I know, I know. Yet ANOTHER versus thread, but I am having a really hard time realistically comparing the two systems.

To give a little back story, I currently work for a non-profit in DC called the National Low Income Housing Coalition. As a matter of fact, I was JUST hired on about 2 months ago. The gentleman who held my position previously was a nice guy, but not exactly gifted in the area of design to be completely honest. The website (www.nlihc.org) is a complete shambles and it needs a major rehaul. Enter me. The current CMS they use uses ColdFusion (which I don't know) is extremely buggy and cluttered. Not a good choice at all. So I want to switch to a reliable CMS with GOOD support and that has a fairly easy templating system.

I have decided to NOT go with an open source system for several reasons, one being support. I need to be able to call/e-mail a support tech and have an answer quickly. I'm all about free, but when the president and ceo wants to know why something isn't working on the website, telling her that I am waiting for someone to answer my question on a forum is not going to be an acceptable answer. Also, the company that created the current CMS is extremely unreliable.

I've tried the core of EE and it is FANTASTIC. Great for developers AND designers. I always had a hard time really understanding the templating systems for other CMS but EE makes it so easy. Drawbacks, it costs $99 (for non-profits, $250 for commercial) and an additional $79.99 for an add-on that allows for multiple sites (we have several websites that I would need to rebuild. Ugh.)

Symphony is something I just discovered. I haven't tried it yet, but from what I have read it works A LOT like EE. Its free (me likey!) and you can purchase tech support if needed. (Supposedly anyway, I haven't found anything on their site that points to HOW to purchase the extra support.) Drawbacks, its a fairly new CMS so it doesn't have a lot of add-ons. Not a big deal, I guess. The biggest draw back for me is you have to learn XSLT (Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformation) which I have no idea if its easy or not, but I just really would rather dive into my site than have to learn a new language. Although, learning is fundamental, right?

Okay to make a long post even longer, what are the opinions of those of you who have played with one or both of these? Is EE really worth the near $200 dollars? Is it worth it to give Symphony a try and just bite the bullet to learn XSLT?

Thanks in advance!

Erika

You answered on your question yourself.
No support etc. Plus I'm sure EE has less potential bug problems.
Common $200 is nothing to pay for good CMS even for no-profit.
At least most no-profit I know pays better then regular businesses.

Best, DS

Thanks everyone! I guess the answer is pretty obvious at this point. Best to pay a little for something you KNOW is going to work rather than risk it on something that may or may not work. I just needed to hear it from others! ;)

- e