Difference Between CS2 and CS4

CS2 vs CS4

CS or Creative Suite from Adobe is a collective name used to describe a group of applications or computer programs conceptualized and developed by Adobe Systems. The more specific sub applications present in the suite are InDesign, Acrobat and of course Photoshop.

As a group of computer-based applications, CS has pretty much evolved through the years. Many versions were developed and ultimately replaced with newer ones. For CS, the newest version CS4 was made public on the 23rd of September 2008 and was released the next month. It replaced the previous CS3 and CS2 versions. The latter was released on April 2005.

The CS4 application can run not only in the usual 32-bit Windows or Mac operating systems but also in the much newer 64-bit Windows Vista OS. This is relatively a new functionality compared to CS2 being originally built for 32-bit systems only. With this, there is no doubt that CS4 is the better performer in terms of processing. Especially when coupled with multi-core (dual or quad-core) processors, its speed is greatly enhanced. The user can really tell the difference to as much as 10x faster than CS2’s 32-bit. This change is more noticeable when handling very large file types. Compared to 32-bit, 64-bit can manage lots of memory thus elevating overall speed.

Like its predecessor CS3, CS4 borrowed the same concept of marketing different editions of the suite. Altogether, there are six editions that include: Design (Standard or Premium), Web (Standard or Premium), Production Premium and Master Collection. This gave CS3 and CS4 better or more functionality than CS2. It can also be recalled that CS2 only had two basic editions. These are the Standard Edition and the Premium Edition. The first edition is bundled with 5 different applications (Bridge, Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop, Version Cue while the latter added Acrobat Professional, Dreamweaver, and GoLive in its package.

But even if a particular user has the Premium CS2 bundle, the overall features are dwarfed by the applications that come with the newer CS4 editions. Aside from the mainstay applications present in the CS2 and CS3 versions, CS4 incorporated other useful programs like Flash, Fireworks, Contribute, Soundbooth, After Effects, Premeire Pro, OnLocation, Encore, Device Central, and Dynamic Link. Almost all of these applications are present in the CS4 Master Collection Edition. This gives Creative Suite 4 more functionality than its earlier versions.

Summary:
1. CS2 is an earlier version (2005) of Adobe’s Creative Suite applications whereas CS4 is the newest (2008) and current CS version available.
2. CS4 can run in 64-bit OS (Vista). It is faster and generally performs better than CS2
3. CS4 was marketed in 6 editions while CS2 only had two.
4. CS4 has more features or applications bundled in the suite compared to CS2.

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