Hi, Stasia - Embird (even with all the plug ins) costs about a tenth of PE Design! I have basic Embird, which is used for combining, editing and resizing designs. It can also convert designs from one format to another. It costs about $70. Embird also has various plug ins to do other functions, like digitize, which is what PE Design does. The Embird Studio (digitizing)plug in costs around $150. Last time I checked, PE Design cost about $1200.

I have no experience with Embird's digitizing, and only a small amount of experience with PE Design, but everything I have read from Embird users is that it is pretty easy to use and to learn.

Hopefully that helps! Donna