Garritan Personal Orchestra (GPO) is a great budget price, sounds good but is quite expensive on CPU/RAM and is fiddly to use to get rid of the "sample" type soundness to it. EWQLO Silver is a great budget item too. You get an easy to use orchestra with some great sounds (granted the violins sound a bit shrill if you are not careful), but you also get a piano and choir (and I think harpsichord and organ). It is then up-grade-able to Gold and then Platinum (which is still cheaper than Vienna SO). I've heard that VSO is the best, but if it is out of your budget then EastWest Quantum Leap maybe well worth considering. Whilst some of its patches might be a little disappointing, its recording is fantastic and easy to mix in with real live recording instruments if you so wish. Hope this helps Steve Dunster