Review by Observer

I started using Quicken in 1996, and this is the third version for me. Please note that I only use the checkbook, so all my comments are confined to that feature.nThe best thing about Quicken Deluxe is that there is no learning curve and little need to change anything. I bought Quicken Deluxe just as I was about to balance my check book. So when I changed from Basic 2005 to Quicken Deluxe, everything went just as before. The only immediately apparent difference was the Tag tab which was added to Category and Memo, and it was easy to get rid of Tag so that the interface was identical to what I had before. All my memorizations and categories remained the same.nThe flip side of this advantage is that there was very little improvement while all previous annoyances, and some new ones, were present.nA truly disconcerting new feature(at least new to me) is that within a report, when you open a folder and its items are listed, a horrible dark blue bar goes across the very line that you put the cursor on and the text becomes illegible. The very text you identify is the one you can’t read. Of course you soon learn to keep the bar just below the item you want to examine, but that is not ergonomic. After all, all other programs try to make the selected item easier to read rather than blocking it out.nIn my first version of Quicken, the program gave me almost full control of color, and provide a rich palette of colors to choose from. Quicken Basic 2005 removed the choices and made the colors less attractive. Quicken Deluxe has continued this regression by almost washing out the colors to the point that text is much less legible.nAn old annoyance is that the check dater loves to revert to to-day’s date at the least excuse. Any number of times I have had to go back and insert the correct dates because the dating tab had insisted on putting in to-day’s date. Why not give us the option of having the date never change until we change it? Is that too much to ask? There were some other problems that I don’t recall at the moment.nIn conclusion, you will probably need to upgrade to Quicken Deluxe to use it Windows Vista. If you stay with Windows XP, you don’t need to upgrade.