Final Results And Overall Mark  

Well we have reached the end of the review. Here are my final comments, notes and grades for the Adobe PageMaker 7.0.

Final Comments

During the past few months Adobe has reoriented its whole range of software on the e-paper theme. The result with PageMaker 7.0 is that the software is more PDF oriented than ever. Not only can you import PDF files into every PageMaker 7.0 document, but you can even export your publications as PDF files to ensure their readability across all kind of platforms (PC, Macs, PDAs, etc). The new enhanced text features are more than welcome for such software. PageMaker 7.0 now offers every font setting you can dream about. During this review I found that PageMaker 7.0 is clearly a mammoth of power thanks to the numerous features it includes. Despite my first thoughts the myriad of features doesn’t make the software hard to use and this is a great advantage. Incredibly powerful, the creative side hasn’t been forgotten with the tighter integration of the software with PhotoShop and Illustrator as well as the inclusion of tons of high quality bonus contents.

Sure everything is not perfect and the software still features two big weak points. First the awful interface of PageMaker 7.0 is quite disheartening. This is really a shame, especially when you know PageMaker targets the SOHO (spell this out whatever it is) market. We hope Adobe will seriously revamp the interface of PageMaker for the next version. The second thing we reproach to PageMaker 7.0 is its price. Adobe may argue that the software is cheaper than InDesign (which is true) however, it remains way too expensive in comparison to Microsoft Publisher 2002, Corel Draw! 10, and other publishing programs.

All in all PageMaker 7.0 is a good upgrade that brings great new features (like the ability to merge data into documents) while maintaining a state of the art creativity level where the user has total control over each setting that impacts the look of a composition. Plus PageMaker 7.0 accommodates itself of a modest hardware configuration making it an unavoidable choice for printer providers, corporate communication services, school teachers, etc.