Photoshop ? Fireworks ? and design tips

Hi guys.

What do most of you for designing and designing templates? I used to always use Photoshop until I started college and all they have on their machines is Macromedia products. So its Fireworks I use. I tend to use it more as well now; there are a few things I think I prefer about Fireworks compared to Photoshop.

In Fireworks you can set the size of everything by typing in the height and width, this is the only real reason I use Fireworks more than Photoshop now, if Photoshop had it i would use it all the time (Maybe it does and is just a hidden feature I don't know about).

Also has anyone got some good tips on how to become a good designer? I would say I’m better at coding than designing, but I would like to develop my design skill to be able to create things which look more professional.

Mostly I struggle for ideas when creating a website; I guess that might be a lack of creativity, not sure. I guess I just need to know the package inside out and learn to use all the tools etc...