I dunno, my Ilustrator 10 running under OS X is very stable. Never crashes. I love the transparency effects; and, yes! I even use the Appearance Palette frequently. I like being able to apply a stroke or two to just one path, and being able to place the stroke below the fill, without having to make another path. The downside? Just that soft shadows and transparency preclude the use of spot colors. (So, when are commercial printers going to be able to achieve with their four inks, the same vibrant color I get from my four-color inkjet? When they do, I won't miss spot colors one bit (well, thet'll need toreduce their dot size, too...)