WOF: What software are you willing to pay for?

That is because people think it is their 'right' to get things for free, however, crux of the matter is even 'freeware' is not entirely free, as they to get paid through various means e.g. donations etc.

I pay for my development software like Visual studio, Maya, and most recently CS5. I also pay for games as I believe in supporting the developers.

I never paid for development tools and suites like Maya or Adobe, but then I really just played around with them. But while I won't impose my morality on others, I think that if you're actually getting money from using any software to create something, you should be using a paid version of the software.

But looking back at downloading software over the last decade I do have to say that its much more of a hassle to download and run software than it was in 2002. The DRM takes a lot more work to crack, there are a lot more viruses and trojans sprinkled around, fake copies with limited functionality, virus writers hijacking "legitimate" releases and infect them, etc etc. Even running a pirated version of windows becomes a hassle, you have to find workarounds for WGA, updating becomes a problem.

Why would you pay for an operating system? Linux is free, and before you start hating on it, you can now use microsoft word on it as well as photoshop on some distros.

Microsoft Dreamspark gave me Visual Studio Professional (along with a ton of other programs), for free.

Games and more Games!

All the other software you can get for free (And not by piracy).

As an alternative for Windows users, Linux is IMO only suitable for undemanding users or those with a lot of time and patience. I tried several Linux distributions over the past year, and they're great for browsing the web out of the box and such, but they might fail to run or install because of hardware they don't like, stop booting because you installed a driver, install incorrectly if you try anything advanced in the installer, might not notify you of problems if you run something through the UI instead of the command line, ... Nothing is obvious. Installing a high performance 3D driver for my Radeon 5850 is something I never managed. I'm sure I could have with some patience and help from others, but I just don't have that patience. And that's just for native Linux. If you want to run any Windows software on Linux, then you can expect to fight even more compatibility problems.

Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of Linux, that's why I keep trying it. I'm also sure it's very good for people who already know it, and who don't spend a lot of time on Windows centric software such as games. The problem is that it reminds me of using a beta of Vista. Well, maybe not that bad, maybe the first release version of Vista. And I'm still using Vista, which I think is a good OS (given enough resources), and I feel there's hope for Linux, too. It's just taking its time to get there.

Wow... Exactly where I stand, word for word

@ET3D
Exactly, having suffered similar issues with Linux, I believe that Linux isn't ready for prime time, an ordinary user doesn't need to go through this unwanted pain and agony; until Linux can become as easy to configure and use as Windows is, I don't see its future beyond geek's PC for a foreseeable time.

Actually, if I can get something to do the job I need for free, that's the way to go. And, since my needs are rather simple, most times there's freeware available that suits the purpose.

That being said, I do purchase imaging software from Adobe, since I'm involved with still photography, (but not video).

Many paid programs have become bloated pigs, for example Adobe "Photoshop Elements", to name the most irritating to me.

The program I bought once, "Nero 6", but will never buy another version of, is a prime example of how to alienate your customers.

If you install the entire suite, it takes over any file type you allow to be associated with it, then changes the file extensions so that other programs have a great deal of difficulty dealing with them.

The installer is sloppy, leaving in excess of 100 dead registry entries after it's finished.

But most importantly, many of the programs, (notably "Nero Vision"), are some of the worst performing pointless junk I've run across. Well, there's Photo Snap also. That even rhymes with "crap".

What we really need, is a good freeware Blu-Ray player. For me, it seems abundantly stupid to pay $90.00 for software to play Blu-Ray discs on the computer, when you can go out and spend the same $90.00 and get a free standing player for your home theater.

@Captain
Nero is not just an example of bloatware, but it is rather useless as well considering the resource hog it is; I mean I can pretty much do whatever I want with ImageBurn for free.

Another good example where software leaves dead registry entries is Graphic Drivers (from almost every supplier) and subsequent instability they cause is just criminal in nature IMO.

Paid:
I pay for the OS on all my systems. Love Windows 7 and now have that on all.
Use MS Office Student (bought it)
DVDFab (cause it just works and is frequently updated and I grew tired of trying to get around Encryption by using 3 or 4 other programs)
Games
Steam Games
Paperport 9 (came with my scanner)
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Free:
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Security:
Microsoft Security Essentials
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Backups:
Acronis True Image Western Digital Version (for main drive complete image)
DriveImage XML (for regular backups of Win7 install)
Bestsync Free Edition (for everything else) (with limitations but works for what I need)
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Misc. Utilities
Bulk Rename Utility
Ccleaner
Disk Monitor Free Edition
Stardock Object Dock free
7zip
MyDefrag
+ a couple or three dozen more
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Office:
Notepad++
OpenOffice with some good templates for some projects
Bullzip with Ghostscript Lite for printing to PDF
Foxit Reader
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Media Music Movies Converting etc.:
Sharepod (instead of iTunes = win)
Audacity
Mp3 gain
Mp3 Tag
VLC
Media Player Classic Home Theater
Iriverter
Daemon Tools Lite
CDBurnerXP
DVDFlick
Super
Any Video Converter
Iriverter (for shrinking that movie to the exact size for my wife's Zen player)
Windows Media Center
AOA audioextractor (the free part of it)
Subtitle Workshop
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Images:
Irfanview
Gimp
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Internet:
Firefox
Download Helper for Firefox
Pidgen
Peerblock2
Utorrent

and countless others.
I don't mind paying for software if it saves me major hassles (like DVDFab) or if it is a must have (like Windows OS)

Tgard

Well I made a nice detailed post that was visible here for about 2 minutes. Don't know why it is no longer here? Did I list some software I maybe shouldn't have that clashed with sponsors or something?

Tgard

I recently had to purchase slysoft's Anyhddvdnow because my monitor wasn't hdcp ready in 2560x1600. It's weird because the site say the wfp8000 is hdcp ready but it will only work with 1920x1080 resolution.

I have lots of freeware utilities on my hard disk but I'm also willing for stuff that matters like Windows 7, my favored backup program Acronis True Image, occasionally when a good AV program is available on a good deal such as the Webroot Internet Essentials on my Windows 7 machine and of course, PC games especially those of the FPS variety.

Games
OS
Office
Security software
Personal video and photography tools

I buy all my games. I would buy more software if it generally wasn't so overpriced.

I love free software, but if I use it for extended periods I generally drop a small donation. (If they accept)

I've paid for my operating system (98SE, XP Media Center, Windows 7 family pack & now 7 home premium), office applications (Office 2010 home edition) & a few others such as good FTP applications, IRC, etc. I also buy my games & even collector editions of very good ones (Bioshock, StarCraft etc.).

Xcode can afford to be free on the Mac but Windows being a dominating platform Microsoft doesn't feel obliged to offer Visual Studio for free which is a shame.

Where's the option for : If I've got money I'll buy it if and I have to absolutely use it, otherwise just use a free option [x]. The OS and backup utilities are only what come to mind.