[wheedwacker]

Are there any cheaper alternatives to Axure or iRise?

Something of comparable quality that doesn't cost thousands and thousands of dollars to outfit a team with the software?

[spiral]

Pencil? (it's free )
Pencil: Firefox Plugin for Diagram and GUI Prototyping | Programming Resources

[wheedwacker]

It can't add functionality, though, can it? Like setting up links and stuff.

(in the trial) Axure does it easily. You could set up a working model of a site for a client in no time. You'd still have to design and program it, but it would show them how everything would work.

[Hunch]

I can't see what any of these interface prototyping tools do that wouldn't be just as quick (and considerably higher quality) in Illustrator and Dreamweaver. At least then it would look roughly like it's supposed to rather than like a bunch of Axure widgets bunged together which bear no real relationship to the actual final artwork.

Making a canned demo of a site for a client is a piece of cake. This is a solution in search of a problem.

[spiral]

I actually use Fireworks for this. It can export pages with links and things like dropdown menus, and once the prototype is approved, I can start working on the design directly on the same fw files.