G'day Stan,
as with most things, the best one is usually the one you're used to. Most of the freebie's I've seen are either too limited in their features, a pain to use (E.G. Lilypond - which gives very good results), or both...

My intro to NWC was a demo of v1 in about 2001. Didn't take long to learn the UI and went on. Once I started feeling the limitations I looked for other products (price wasn't that much of an object at the time) but found that after the ease and speed of the NWC UI that other products just didn't stand up. In the end I bought a licence for NWC 1.75, got on the V2 beta team and haven't looked back. V2 is now shipping and I am looking forward to a V3 beta program 'cos I want on!

Like PGMusic, NWC are very responsive to users and have a very helpful and friendly forum. Even during the beta phase of V2 I only once had a crash that could be attributed to NWC - not a bad track record!

I guess I could be accused of being a fanatic about NWC, but I do like it.

--=-- My credo: If it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing - just ask my missus, she'll tell ya laugh --=--
You're only paranoid if you're wrong!