Jake Ludington's Digital Lifestyle

I love the deals offered in stores on Black Friday, but I absolutely despise the required trip to the store to get the massive discounts. It seems like you either have to be waiting outside the door at 4am or plan on the stuff you really want being sold out when you get there. Then there's the issue of parking and fighting through the crowds of other people who are all chasing the same deals you are. Fortunately digital downloads don't suffer from any of these problems. You can still get great Black Friday deals on software without having to venture out into the battleground of shopping madness.

Below is a collection of software specials I tracked down, including a few for those of you who are Mac users. These deals expire next week, so be sure to act immediately if you want the savings.

50% Off Specials

50% discount on all Uniblue products! Uniblue makes several system tweaking utilities designed to improve performance, prevent crashes and keep things running smoothly. SpeedUpMyPC, Registry Booster and WinTasks 5 Pro are the most popular Uniblue apps. All of their apps are 50% off if you use coupon code THKUN50%.

50% Discount on Dragon Naturally Speaking 9 You must use Coupon Code BLKDRG07 to get the discount. While I still find voice recognition less than perfect, Dragon NaturallySpeaking is the one app I've found worth using. Dragon NaturallySpeaking Standard is an effective way to talk emails, documents, and instant messages, without ever having to touch your keyboard. With some practice, it's a great way to give your wrists a break if you frequently type.

50% discount on PDF Converter Professional 4 using Coupon Code BLKPDF07. ScanSoft PDF Converter Professional 4 is a complete PDF solution including support for creating, editing, and conversion documents to PDF format. It's far cheaper than Adobe Acrobat and includes a couple of cool features like instant conversion of PDFs to interactive forms and the ability to convert PDF text to speech. This is the only real competitor I've found to Acrobat because it easily supports adding links and embedding images.

Multimedia Software

Get a FREE copy of Roxio Buzz ($19.99) with a purchase of Easy Media Creator 10. I believe this also still qualifies for an additional $20 Rebate on Easy Media Creator.

Or if you don't need Roxio Buzz, there also the option to SAVE $50 when you buy Roxio's EMC 10 and Back On Track 3 Suite Together.

23% discount on Pinnacle Studio Ultimate 11 using Coupon Code STUDIOULTBF. Pinnacle Studio Ultimate is one of the two video editing apps I use almost every day. The ulitmate version is definitely worth the additional features.

System Tools and Utilities

30% Off Registry Mechanic 7 - This continues to be one of the tools I use to avoid frequent operating system installs due to installing and uninstalling many applications.

25% off Webroot Childsafe for up to 3 computers. While the best way to supervise your kid's computer use is to actually be there while their online, you can't always catch everything. Childsafe does a great job of blocking objectionable sites, without making it impossible to navigate to legitimate sites. You can also get monitoring of your child's Internet activity.

ACDSee has 4 different offers possibly the best of which is 2 copies of ACDSee 10 and a 1GB SD memory card. ACDSee has been making great imaging tools for as long as I can remember. These four Web specials are a great way to upgrade to new versions or add some useful tools to your sweet of photo apps.

Antivirus and Antispyware

30% Off Spyware Doctor which is arguably the most accurate spyware defense available. The freeware tools simply don't keep up with the number of online threats and Spyware Doctor is consistently rated near the top by all reviewers.

25% Off Webroot AntiVirus with AntiSpyware and Firewall. If you aren't currently running an AntiVirus application, you should be.

20% off Internet Security Pro from Trend Micro. This is among the most comprehensive security suites available.

Mac Special Offers

Buy Toast 8 Titanium and Get 3 Menu Style Packs for only $9.99 ($50 savings). Toast has long been the CD and DVD burning app I recommend for Mac users. It also includes a great tool for converting analog audio to digital formats.

$10 Off Parallels Desktop Parallels is a great solution for running Windows on your Mac hardware.

Save 30%! on Norton Internet Security 3.0 for Mac using coupon code BFNISM. I'm not entirely convinced Mac users need AntiVirus protection, but it's better to be safe than sorry. This suite includes Norton AntiVirus, Firewall, Privacy Control and Alladin iClean.

If you don't need the full Norton suite, you can still Save $5 on Norton AntiVirus 10.0 for Mac OS.