Quicken 2005 for Dummies

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Customer Reviews:

Fabulous for Quicken "Newbies" - easy to use! [Posted on 2004-11-10]
I have been a Quicken user for years and have been happy with all the improvements over time! Needless to say - I have repeatedly raved about this great software, but my in-laws are computer phobes and have resisted even trying it.

I purchased "Quicken 2005 for Dummies" for them and assured them the book would answer all their questions. Well, they hemmed and hawed for a few more days, but then tried it out. It worked like a charm! Any question they had was answered quickly by the book and they now feel they invented the software! (You can only imagine how ecstatic they were when they discovered google!).

If you are new to quicken, or are already a believer and want to get someone else hooked, this book is really worth it! Thanks Mr. Nelson for a great guide to some super software!

Personal finance software guidebook [Posted on 2005-03-07]
Quicken 2005 for Dummies is the latest edition it the Quicken for Dummies series, all editions written by Stephen L. Nelson. Nelson also wrote all editions of the QuickBooks for Dummies. Whereas Quicken focuses on personal financial record keeping, QuickBooks focuses on business accounting. If your immediate interest is taxes, you might want also to check Taxes 2005 for Dummies by the same publisher, Wiley. More than a million copies of the various editions of Quicken for Dummies have been sold, and that indicates consumer satisfaction with the book in general. It is an easy-to-use guide to the popular Quicken personal finance software.

Although focused on Quicken Premier software for Windows, Quicken 2005 for Dummies contains useful guidelines, tips, and warnings for any Quicken user. The Mac user can refer to the Quick Start card that comes with the Quicken 2005 for Mac for Mac-specific information, like backing up Quicken data and keyboard shortcuts.

After a brief introduction, the book is divided into six parts, the first providing a brief overview of the Quicken 2005 software. The basics section covers checkbooks, accessing online accounts, generating reports and charts, balancing accounts, and calculators for investments, retirements, college, and taxes. The home finance section addresses credit cards, debit cards, petty cash, mutual funds, and stocks and bonds. The business section has a chapter on payroll and one on receivables and payables. The concluding section lists frequently asked questions, with answers, and provides both finance tips and Quicken troubleshooting tips. Part 6 contains an appendix on Windows and a glossary of financial and computing terms. The book also has a detailed table of contents and an index. Introductory and basic material fill half the book; home finance and business follow for those who wish to do more than basic personal financial record keeping. A reader can jump directly to text about the specific topic or task of interest at the moment. One need not read the book from start to finish.

Like all Dummies book, Quicken 2005 has marginal icons to mark tips and warnings. Bold-face type and type changes make it easy to follow step by step, and additional text expands upon each step for the novice. The text is illustrated with corresponding screen images, but these "screens" are too small for easy reading; I have to wear my glasses to read the text but remove the glasses to read the screen images.

The author warns that moving Quicken data from a Macintosh to Windows involves exporting, and he "can think of about a million things more fun to do than exporting Quicken data from a Mac to Windows" (p. 22). That is it for Mac-specific content in this book.

Another word of caution comes from Jeffery Battersby, who in MacWorld (February 2005) reviewed Quicken 2005 software. Battersby concluded his review, "In the end, Quicken remains the hands-down best way to track your personal finances," but, he added, "Quicken's tax planner is no substitute for a trip to the accountant, especially if your tax situation is even a little bit complicated." Similarly, Quicken 2005 for Dummies is a good guide for record keeping but not a substitute for a tax accountant.

That said, Quicken 2005 for Dummies will help the Quicken 2005 user get done the job of keeping personal financial records.

[...]

Great for the beginner [Posted on 2006-01-10]
Like Steve Nelson, I too am a CPA and MBA, with a JD thrown in for good measure. Unlike Steve, I don't make my living writing how-to books for software. I've been searching in vain for a book that takes a look under the hood of Quicken. As Steve points out, "[I]f you're an experienced Quicken user and want to 'take your personal accounting to the next level,' the book is probably a poor choice ... [I]f you're looking for encyclopedic coverage of all Quicken features, this is not the book for you." Regrettably, such books DON'T EXIST. If you have technical training in accounting, Quicken is a real stinkeroo because it is NOT a double-entry accounting system, but rather a sophisticated database application. It uses procedures and terminology foreign to accountants, masking much of its functionality with obscure, proprietary language and reports. Regrettably, Scott Cook (founder of Quicken) won the marketing war and now we're stuck with this beast (or MS Money, which possesses the same faults) for personal finance. Except for some obscure Linux programs, these two packages dominate the market, yet there are no publications intended for tax and accounting professionals to maximize the usefulness of this software. So if you're a beginner, dive right in and get started. If you're experienced with either Quicken or accounting or both, you're on your own. Apparently Intuit (and other publishers) want to keep us in the dark, force us to spend unconscionable amounts of time with their software, and steer customers towards Intuit's "certified" consultants.

Not for my Mac [Posted on 2006-02-23]
It's an excellent book--unless you have a Mac. To my disappointment, I discovered very little useful info for "the rest of us." Tip to Mac users: before you purchase this book from Amazon, skim through a copy at your local bookstore and see if it's worth the price! Had I done that, I wouldn't have bought it. My fault.

Great Source of Bad Jokes - Look Elsewhere For Useful Information [Posted on 2006-03-11]

It is not exactly a closely guarded secret that Lawyers and Accountants have a rather bizarre sense of humor. Given the manner in which they make their livings I guess this is understandable, if not entirely forgivable.

All that said, I will warn you that if you purchase Quicken 2005 for Dummies in hopes of getting useful information all you will receive for your twenty-two dollars is a pitiful collection of bad jokes.

Don't believe me? Well just how funny are you going to find it when as a Mac owner you are faced with the most unenjoyable task of moving Quicken files from a Windows machine to your Mac and having turned to the relevant section of the book you read the following:

"Did Somebody Say Macintosh?"

"....Keep in mind, however, that this process (converting Windows to Mac or vice versa) is not for the timid or faint-hearted. I would also say that it isn't for people who have better things to do with their time. My advice to you? Go to a movie. Mow your lawn. Read a trashy novel. Forget all about this importing business."

And, as Bugs Bunny would say "That's all Folks!" when it comes to advice on transferring Quicken for Windows files to a Mac.

That's correct, not a single useful word of advice about moving Quicken files between Windows and Mac machines exists in this entire book. I know because I wasted a great deal of time looking. And yes, I would vastly have preferred to use that time doing something useful like mowing my lawn.

And believe you me, Mr. Nelson is an equal opportunity kind of guy when it comes to discriminating against computer users in search of useful Quicken information. Not only does he virtually slam the door in the face of those of us who use Macs, he does his level best to ignore the needs of all other users as well.

Time after time after time I have found myself trying to find information pertaining to some confusing and poorly explained feature in Quicken only to find myself the butt of yet another of Mr. Nelson's lousy jokes.

Countless other times having spent nearly $25 for a manual on Quicken so that I can avoid wasting time wandering aimlessly through the poorly written and illogically organized Help Files that come with the program I find myself being referred to those very files by the author of this book. Excuse me, does he think that I spent $25 to gain access to critical information not provided by Quicken so that I could be told time after time to go to Quicken's help files for the critical information I need?

If all of this were not bad enough, I am afraid that as a book store clerk of 8 years experience I have long understood something about computer manuals that is blatantly apparent in this particular one.

To whit, software sales rest entirely upon constant change. Why buy a new version of a program unless it's different? One of the most unfortunate offshoots of this change or die mindset is that computer manuals have a shelf life of about 6 months. This is not happy news at all to the folks publishing these manuals as they are used to books with shelf lives measured in decades not minutes. One of the tricks that these publishers have come up with in an effort to make these manuals profitable is to issue "New and Revised" manuals each time the software changes in which the new and revised material is a bit on the scanty side if you get my drift.

Thus although the title says Quicken 2005 for Dummies even the dumbest of the dumb will soon realized that the author did not exactly knock himself out during the revision process. In short, all sorts of "old" information remains unchanged, and all sorts of "new" information didn't make it in.

I don't know about you, but I've got better things to do with my time than read books like this... like mowing the lawn or reading a trashy novel, for instance!

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