An acquaintance recently needed a new computer and asked for advice. He had very specific needs, and we found him one, but he was surprised at the price. There were cheaper machines around, but the new one he has will do everything he wanted and for a good time. And he is very happy.
But budget being tight, we looked for cheaper software.
I used to create websites for people. I bought a product more than 15 years ago for maybe £75 and it did what I wanted. But recently they have changed to a subscription model, £10 per month, plus VAT, every month, and while I’m sure some people will find that good value, for me, it’s too much, especially for the little sites I do.
So many companies are changing to monthly billing. You don’t realise how much it adds up.
So, for my person, we looked for cheaper/free solutions that would do what he wanted.
Since he did lots of typing and spreadsheets, we installed LibreOffice. It does pretty much everything Word and Excel can do, at least, what he wanted. His very special need was not obvious but someone in a forum had done it before and gave him support.
There are plenty of packages out there that have most or all of the features of more expensive stuff.
We do occasional video editing, very simple stuff. Kdenlive works well for that.
There are many programs that help you manipulate graphics. We use GIMP and it does what we want.
With all of these, we have never got into all the advanced features. We know they all, and others, can be very powerful. My colleague runs his business using Libreoffice and he is very happy. Just because it’s free, does not mean you skimp on features.
This is not an advert for any product, just an account of what we did and a reminder to at least consider the free stuff. There are websites and YouTube videos that will talk about all these alternatives. And if you like them, consider a contribution.