Smart Software Review

If you are responsible for providing detailed charts, diagrams, floor plans, or maps for your business, undoubtedly you no longer do things by hand. That’s just not how things are done anymore. These days, everything is done with a computer. To wit, there are hundreds of drawing programs out there that make this process easier. SmartDraw 10 is one such program, so let’s see how it measures up.

First, I always look at how easy software is get up and running. Fortunately, SmartDraw does this well. It’s easy to install with just a few clicks. Next, I look at the interface. I found SmartDraw to be very easy to use. It’s not like this is a program that I would use on a daily basis, and I have little experience using such software, but I found it to be very intuitive.

SmartDraw Guided Tour. Click the Picture to start the Video…

After tinkering around with the software a bit and reading through the guide provided, I found I was able to actually accomplish quite a few things. There is even an assistant built into the software (not the cutesy animated thing ala Windows) that can help you when you use an application for the first time.

Architecture is a little hobby of mine, so I first tried to use SmartDraw to make up some floor plans. It was actually a lot easier than I thought it would be! Maps go hand-in-hand with floor plans, in a way, and I enjoy them as well. I was also able to use SmartDraw to make some maps. All in all, they all turned out well.

To fully round out the review, I took the time to play around with the charts and graphs in SmartDraw as well. Although my understanding and interest in these formats is not as great, I found that I was able to actually accomplish something here as well. So far, so good.

The way this all works is through SmartDraw’s massive symbol library. This is the “smart” part of SmartDraw, I suppose. Rather than having to create your own, you can draw upon SmartDraw’s library of over 30,000 images and shapes to create what you want.

If you’ve ever tinkered around with other drawing programs as a neophyte, you know what a headache it can cause. All the trial-and-error really turns off most people that haven’t been formally taught how to use such programs. This is where SmartDraw really shines, in my opinion. The format they’ve created allows even the least skilled user to create things.

SmartDraw will cost you about $200, or half that if you just need to upgrade from a previous version. This may seem a bit steep if you aren’t familiar with such programs, but when you look at everything it can do and compare it to similar programs made by bigger companies, it’s quite a steal. SmartDraw does everything those other programs do and makes it more accessible to new users. It’s definitely worth the price, I’d say.

SmartDraw 10 Summary

Overall, I’d recommend SmartDraw to anyone that needs a easy, reliable program on hand for generating charts, graphs, floor plans, maps and the like. If you are a freelancer, you’ll definitely get back the money you’ll spend on getting this software (not to mention the tax write-off), but if you are in charge of your company’s IT department $200 isn’t a big deal. In addition, you can get multiples of SmartDraw for a cheaper price if you need to put it on multiple computers. It’s nice to see a company taking the initiative on a deal like this and I think it’s indicative of the company’s attitude overall. Highly recommended!