Photoshop advice?

Hi, my question is 'Which is the best photoshop program' I know that the ''best'' would be the newest but it costs soooo much, $1,000!, so I'm wondering which ones you guys use the most? I want to buy a P-shop but I'm clueless as to what makes each one different. Specifically I just want to draw pictures that are really good, like the ones professional digital artists use.

P.S. No comments about free programs like paint.net, etc. I want photoshop.

THANKS

Photoshop advice?live update

Your computer will govern what Photoshop you can buy, look at the system requirements to make sure your computer meets them, it makes sense in the ling run to buy the latest version that suits it.

If you just want to draw pictures you might find Corel Painter to your tastes, it does have some great drawing features that are less developed in Photoshop which is more geared toward photographic retouching.

http://store.corel.com/webapp/wcs/stores...

Photoshop advice?norten

Adobe Photoshop CS3 is great. They've enhanced a lot of aspects of this program since CS and it really helps improve the flow of your work.

Also, are you in school? You can get the programs for way cheaper that way through a student discount. It usually will come out to be about $600 for the whole suite that includes Illustrator, InDesign AND Photoshop plus more programs.
i have the adobe premium suite wich has photoshop cs3 in it its more than photoshop cs2 but the only difference is were the tools are located you just have to find them and other than that its the same so you could go with the less expensive version cause its 99 percent the same as the newer one i have it works just as well and cost like alot less

i dont know how much the new photoshop (cs3) is by itself sincei got hte suite which has cs3 photoshop, illistrator, indesign, flash and dreamweaver but i got that package for 600 dollars so the last version of photoshop(cs2) cant be much and you say the new photoshop is around a thousand dollars because at stores like mac outfitters and such sell it for much more than it should be go to a college bookstore or somewhere like that and its at least 300-400 dollars cheaper thats how i got mine

hope this helps and good luck