Product Description

Trust the experts at 3D Home Landscape to guide you every step of the way. Access a host of powerful design tools, 7,500 plant varieties and an array of valuable plant care resources for long-term success. It's everything you need to bring your landscape dreams to life!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2753 in Software
• Model: 385498
• Released on: 2005-09-27
• Platforms: Windows Me, Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows 95, Macintosh, Unix, Linux, Windows NT, Windows XP
• Format: CD
• Dimensions: 2.15 pounds

Amazon.ca Product Description
Imagine having a professional landscape designer right on your desktop. Trust 3D Home Landscape Designer Deluxe 5 to help you easily create your ideal landscape. Combining powerful design tools with extensive botanical reference resources, it's everything you need to bring your landscape dreams to life.

Exciting new features like 3DTrueView photo-realistic rendering and easy 3D editing make this the most powerful landscape software yet. From laying out your design to selecting the perfect plants for your soil and climate, this comprehensive program puts you on the path toward surefire success.

This software will help you: design a landscape around a pre-built home from the program (or even those created with 3D Home Architect 5); use advanced terrain modeling to add realistic slopes and grades; incorporate decks and patios (plus more than 300 decorative and functional garden objects); expand your knowledge of plants and their maintenance with a 7,500-item plant encyclopedia; take inspiration from sample plans created by professional landscape designers; view your landscape over time--lifelike seasonal changes occur onscreen; use the Plant Care Calendar to establish an effective landscape maintenance plan; study 9,500 plant photos and 100 animated plant care demonstrations.

3D Home Landscape Designer Deluxe 5 also includes a Garden Notebook in which you can record your discoveries and an Encyclopedia of Plant Diseases with details on the symptoms and solutions for common plant problems.

Customer Reviews

Read the Reviews FIRST - ZERO Stars
I just now read the reviews of this product; unfortunately, I did not read them before I purchased this pathetic program. Basically - false advertising. Does not include anywhere near the number of items indicated on the box and queries to Broderbund indicate the items are no longer available. Save your money - get some crayons!

Actually 0 Stars DON'T DO IT!!!!
I have had Broderbund Home Designer 5.0 for about 4 months now. Three years ago I used 3D Architect Vers. 1.0 to remodel my kitchen and it was great. So, I decided to buy 3D Architect Professional 5.0 to design my Master Suite (converting two BRs and a bath to do it) and remodel my back yard and pool....completely. To begin, all Broderbund architectural products' names are similarly named. I thought the "professional" 5.0 included (and was led to believe by skimming the info on it) the landscape design program. You can even switch to landscape mode but NOTHING happens! After calls to tech support and customer service asking why I can't get to the landscape portion, I (not they) realized I had to buy 3D Home Landscape. So I went to buy it, installed it and went to use the program and still no landscape mode. Long story short...after many frustrating calls and e-mails, I (again me, not they) discovered how the two programs merge together to form one program (if installed in a certain method and order) named yet another program name...3d Home Designer 5.0. Unbelievable!

Again, long story short...after limping through a multitude of crashes, letters to tech support and getting answers back e.g., "I don't know, I don't use the program" and countless other frustrating and irritating things, today was the last straw. I opened the program and four months of re-creating my four bedroom tri-level home and yard are gone to waste. As soon as I open the program to do anything, it crashes. I have re-installed and to no avail.

BY ALL MEANS, save yourself the frustration and look for another package. I used to work in the computer industry up until '98 and Broderbund typifies the reason I got out...mediocrity!!

If you are doing a very simple two room house, want to WOW your friends or clients twirling the house around, do walk thrus (on the computer, can't make a separate walk thru file and send to someone), or you want your three-year old to be an architect and start them off early...buy it! Otherwise...go back to the ole drafting board....which is what Broderbund ought to do.

Buggy, difficult to use, not-intuitive
I just tried to design a garden for our new house using "3D Landscaping". Despite what the box says, the software contains no templates of gardens that you can modify, just shapes (circles, rectangles, squares) with pre-programmed lot sizes (such as 40' x 110'). I tried to edit the dimensions of the 40' x 110' rectangle to mimic our new lot. Forget it. You cannot edit the sizes even if you follow the steps in the manual.

So, I tried to create a new lot from scratch. Instead of a flat plane to show our new lawn, the program created a cylinder. The cylinder could not be modified no matter how I tried.

I finally decided to accept the incorrect dimensions of the rectangular plot (40 x 110) and just insert sample plants (trees, climbers, etc) from the toolbar, to get an idea of what would look good next to what. The program crashed. When it did allow me to add the plants in outline view, they did not show up in 3D view, which means you can't see what they will look like in your garden (the whole point of the program!) The program crashed again when I toggled from 3D view to outline view. (My system surpasses the system requirements, so that was not the problem).

I am not a software neophyte, and I followed both the manual and the tutorials step-by-step to create a diagram, but the software did not work. I don't believe Broderbund tests this before releasing it to the public.

If anyone has found a quality landscape design software program, please tell me. Right now, I'm ready to turn to Powerpoint.