Punch! Professional Home Design Suite Platinum v.12.0 - 94100
Punch! Professional Home Design Suite Platinum v12

I've used other CAD home design programs, and compared with those, Punch! is a very good value. For the money, you really get a large array of capabilities. There is a large library of colors, furniture, fabric, and other surfaces and materials. However, the navigation is not very intuitive. For my first few projects, I found myself confused about how to get the program to do what I wanted. And the biggest pain--on every project I've worked on so far, I've spent much more time than I wanted to trying to get the room boundaries, walls, roof lines, and floor lines how I wanted them. It requires you to label each wall as either exterior or interior, and it creates the floor based on your assignments. But what it does automatically is often not correct, and difficult to change. Overall, if you're on a tight budget, I'd recommend Punch!. But if you have more money to spend, I'd look for something with more intuitive and natural navigation. But if you have the time and patience to learn the program and deal with its flaws, it'll do what you want.
 
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I've been casually looking for 2D and 3D software to help with possible remodeling ideas for our home. Most software I'd seen was well over $100, and wasn't very intuitive. A friend showed me a 3D-rendering of how he was going to turn his garage into a living space. I wasn't all that crazy about his design ;-), but I did like the rendering. He told me it was software from Punch! Software. I went to their site, and downloaded a demo of their low-end design product. Within a very short time, I was drawing things...very intuitive to use, and it seems like a pretty decent product. About 3 days later, I got my next Buy.com email deals, and saw that this version (Platinum v12) was out, and they had it on sale for more than 50% off list. I grabbed it, and I cannot believe how powerful this software is! After spending just a couple hours playing with it, I was able to draw the exterior dimensions of my house, put on different types of roofs, drop in some windows and doors, and viola: my house in 2D and in 3D! If you've ever watched some of the home and garden shows where they show a 3D computer rendering of a remodel and pan left/right or walk thru the rendering on the screen, well, that's exactly what this product allows you to do. It has a wealth of useful tools built-in, and even has a number of video tutorials within the product that show you how to draw exerior walls, interior walls, roofs, landscape, decks, etc. Check out the manufacturers web site for lots of info about this product (www.punchsoftware.com). This product regularly goes on sale here at Buy.com for less than half of the list price, but even at list price, it's worth every penny.
 
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