image editors

a satisfied psp8 user for more than a year wants to know if 9's worth the ~100 megs.

or are there even better alternatives?

It's very well worth it. It's more stable and has interesting features. Can't remember what changed, but the day I updated I was very happy with it.

An alternative is Photoshop, although for that 10% more power/better algorithms, you get 30% harder/slower to use software, and a 100% more expensive package.