[Alan Dearborn]

Thanks for the info John. Sadly, Illom sent me a reply stating they would not be making a version of Cutline for OS X:

“Sorry but we are not. The current sign-cutting market on the Mac is too
small.”

Thanks also for all the other answers and suggestions!

I am really trying to do most of my designing in Adobe Illustrator as I want to gradually move into more design/print/web and less sign production. I’ve found it easier to take Illustrator files into my sign programs than the other way around.

Years ago, when using CasMate in a shop I worked at, I found exporting to .ai very problematic; the conversion created a huge amount of nodes, when it worked at all. Any feedback on how well FlexiSign exports files (esp. to .ai)?

Thanks again!

[Alan Dearborn]

The reason I would go with Flexi Starter is mostly for the cutting as I am doing more graphic design right in Illustrator.

I was concerned about buying it off ebay, but have found only good referrals for the company. They are offering legitmate copies with dongles included. The offer I might go for is a combo of the Starter version (which includes the cutting side of Flexi) along with Flexi Designer. Each program comes with it’s own dongle so I could have the cutting module on my desktop mac mini and the Designer on my laptop and could do design wherever and then send the cut files through the network to the mini to cut to my plotter when ready. The combo is just $799 here:

http://stores.ebay.com/A-Digital-Company-for-Signmaking/FlexiDesign-Suite-7-6.html

Their website is:
http://www.desaypc.com/producthome.html