I recently entered the 21st century with the purchase of a digital camera, and I am planning to buy both a computer for photo editing and photo editing software. What about buying a good condition used computer (I am thinking about an imac) with pre-loaded software (e.g., CS4)? This would save me a lot of money to start with, but I am concerned that this would violate the software licensing and/or maybe not be such a good idea. Thoughts? Thanks.
Software licenses can be transferred. The old user has to notify the publisher of the sale to the new user. If someone transfers their license however they no longer qualify for update pricing based on the software they sold. OTOH CS4 is the most recent version so there are no updates at this point. Is the party selling you this system not going to be doing digital photography any more?
You should BTW how much RAM there is in the used equipment. Two gigabytes would be minimum for handling CS4. Four gigabytes would be better.
A caution about using an iMac. They are notorious for being too bright. If you plan on trying to match your screen to your prints for example, your prints will generally come out looking "too dark" - because your iMac will be too bright by comparison.
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2 repliesYou should BTW how much RAM there is in the used equipment. Two gigabytes would be minimum for handling CS4. Four gigabytes would be better.
There are some ways around this, but you should know about this up front. More information in this article from colorwiki:
http://www.colorwiki.com/wiki/My_Printer_Is_Too_Dark