Any suggestions for a Control Program?

Hi Everyone,

I have just finished a CNC Router (based on John C Kleinbauer's
PipeDream) and am considering which CNC Control software to
purchase. I have looked at CNC Pro, Turbo CNC, and have just
downloaded MASTER5.

The controller is John's Piker4X step/direction controller for
steppers.

I realize this is a newbie question...but I was wondering if anyone
has any preferences one way or the other.

The MASTER5 program seems like it will do more than CNC Pro for less
money. It looks like it reads standard files as well as image
files. I have not connected it to my machine yet to see if it
actually works as reported. It would be nice to use windows to
design and then control the router, but I realize there may be a
performance hit by using windows as the OS.

From what I have seen there are lots of small programs that do a
specific task well, but you have to flip between programs to obtain
the task you need. For instance, you can make your design in Corel
Draw, save as .dxf, read in using KCAM, then output as GCODE, then
read that with GCODE2000 to change cut depth, or other edits, then
save as GCODE to CNC Pro...Wow, thats a lot of flipping...anyone have
any thoughts?


Any advise would be great,

Thanks in advance,

Steve