Friday, June 20, 2003
Review: Pocket Quicken 2.01 - Your finances in Hand
Posted by Jordan Rosenwald in "SOFTWARE" @ 09:30 AM
We all waited…and waited…and waited. Pocket Quicken is finally here. Does it do everything we expected? Does it integrate seamlessly? Read on to find out whether this software is worth your hard-earned money.
Need your finances at your fingertips? There are several options out there. Does Pocket Quicken set itself apart and is it all that we had hoped?
Taking Account of Your Accounts
Jumping right in, we find that the layout of Pocket Quicken is exactly what we expect. The main screen gives you a familiar view: account name, type, balance and we can sort and change the view simply by clicking buttons on the toolbar or using drop-down boxes.
Figure 1: Nothing new in this basic view. Simple and effective.
Transaction Entries
Entering transactions is simple and shows all the fields that we all expect. Points of note are the ref., payee, category and class fields. The ref. field has 10 entries and the ability to add as many more as you need. The payee, category and class fields all use auto-complete as well as giving you the ability to bring up a list to pick from.
Figure 2: Again, a largely familiar view.
Entries can be split up to 30 times. I know that’s about 25 more than I think I’ll ever need. But then I didn’t need any about a year ago. Tha said, 30 fields seems more than adequate for personal finance. Finally, you have a tab devoted entirely to your memo. I'm not sure that they needed to make it an entire tab when they had plenty of room on the transaction tab, but no harm done.
Budgeting
I can’t say I’ve used the budgeting feature in Quicken in quite a few years, but with it being a ready part of Pocket Quicken I could certainly see myself going back. Use of the budget function is simple enough. By clicking the New button, it prompts you to pick expense or income budget items. From there you select the category and the amount you want to budget per month. As you enter transactions, it will deduct from the Remain column. While there's nothing magical here, this is quite nice to have on hand and really speaks to the simplicity and usefulness of Pocket Quicken.
Options
Those who have read my other reviews know that I love to explore the options screens. Why? No idea. I just findi that I often find little gems. However, I wouldn’t say I found many gems here, but the options are simple and effective. You are able to change what items (account, category, currency and class lists) as well as how much of them get synchronized (by date). You also have the ability to enable or disable transferring transactions entered on your Pocket PC to your desktop Quicken. Why you would want to disable that, I'm not sure, but you have the option.
Under the display preferences, you can change your default account notifications in case you forget to categorize or when you’re deleting a transaction. You can also change settings for hiding and showing different data, such as currency type or hidden accounts and change how the QuickFill will work.
Finally, under security settings you can set a four-digit numeric password for launching the application, which also prompts you when you turn your device on if it automatically shut off while you were in Pocket Quicken. You can also enter your desktop password, if you have one, so you won’t be prompted every time you synch.
Synchronization
This is where the magic happens. I think that this is the defining point for many users and I have to say that they didn’t let us down. The synchronization seems to be flawless. You can set the sync to occur every time you dock, at scheduled times (once per day, week, two weeks or month) or only when you manually kick it off.
Figure 3: Plenty of options on how to have everything synchronize.
Updated
I was barely into working on this review when Landware came out with an update. While .01 updates are usually not a big deal, I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it wasn’t a bugfix upgrade as I had thought. Instead, I found that along with a few bugfixes there also some legitimate added features.
First, they added “Quicken Transaction” under the global New menu. Nice touch. Very convenient, yet still secure. You are still prompted for your password before you can enter the transaction. Second, they added a small popup calculator to the main account screen. While using the built-in calculator was adequate, this is a simple improvement that has already proven useful. Finally, and what really set this apart as more than a bugfix update, is Today Screen integration. You can now add the number of unsynchronized transiations you have to your Today screen along with the date of your last synch and the ending balances for any/all accounts.
Figure 4: Today integration
Gotchas
While well organized and simply laid out, there are a few things missing from Pocket Quicken.
The software can be purchased for $39.95, directly from Landware. As a special offer to Pocket PC Thoughts readers, simply put PPCTHOUGHTS in the comment field when purchasing the downloadable version and receive $10 off the price. This offer will expire July 20th, 2003.
Specifications
Pocket Quicken requires 593.6KB to install. I did install it on a Secure Digital card without any issues.
Conclusions
Pocket Quicken is a great companion for any Quicken user. The seamless synchronization is the killer part of this app. If they could throw in my pretty graphs and the ability to reconcile all transactions there’d be no reason for me to even entertain any other personal finance software. I anxiously await the next version. Let’s just hope it doesn’t take so long.
Need your finances at your fingertips? There are several options out there. Does Pocket Quicken set itself apart and is it all that we had hoped?
Taking Account of Your Accounts
Jumping right in, we find that the layout of Pocket Quicken is exactly what we expect. The main screen gives you a familiar view: account name, type, balance and we can sort and change the view simply by clicking buttons on the toolbar or using drop-down boxes.
Figure 1: Nothing new in this basic view. Simple and effective.
Transaction Entries
Entering transactions is simple and shows all the fields that we all expect. Points of note are the ref., payee, category and class fields. The ref. field has 10 entries and the ability to add as many more as you need. The payee, category and class fields all use auto-complete as well as giving you the ability to bring up a list to pick from.
Figure 2: Again, a largely familiar view.
Entries can be split up to 30 times. I know that’s about 25 more than I think I’ll ever need. But then I didn’t need any about a year ago. Tha said, 30 fields seems more than adequate for personal finance. Finally, you have a tab devoted entirely to your memo. I'm not sure that they needed to make it an entire tab when they had plenty of room on the transaction tab, but no harm done.
Budgeting
I can’t say I’ve used the budgeting feature in Quicken in quite a few years, but with it being a ready part of Pocket Quicken I could certainly see myself going back. Use of the budget function is simple enough. By clicking the New button, it prompts you to pick expense or income budget items. From there you select the category and the amount you want to budget per month. As you enter transactions, it will deduct from the Remain column. While there's nothing magical here, this is quite nice to have on hand and really speaks to the simplicity and usefulness of Pocket Quicken.
Options
Those who have read my other reviews know that I love to explore the options screens. Why? No idea. I just findi that I often find little gems. However, I wouldn’t say I found many gems here, but the options are simple and effective. You are able to change what items (account, category, currency and class lists) as well as how much of them get synchronized (by date). You also have the ability to enable or disable transferring transactions entered on your Pocket PC to your desktop Quicken. Why you would want to disable that, I'm not sure, but you have the option.
Under the display preferences, you can change your default account notifications in case you forget to categorize or when you’re deleting a transaction. You can also change settings for hiding and showing different data, such as currency type or hidden accounts and change how the QuickFill will work.
Finally, under security settings you can set a four-digit numeric password for launching the application, which also prompts you when you turn your device on if it automatically shut off while you were in Pocket Quicken. You can also enter your desktop password, if you have one, so you won’t be prompted every time you synch.
Synchronization
This is where the magic happens. I think that this is the defining point for many users and I have to say that they didn’t let us down. The synchronization seems to be flawless. You can set the sync to occur every time you dock, at scheduled times (once per day, week, two weeks or month) or only when you manually kick it off.
Figure 3: Plenty of options on how to have everything synchronize.
Updated
I was barely into working on this review when Landware came out with an update. While .01 updates are usually not a big deal, I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it wasn’t a bugfix upgrade as I had thought. Instead, I found that along with a few bugfixes there also some legitimate added features.
First, they added “Quicken Transaction” under the global New menu. Nice touch. Very convenient, yet still secure. You are still prompted for your password before you can enter the transaction. Second, they added a small popup calculator to the main account screen. While using the built-in calculator was adequate, this is a simple improvement that has already proven useful. Finally, and what really set this apart as more than a bugfix update, is Today Screen integration. You can now add the number of unsynchronized transiations you have to your Today screen along with the date of your last synch and the ending balances for any/all accounts.
Figure 4: Today integration
Gotchas
While well organized and simply laid out, there are a few things missing from Pocket Quicken.
- Graphs! Charts! There are none to be found. I greatly enjoy viewing my finances in different views, at a glance. Without the pretty graphs I’m reduced to just using the balance total at the bottom of the Account List.
- Personally, I have no need for it, but I can see where people might have the need to synchronize more than one Quicken file. Pocket Quicken doesn’t allow for such a thing, and in fact, merges the two files into one.
- No ability to reconcile transactions that are synchronized down from the desktop. You can reconcile transactions entered on the Pocket PC, but not ones that come down from the computer.
The software can be purchased for $39.95, directly from Landware. As a special offer to Pocket PC Thoughts readers, simply put PPCTHOUGHTS in the comment field when purchasing the downloadable version and receive $10 off the price. This offer will expire July 20th, 2003.
Specifications
Pocket Quicken requires 593.6KB to install. I did install it on a Secure Digital card without any issues.
Conclusions
Pocket Quicken is a great companion for any Quicken user. The seamless synchronization is the killer part of this app. If they could throw in my pretty graphs and the ability to reconcile all transactions there’d be no reason for me to even entertain any other personal finance software. I anxiously await the next version. Let’s just hope it doesn’t take so long.
