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| Microsoft Money Deluxe 2005 [Old Version] | ![Microsoft Money Deluxe 2005 [Old Version]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51J5MJEEE3L._SL160_.jpg)
 enlarge | From: Microsoft Software
Category: Software
List Price: $59.99
Buy Used: $19.95
You Save: $40.04 (67%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  57 reviews
Sales Rank: 4360
Format: Cd-rom
Platforms: Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows Me, Windows Xp
Media: CD-ROM
Edition: Deluxe
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 5.4 x 1.4
MPN: 86000349
Model: 860-00349
UPC: 805529809864
EAN: 0805529809864
ASIN: B0002D12D4
Release Date: September 13, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: CD-ROM, plastic case and booklet like new are excellent condition. Missing box, manual book. Ships immediately.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Great personal finance program, no problems whatsoever March 1, 2005
I downloaded the 90-day trial version of Money Deluxe 2005 from Microsoft's website and have been testing it for the past three weeks. My conclusion is, most user "reviews" here on Amazon are simply white lies posted by people who apparently never used the program.
The trial version file is about 28MB and includes everything in the retail version, except multimedia tutorials you'll find on the retail CD-ROM. The program installed in under a minute on my P4 3.2Ghz PC. I ran it, imported my old Money file, and presto!, everything was working. The user interface is better than before, with the working area bigger than before. (The guy who says the working area is less than 1/3 is simply LYING! The work area occupies most of the screen even on a 800x600 monitor. Shame on him.) The buttons are easy to understand, although the program does have too many menus: up to three horizontal ones (not counting the menu bar menus File, Edit, ...), and one vertical one!
The program is snappy and it synced my file with my Hotmail account in no time. (You do *not* need to link it with a Hotmail or Passport account to use the password feature; Money supports local passwords.) Everything that worked before in the old version works here, but things just look better and work more smoothly. I just re-read most of the negative reviews here on Amazon and let me tell you very few of them are true, like the recent one about "Microsoft admitting this is full of bugs"; the guy who posted this is full of sh*t. Microsoft never said that; saying things like that would subject a company to lemon lawsuits. As a real-world user I've tested this program extensively (since I'm still using the trial version and I've backed up my files each night), and haven't come across any of the problems all those phony "reviews" claim. In short, the program seems rock solid. Do note that I run this under Windows XP; if you run it under Win98 (assuming it supports win98), you might experience stability issues simply because Win98 isn't a rock-solid system.
Money 2005 is feature-rich and integrates well with H&R Block's Taxcut software. Most popular financial institutions support Money; you can either download your transactions automatically into Money or do so via your bank's website, if your bank requires this manual step. One of Money's fortes is its reports feature, something users have lauded over the years. I use it extensively to check on my financial health. I don't use the investment tools much since I have a separate trader's toolkit, but Money makes it easy to manage your investments.
In short, this is definitely the best version of Money yet. No wonder magazines like PC World and PC Mag gave it five stars. Good thing their reviewers are not pants-on-fire liars like what we have here.
To be honest I'm so sick of people posting fake reviews just because this is a Microsoft product. What can I say, we live in a free country and everyone is entitled to an opinion, legit or not. I'm just glad there's a free trial version that let me know the truth. I'm ordering the retail version tonight. I urge everyone interested in personal finance software download this and try it themselves, ditto with Quicken.
 Microsoft Admits: Full of Bugs February 11, 2005
9 out of 12 found this review helpful
This product is full of bugs that Microsoft acknowledges are known issues with the product. For instance, when making a transfer with the electronic banking feature in Money enabled, the information typed in the memo field magically becomes entered in the pay to field and becomes a new payee. The problem: You get a lot of payees such as "christmas gift", "confirmation number abc123", "ski lessons"... clearly not a payee. Second, the automatic update feature is far from automatic. You must click the update box every time even if you tell Money to update at startup. There are a slew of other bugs as well. I do not recommend this product. Go with an earlier version of Money or some other software.
Microshafted again... February 6, 2005
16 out of 19 found this review helpful
Great software if you believe that software designed to satisfy the the interests of the corporate sponsors is the reason you should pony up your hard earned money. Feature rich, yet disappointing. I downloaded the trial version when Quicken informed me that yet again I would be required to update from a usable version of their software to one that has been universally panned (another issue but since these are the only real viable choices for personal finance it's the rock and the hard place) First it would not import my Quicken files - claimed they were corrupt. Ran Quicken file repair utility and got a clean bill of health. Still would not import. So I decided to start from scratch. 20 weekend hours later I was up and running. Re-creating a budget was the most frustrating and time consuming of all tasks. Navigation between budget creation and budget category edit functions is abysmal. In fact navigation in general is poor - I frequently found myself 3 or 4 clicks away from the screen I wanted to get to - assuming I could remember the correct path at all. Some items referred to in the help could not be accessed at all UNTIL I discovered that to access them I first had to modify my "Home Page" to make them available. Poor, amateurish GUI design meant mostly to provide lots of opportunities to present various online offers. Microsoft would like users to sign up for a .Net Passport and store their data on their servers... NOT! This can be worked around however as long as you are careful to turn down all opportunities to do so.
Most unbelievable - after actually purchasing my full version copy and installing it, it would NOT OPEN MY MONEY FILE that I created in the Demo version. Claimed it could not find it or that it was read only. Uninstalled, reinstalled demo version and was able to open it right up. Reinstalled full version - same problem. Only after attempting to create a new file was I prompted to get an update that appeared to cure the problem.
I would not recommend this software nor would I buy it if there was any acceptable alternative. Unfortunately there is none. This is a product that is designed for the benefit of Microsoft and it's corporate partners - NOT the end user.
Works for me, although interface still not the best February 1, 2005
12 out of 21 found this review helpful
There is a small army of people who, like the recalcitrant insurgents in Iraq, will do anything to try to destroy Microsoft's reputation. I'm not here to defend the biggest software company in the world. As with any company, it makes some great products, many good products, and some bad products.
I did not upgrade to Microsoft Money 2004 because, sometime in 2003, my Money file developed some kind of minor corruption ("This operation cannot be performed" error after entering certain types of transactions), and Money 2004 refused to even read the file. This time, I downloaded the trial version of Money 2005, and it loaded the old-format file without a hitch. And the mysterious error message is no more!
Money is cool because it makes it easy to keep track of your accounts, esp. for someone like me with dozens of banking and brokerage accounts (many from the days of Internet bubble when banks were giving away free money for opening accounts -- I knew I needed a real job...). It's generates useful reports to track your networth, by category or over time. Even for someone like me with lots of small accounts but little to show in the aggregate, it's immensely useful.
Should you get Money 2005, or upgrade from an earlier version?
I can't really help you with that question. But I do have a couple suggestions:
1) Download the 30-day trial copy of the program from Microsoft's website and give it a test drive. I tried it on my two laptops and both copies worked perfectly, which led me to doubt the truthfulness of a lof of these reviews from so-called "I'm not anti-Microsoft" people. (No, yours truly doesn't work for Microsoft or get paid by them in any way.)
2) For a peace of mind, make a manual backup copy of your existing Money file in Windows Explorer. Just go into My Computer or Windows Explorer, find the Money file (it's usually in "My Documents"; its extension is ".mny"), and use copy-and-paste to make a copy. Keep the backup copy in a different folder. Better yet, zip the backup copy for extra security. :)
Try the program and judge for yourself if it works fine on your PC. Not all the naysayers are liars, no doubt. But, as I always advice my friends when they ask about gadgets, movies and whatnot, always try it yourself and form your own opinions.
WATCH OUT--YOUR BANK MIGHT MAKE YOU UPGRADE--egads January 25, 2005
9 out of 16 found this review helpful
I CANT BELIEVE IT!!! I AM BEING FORCED TO UPGRADE TO A LESS THAN ACCEPTABLE VERSION. WHY??, the only thing they said was now my transactions would automatically download. Is that a perk, I do that already! Quicken is no better, they have major problems with their new version as well, such as no longer supporting QIF files. Great, not a lot of options. Its worth it to keep what you have until you find something that most people can agree is just as good or not better that the previous versions of MS Money such as 2000 or 2001. Happy hunting!!!
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