knowing full well that I had the ability to transfer the license, I thought now would be the best time to purchase the mac.
Now I’m near £300 out of pocket, and unable to continue my project work without using CS3 and ‘Windoze’ through bootcamp.
I was told that the policy is that Student Licenses cannot be transferred. Is this new policy? I can’t understand the reasoning behind this as I can install windows and the CS3 suite through boot camp and still use it on my Mac. That and the fact that this is exactly the same piece of software, even if I have to destroy the disc etc. simply to enable me to do my college work.
You’re help would be much appreciated in trying to resolve this matter.
Kind Regards
Ian Read
UK

By: Thomas Meldgaard Nielsen

Thomas Meldgaard Nielsen — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 06:19:55 +0000

I was about to write my experience about cross grading my copy of a CS3 bundle. Since the experience was (and still is) such a joke I just had to vent at my new Mac blog instead. In case you want to read what happend feel free to visit the blog. Scroll down to the Adobe part for the cross grade issue: http://iandmac.com/2008/06/adobe-cross-grade-fun/ Right now I am not sure how to proceed, I have given up on support. Any advice would be appreciated highly.

By: Frank

Frank — Sun, 25 May 2008 10:48:33 +0000

Hi John,
I should have searched before I posted somewhere else in your blog. This is quite an impressive list of similar problems and complaints. And they have been going on for over a year and still nothing has changed. According to Adobe Customer Service crossgrading from CS2 Win to CS3 Mac costs 300 EUR or $450 – not quite a “nominal fee” given the fact that the regular upgrade sells for $199.
The platform specific licensing is not just creating a lot of problems. It is also unfair as you can see. There is no reason why the one upgrade is more than twice as expensive as the other one as I still can use the software only on the same amount of computers with the same amount of functionality.
Please please fix this.
Frank

By: fiona macgregor

fiona macgregor — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 00:20:18 +0000

i want to get dreamweaver but am confused about the one user thing (new to this), i use three different computers depending on where i am (work, home, out). will i be able to load and use this software on all three machines. [You can load it onto all three machines, but you can activate it on only two. That means that you'd periodically have to deactivate on one machine, then transfer activation to another (not a hard process). --J.]

By: sly Dev

sly Dev — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 09:56:13 +0000

After the last few viruses, I switched my compnay over 99% to linux. Wow, I am happy I did that. The only product I have not ported yet, is Adobe CS3 PhotoShop, Bridge, and Premiere.
Does anyone have any recommendations?
Currently trying out GIMP, pitivi, Ardour 2. With 40 computers, this may end up saving me huge $$$ in the medium and long run, once my staff picksup and learns the newsoftware. Adobe, what are you doing, not supporting LINUX!!
Until Adobe offers a linux version, I will be dropping adobe, unfortunately, because I really liked it over the last 7 years.

By: Cris Ward

Cris Ward — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 06:24:46 +0000

We bought four copies of Creative Suite CS3 Design addition (windows) for our web design company here in Manchester UK. With the nice new macs coming out and parallels allowing us to use IE, when our pc’s started to die I decided we should get macs. I rang adobe and they said we could transfer our licences no problem.
Not wanting to leap before we looked I decided we should get one mac, try everything out and if it all worked follow suite with the other three. I mentioned this over the phone to our helpful adobe support person and they seemed to thin k there would be no problem.
The first mac worked fine, so off I went and bought another 3. Now Adobe are telling me once we transfer one license we can’t do any more. We had to do them all at the same time! This leaves me with 3 copies of CS3 Windows that we can’t use on our Macs. We could install them under parallels, but they’re not the sort of programs you want to use in a virtual environment. In contrast our Macromedia Studio 8 license worked first time as the license is cross platform.
Any advice would be much appreciated. Waiting for CS4 isn’t really an option (the upgrade route). Adobe pretty much have a monopoly on this kind of software so we can’t even jump ship in protest (especially as macromedia has now been bought up).

By: Joe

Joe — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 11:50:16 +0000

Hi John, Now here's a blog that makes sense. I'm purchasing a student edition of CS3 premium and I have both a PC desktop and PC Laptop. I notice that activation is necessary by internet. Does this mean that I can only install on one computer ever? [Nope: you can activate the software on two machines. The idea is that you would be using only one copy at a time. --J.] Sorry to get into this discussion so late in the game. And if I migrate to a Mac, will I have to repurchase the entire program again. [No, you can cross-grade from Windows to Mac or vice versa pretty easily; here's more info. --J.] Are activation and registration two completely different things? [Yes; more info is here. --J.]

By: Greg

Greg — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 12:46:29 +0000

John, I have Production Studio Premium on Win on a workstation and have plans to move my portable work in the field to a MacBookPro. Seeing how the two-computer rule won't work here, can I run the second version on the MacBookPro under Parallels? Do you know if the Studio is hosted OK in that environment? [Yep--as far as I know that should work fine. You might try searching the user forums to find out others' experiences. --J.] I really don't want to waste the space to do bootcamp. [I think that if I were getting a new machine today, I'd devote some space to a Boot Camp partition. I'd very rarely want to boot up under Windows (vs. Parallels/VMWare), but there are times I'd like to know exactly how things run when not wrapped by the Mac OS. I don't know how much performance differs when running in that mode vs. when run through a virtualization app, but I believe it's at least somewhat better. --J.]

By: Ed

Ed — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 14:30:47 +0000

I need where i can find a serial for adobe photoshop cs3 extended or adobe photoshop cs3.
Please, i need to see how work this new application
Ed
[Buy one. Genius... --J.]

By: DebL

DebL — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 10:46:13 +0000

I Have a question - I have a version of CS on one mac computer, and CS2 on another Mac Computer, as i use to have an assistant designer full time. My question is I bought the Upgrade CS3 for the CS version, can I also upgrade my 2nd computer with the CS2? I really don't want to by another upgrade! ouch! [Well, there's nothing in the software that will prevent you from installing on those two machines, activating, and running. You wouldn't be using the software according to the spirit (and probably the letter) of the license agreement, however. --J.]