Purchasing
Before you buy anything, take a look at https://software.ucdavis.edu, UC Davis's Software Licensing site. You might find it free (to you) or much less expensive. We can assist with any licensing questions, software purchases, installs.
Note: Don't overlook popular open source or free software like Maple, MathSage, Inkscape, Paint.net, GrassGIS etc. Some of these are powerful alternatives to the big hitters above.
Software Support and Troubleshooting
We can help with most mundane packages (Office, Adobe, etc), especially in terms of installation issues, crashes, or slowdowns. For assistance on things like ArcGIS or Matlab, you can ask your peers in the department or look online for training. Through our campus licenses for major applications, we often have access to user support through the vendor.
Programming Assistance (For compile errors, etc.)
For the modelers of the house using Fortran, C, Python, we do have a talented programmer who can assist with various issues. He's probably not going to write your model for you but he may rewrite pieces of it to make it work (snippets really). And he can pretty much get anything to compile. Just ask.