Professional Looking Charts

[Chartman of the Bored]

Can someone recommend some software that produces high quality (aesthetically) charts & graphs, and works with Excel and/or Powerpoint?

I've been looking around, and the best I've found so far is CrystalGraphics. It's not bad, but I'm not thrilled with it. Someone on this board mentioned Harvard Graphics a while ago, but it doesn't seem to have a downloadable free trial to test.

I've spent hours searching the web and tested a few others, but can't seem to find what I'm looking for (mabe I'm too picky).

Thanks

 

[Chartman of the Bored]

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

 

[Bubbis Thedog]

I've heard that XCelsius is good for dashboards. The demos they have are quite impressive, IMO.

HTH

 

[Chartman of the Bored]

Thanks... In fact, I already own a copy and like it a lot.

It's a very cool program with impressive graphics, great features, and great potential. But, in my opinion, it's not quite ready for prime time. It doesn't seem to handle large or even medium amounts of data very well (you get an error message saying Xcelsius can't handle so much data).

And while the charts are impressive looking, there aren't enough custom options. For example, in a column chart the labels below the x-axis (for each column) often get automatically aligned vertically (so that you have to tilt your head to the left to read the labels), with no option to lay them out horizontally and wrap the words around... and there are other similar problems.

Anyway, I don't mean to rant. It's a nice program and they're supposed to be releasing another version soon which, hopefully, will solve some of my pet peaves.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Any others would be welcome.

 

[Bubbis Thedog]

I just learned more from you than you did from me! HAHAHAHA

Thanks for the info ("rant").

 

[ausernamenottaken]

Charts and graphs in PowerPoint are a pain. I work in Excel and use xpport.com to port to PowerPoint.