IT-Enquirer wrote a 34-pages analysis comparing the most important functionality aimed at productivity, creativity, and efficiency in QuarkXPress 7 and Adobe InDesign CS3. The analysis consists of timing results measured for identical tasks performed in each application and of a qualitative assessment of features that can’t be measured in time.

The report is available as a PDF download to Subscribers. Registration here.

The French report can be downloaded direct: QuarkXPress 7 face a InDesign CS3 Analyse

In particular, we tested tasks and challenges in the following application areas:
- Document, setup, collaboration and design consistency
- Working with layouts
- Printing and output
- Miscellaneous other tasks

The table at the end of this summary lists the results.  We found QuarkXPress to be faster in 79% of the tasks; InDesign was faster in 21% of the tasks.  However, the degree to which the tasks were faster in either application varied and might not always be relevant to the user.

For example, most users won’t notice if a task takes 9 vs. 11 seconds, even though that is 18% faster.  However, if that is a task that in their particular workflow they perform all the time, the 2 seconds delay in one application does matter.  Where appropriate we will highlight in the report which task matters most for which type of use case. 

We found that QuarkXPress 7 has better support for design departments where more than one person must be able to control and manage the layout process by offering support for Job Jackets, Composition Zones and sharing colour management elements. In many areas, QuarkXPress 7 also is just faster, supporting the creative process better by including –right within the application– Web and Flash layouts, and the most often needed creative tools and effects.

InDesign CS3 is faster and offers better support in the areas of table styling, XML, and Object Styles. The automation of long-document functionality like automatic running headings, run-in headers and nested styles are other examples of where InDesign CS3 is better.

In the qualitative domain, we found users can perform many tasks without opening extra palettes using QuarkXPress 7’s measuring palette. QuarkXPress 7 offers the designer a large number of graphic tools and effects, but some of these are not as obvious as they could be in the interface. On the negative side, the XPert Tools Pro XTensions set in QuarkXPress 7 has palettes that do not integrate well visually with the other interface elements in the program.

InDesign CS3 has a more aesthetically pleasing interface and a more obvious access to its graphic tools and effects. On the negative side, the creative tools in InDesign CS3 are often implemented as a link to the external applications in the Creative Suite.

In some other areas of InDesign CS3 we were surprised to find that the program isn’t up to the requirements of professional prepress users. The Pantone colour library problem, covered in the chapter on colour management comes to mind. 

QuarkXPress 7 Better For Designer Groups

QuarkXPress 7 is equipped for vertical and horizontal layout markets: print, web, Flash, mobile content, etc. Because of its many products it must sell, Adobe is forced to deliver InDesign CS3 without the cross-media functionality that Quark has built inside QuarkXPress 7.
In most areas, therefore, we were not surprised to find that QuarkXPress 7 offers the best support for professional creatives, with the best toolset for those whose work has to be finished by a deadline.

The table above shows where QuarkXPress 7 and InDesign CS3 respectively were faster in the timing tests. This table does not represent qualitative assessments nor how important the time differences were. For those assessments, please read the corresponding chapters of the report.

The report can be downloade by Subscribers. Registration here.