Comment: Test bed: Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator CS6
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I've left these comments out of the official review only because I wanted to spare everyone a seventh page. I'm also not sure I got across just how much better Adobe's Creative Suite feels this time around.

If you haven't read it yet, we've just released a Test Bed article featuring two of the more prominent CS6 apps (Photoshop and Illustrator).

I was more than skeptical when Adobe announced a little while back it would be delivering more frequent "incremental" updates to the CS products. The announcement was quickly followed by CS 5.5 which, to me, didn't offer a completely compelling reason for upgrading (and at the time I was still using CS4). I was worried that updates might loose the "wow" factor and worse, users would be paying for smaller content updates.

CS6 has proved me wrong, period. (We'll see if that keeps up with the next .5 release). For the applications I use everyday (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign), Adobe has managed to make everything feel fresh. Features like faster access to frequently used tools with improved layout options in Illustrator, or the new blur gallery in Photoshop will change some older workflows I've built up, and I suspect it's the same for most users.

Personally, the big piece for me is text styles in Photoshop. Being able to save a style and use it across multiple pieces for the same project feels like it should have been implemented ages ago. And, while I rarely take advantage of the spot removal tools and content aware options their speed and accuracy in CS6 could change my ways.

Perhaps, more than anything, users will notice better performance with CS6. Adobe has done a number of things with the CS6 line including native 64-bit support for some applications and integrating its Mercury Playback Engine technology into design programs.

I'll look to highlight this more in the next CS6 article.