Coding Horror lists prices for TextPad replacements:

# UltraEdit - $40
# EditPlus - $30
# EditPad Pro - $40
# TextPad - $32
# EmEditor - $40
# NoteTab Pro - $20

My obligatory reaction:

  • Vim - priceless

Portable, Powerful, Programmable.

Smart IDEs are great, but there’s always a need to edit plain text files, e.g. config files on a server, and documents too. And even with IDEs, you have to use the editor to get text from your keyboard somehow. If you’re sticking with the default Eclipse/IntelliJ/JBuilder key mappings, you have to change mind-modes everytime you switch to a new IDE. And they’re pretty slow anyway. Better to use a plugin like IntelliJ-Vim to keep using the same style for adding and editing text, while retaining all the benefits of the IDE.

If you’re planning on spending several decades editing text files - writing, coding, configuring - I’d recommend taking a couple of hours to learn a decent, standard, input tool. Namely, one of vim or emacs. Here is a straightforward vim tutorial.