discount websites

For both software and hardware a good starting point is to try and find what you want for free.

Search on, say, google, for [free software directory], omitting the brackets.

That should give you many sites, which you can look at one by one till you find what you want.

Try something like [cheap electronics directory] for hardware.
Use a bit of imagination in your selection of search words and make the web work for you!

I hope this helps you.

It might help us if you let us know what you want specifically-- especially for software.

I am a big fan of OpenOffice which is a free version of Microsoft Office. It is quite easy to install and use and is compatible with Word and Excel files.

I don't know why anyone would shell out the money for the Microsoft stuff.

Good idea to check out free software, there is a lot out there if you dig around - though some of those other programs you have to buy - in which case the discount site may be my best bet. (?)

In general I just like looking for new computer stuff (not always with aim!) I started blogging and have been doing well but would like to make a better looking banner, etc. Someone recommended GIMP, which I guess is free online, though at some point I may want something like Adobe with more features, etc.

The Gimp is an excellent program. It is very well programmed and can do most everything that Adobe photoshop can do... and some things it can do better.

The downside to the Gimp is that it was written by image processing experts for image processing experts. This means it does everything you would want very well, but it is not always the easiest program to use. Adobe Photoshop's main advantage (in my opinion) is a sleaker, easier to use interface. To me ,this is not worth the hundreds of dollars they charge.

Of course the big upside is that the Gimp is completely free. It is not an introductory version of a pricy product (some software tries to trick you with a "demo" version). It is really free.

The other upside is that, like most Open Source products, it comes with a community. They have done work in later versions to make it easier to use for non-experts and I find most things pretty easy to use. There is also a somewhat nerdy, but quite helpful book I bought called "Grokking the Gimp".

For doing simple things (like making a simple banner) plan on spending a few hours learning and you should be able to do pretty good things. The program comes with a menu called "Script-fu" that has some really neat effects pre-programmed which includes metallic effects and 3D looking letters with reflections and ....

If you want free for Graphics, you aren't going to get any better than the Gimp. I can't recommend anything cheap because most "cheap" software I have seen is poorly made.

Things like the Gimp are labors of love and are remarkably good.

If you are looking for a good free HTML editor, I recommend Nvu. This is an open source product, but it was made by a commercial company but released as open source. A different model... but still quite well made for someone who wants a fairly advanced, but easy to use editor.

... I want to make sure I don't overemphasize the ease of use issue.

My 12 year old son is artistically inclined (i.e. not a tech nerd like his dad). He was able to make neat creative art (involving dinosaurs rampaging through a aerial view of Boston) in a couple of hours of playing with it. I probably had to give him 20 minutes of help getting started.

Go ahead, install it and try it out.