Quicken 2004 Premier

Rating:
Summary: Best Version Yet
Review: I have used Quicken since the DOS days and this is the best version yet. There were absolutely no problems with my upgrade from Premier 2003.

Contrary to what others have posted, the program does not require your data to-be-posted on Quicken.com; it merely makes it convenient to do so. You have the option to opt out.

I reviewed Money Deluxe 2004 prior to my purchase of Premier 2004 because I kept hearing how "clean" and "user friendly" Money was. Well, in my opinion, Premier easily wins because accounts are no more than one click away (they are all listed on the side of the screen) and Premier remembers what screen was displayed the last time you were there.

Money makes more use of a browser methodology where you can go back/forwards to where you were but this isn't as intuitive and also does not make use of screen tabs like Premier does.

I have not had any stability issues with 2004 and this version corrected a bug I had in 2003 that caused 2003 to crash.

Finally, the Investing Center has nice improvements like MorningStar ratings for mutual funds build into the program as well as portfolio and stock comparisions to market indexes.

Anyway, I'm happy with Premier 2004.

Rating:
Summary: I've Got $17 Million!
Review: I just installed Quicken 2004 Premier after having used Quicken 99 for several years, then a brief stint with Money which I found infuriating. I had high hopes for the simple interface I came to know and love with older versions of Quicken. This version reminds me of Money. Like Money, it's online account synchronization is flakey at best. Upon setp, it connected with my bank, downloaded my transactions and reported that I had -$1.5 million in my checking account and +$18.5 million in my savings account. It probably goes without saying, but... not even close.

Rating:
Summary: Premier not worth it; stick with Deluxe
Review: I upgraded from Quicken Deluxe 2003 to Quicken Premier 2004. I won't address whether or not I think the 2003-2004 upgrade was worth it. What I am addressing is that I don't think the Deluxe-Premier upgrade was worth the extra cost.

Premier gets you some portfolio analysis tools and "insights", which I don't find that helpful (I am not an active or sophisticated investor).

As an aside, I -do- think the Deluxe features (over Basic) are worth the extra money. Deluxe gets you investment tracking (Basic appears to only give you basic checkbook tracking).

In 2001, I switched from Microsoft Money to Quicken. The original motivation was because I thought I might get a Mac, so I wanted my personal financial data to be prepared for the move (Quicken is also available for the Mac, but Microsoft Money is not). The feature set in 2001 was better in Quicken than in Microsoft Money (better tracking of investments like ESPP and 401k).

Recently (Quicken 2003-2004), however, I have been encountering random bugs and inconsistencies (multiple paycheck deposit accounts doesn't work consistently) that lead me to believe that Microsoft Money has probably reached parity with Quicken by now. And I still haven't switched to a Mac.

Since I now have a few years' data tied up in Quicken, I won't be frivolously switching back to Money anytime soon (unless Quicken completely screws something up), but unlike in 2001, I don't think I can unconditionally recommend Quicken over Money anymore.

Rating:
Summary: Much better than I expected.
Review: I was afraid to purchase the upgrade (from Q99), because of a bad experience upgrading a few years ago and because of the many negative reviews Q2004 has generated. I did it because I hadn't really found a better option (Reeally! and Portfolio Record Keeper just didn't have many of the features I was used to in Quicken). Quicken's 60 day money back return policy was enough to convince me to give it a try.

I consider myself a fairly proficient user, having used Quicken for 11+ years, although I have used Quicken primarily for investment tracking--not the banking and expense tracking features. Overall, the conversion went better than expected. I encourage everyone to take some time to back up the old version of Quicken data files and use the Custom install option to preserve the old version of the Quicken program. That way it is easy to hop back and forth between the old and new versions for easy data verification. At a minimum, run a couple of reports from the old version, so you are able to verify account balances just to be safe.

I did have a handful of items that appeared incorrect. I had the opportunity to use the Quicken Chat support. They are helpful (and free), for basic installation questions only. They will not handle any data issues at all and will refer you to their phone support. I decided to bite the bullet and call them (hoping desperately I wouldn't get charged), and when I explained that I had some discrepancies with my account balances right after converting, they spent more than a half an hour with me on the phone and didn't even ask for my credit card number. The issues really turned out to be reinitializing some reporting views that copied over from my old Quicken, as well as them providing clarification of how the new Quicken handles certain investment particulars. Bottom line: all of the data (my backup data file is 8 floppy disks!) transferred over without a hitch. The problems were all outside the data realm. I think they have actually improved their product support from what it was back when I tried (unsuccessfully) to upgrade to Q2001.

All in all I really do like the new Quicken. It offers much more in the way of reporting for investments than my old version did. I have not had any trouble running the program on my 3 year old machine. In fact, I have had Q2004, Q99 and AOL running at the same time and have not had a problem.

I did not give the product 5 stars, because I am not crazy about some of the new features--especially the way they changed to the dialog-type of entry for transactions in investment accounts. It seems like they want everyone to just use the downloads from their banks and brokerage firms which I prefer not to use. The new method of transaction entry will,unfortunately, be more time consuming. I'm not sure why they made this change. They also go a bit overboard with trying to provide the user with investment advice. I think they should just stick with providing a good product with good technical support and let us make our own financial decisions.

Rating:
Summary: Not as bad as I've read here -- buy 2004 and not 2005
Review: I was hesitant to buy the product because of all the negative comments. I upgraded from Quicken 98 and it's been a pleasant experience. It was time for me to upgrade. I didn't like having to pay $50 for only minor new features. I bought a 2004 copy of the Premier Home and Business for only $18. Strangely, people are charging $45 for a 2004 Premier. For $27 less you get Home and Business. The upgrade is well worth it if you are still using a very old copy of Quicken.

Rating:
Summary: Better than I thought
Review: I was quite wary about Quicken 2004 when I read the reviews in regards to program stability and bugs. I had Quicken 2001 deluxe and just recently bought a Dell computer with Windows XP. I upgraded to Quicken 2004 Premier, I immediately checked for product updates, then imported my data and held my breath. Luckily my old quicken files imported without a hitch. So far no problems to report and it's been two months. No graphing issues or crashes. I like the interface it is much simpler especially for stock transactions. Now I do not do any real online banking or transactions other than stock quotes so I don't know how that is. I gave it fours stars instead of five for the marketing jazz that intermittently comes up. Overall I am satisfied with the product.

Rating:
Summary: Works Great
Review: I was using a free Quicken version that cam with my computer and upgraded to Quicken 2004. It was easy to load and I can now download all of my information directly from my bank(s) and my broker. What a great tool. I have an older computer and occasionally it locks up when I have too many windows open. Otherwise it works great!

Rating:
Summary: Moo!
Review: I'm hoping to get a better response here than from Intuit's customer service. Could one of you people who simply love this product please tell me how you produce meaningful reports given:

1. "Exclude internal transfers" includes internal accounts, anyway.
2. Phantom amounts show up on reports. (Intuit has acknowledged this problem since April. It's now July...)

Intuit made me upgrade in '99 because they forgot about Y2K. They made me upgrade again this year because they stopped online services for Quicken '99. Does anybody doubt that in a year or two, this product will no longer work? How else can they keep the cash cow alive?

Rating:
Summary: Moo!
Review: I'm hoping to get a better response here than from Intuit's customer service. Could one of you people who simply love this product please tell me how you produce meaningful reports given:

1. "Exclude internal transfers" includes internal accounts, anyway.
2. Phantom amounts show up on reports. (Intuit has acknowledged this problem since April. It's now July...)

Intuit made me upgrade in '99 because they forgot about Y2K. They made me upgrade again this year because they stopped online services for Quicken '99. Does anybody doubt that in a year or two, this product will no longer work? How else can they keep the cash cow alive?

Rating:
Summary: CAUTION!!! CAUTION!!!
Review: I've been a Quicken user since 1993 and have purchased and upgrade every year. This year I upgraded to 2004 in October and everything was fine until 1/1/2004, where the program fails to open my file and just hangs there not responding. But if I back date my computer to 12/31/2003 it opens just fine. I spent some time with the chat support and they told me that I will have to use Quicken's disaster recovery service, $200.00 and 10 days-yea right. It's too bad because since I upgraded I spent about 40 hours entering in Budget and Plan data which will now have to be reentered. My only hope is to use my backup and go to 2003 and take a good look at going to Money. Intuit really screwed this one up and their support has been even worse.