Not surprisingly, Adobe has updated their Creative Suite product line to version 2. Surprisingly, the new versions actually have enough new features to warrant their release.

Previously, Adobe would release new versions of their programs, with only a minor amount of new features, stuff that really should have been included in a free incremental update.

A few issues remain, however. Among them is Photoshop's inability to work with more than 3.5 GB of RAM. It may seem like an excessive amount at first thought, but with today's Power Mac towers having the ability to work with up to 8 GB of memory, it really is an unacceptable situation.

A few exciting new features:

Instant video preview: The ability to preview your Photoshop CS2 images on a television monitor connected to your computer via FireWire. Extremely handy for anyone working with video who does titles/backgrounds/etc. in Photoshop to be able to check title- and tv-safe areas with one click.

Multiple layer control: It is now possible to select more than one layer in the Layers palette and have control over all of them at once on the canvas. This gives you the ability to move, rotate, and warp multiple layers' worth of graphic elements at once.

Smart objects: Working with vector data in Photoshop has never been a walk in the park. This feature enables vector graphics to retain their format and style while being manipulated within Photoshop.

Two other new features that sound somewhat interesting are 'event-based scripts' and 'variables'. The upgraded scripting capability lets you assign certain actions to be automatically performed at certain points in your workflow.

Variables are a way to populate your designs with data from spreadsheets or databases. These features will both come in handy for many users at some point, and could become real time-savers for pros and power users with the urge to constantly refine their workflow.

Overall, a sweet upgrade, well worth the package price for either version of the Creative Suite. Hopefully Adobe will issue a point update for the ability to work with as much RAM as you may have in your machine.