In the past I’ve managed to get some good deals on second hand software from EBay and actually found Microsoft and Macromedia’s licensing departments surprisingly helpful in helping to ensure that this is done correctly to allow for legally licensed software (Macromedia actually transferred a license for me).

Perhaps I took my eye of the ball but recently I bought a new version of Office 2010 Professional, which turned out to be counterfeit (I did get a full refund though) and today I excitedly opened a new (I was assured by the seller) version of Adobe Creative Studio CS 2/Macromedia 8 (old software but the cost of current versions is astronomical for a home user); all the CDs relating to Adobe Creative Studio CS2 are missing. As well as being very disappointed I’m now going to have to chase a refund and send it all back.

I shall certainly think twice in future!

I’d hazzard a guess that you’ve been lucky so far.

What part(s) of CS2 do you really need?

The whole of CS2 is available to licensed users from Adobe’s website but I’m a bit anal about being correctly licensed and I’m not sure where I’d stand never having owned the original CDs.

I don’t really ‘need’ any of it, I’m just a keen IT tinkerer but I would have really liked Illustrator, Acrobat and Photoshop.

The one thing I never buy from ebay is software. The price always seems too good to be true even for older software and when I ask questions of the seller regarding the authenticity of it I always get replies like ‘well its a copy cd not in a retail box but its a kosher license key…’

I would rather pay a little more and know I’m getting the genuine thing…

ebay looks like its down at the moment.

buying has been as good as ever but i stopped flogging stuff on there to be honest as its just a pain in the arse.

it’s got worse since the ‘credit crunch’ as people want something for nothing.

A while ago I paid about half price for a “genuine copy” of photoshop 7, when i got it it turned out to be just that. A copy of a photoshop cd with the passkey. Ebay and paypal weren’t much help as i got exactly what i ordered.

I don’t buy software on ebay anymore.