finance

Over the last 6 years, IGG Software has continued to lengthen their lead in the Macintosh Personal Finance space, becoming the dominant player assisting you with all aspects of your Financial Life (ironically, that’s what the aborted attempt at re-writing Quicken was supposed to be called).  Unfortunately, as I predicted, Intuit has only made one improvement to Quicken Essentials for Mac since I wrote my article 4 years ago:  you can now export to TurboTax (wow). But I digress, this article is about iBank 5, the new offering from IGG Software in the iBank line.  A piece of software I’ve been running (and loving) since 2011. The Updates Several new features in iBank 5 will have Macintosh finance...

I was wrong. That’s not something anyone likes to admit, but when I’m wrong, I’m wrong, I’ll admit it. Some quick background for any readers who are experiencing my personal saga with Macintosh Finance software for the first time. Back in February of 2010, I was terribly frustrated with the direction that Intuit was taking with Quicken for Macintosh, or the lack thereof. I vented that frustration in my article titled, Quicken Essentials 2010 for Mac. Why Bother? I fired up the Macintosh Quicken community. So much so that I got the attention of senior people inside the Intuit organization. I ended up interviewing Aaron Patzer, the GM/VP of Personal Finance at Intuit, and the...

A year ago I upgraded from Quicken 2007 for Macintosh to Quicken Essentials 2010 for Macintosh. I wrote about that upgrade in my article entitled Quicken Essentials for Mac – The Bare Minimum. In that article I went through my upgrade experience and got the reader setup on Quicken Essentials. I then went over the decision criteria between Quicken Essentials and iBank 3. I made the decision to upgrade to Quicken Essentials, but only by the smallest of margins. It was basically the best of two bad options. I had been a Quicken user for over a decade and Quicken Essentials maintained the feeling of a Macintosh personal finance application. iBank 3 was different and had some performance problems that weren’...

Update – 20120712:  I was wrong, this is still a great article, but I gave up on Intuit and any and all of their Macintosh software, see my latest post here. As I mentioned in my last article, iBank – Your Quicken Alternative, I’ve entered my last transaction into Quicken 2007 for Mac. I haven’t deleted it off of my system yet, but I will shortly. This is my review of Quicken Essentials for Mac (QEM as as my fellow bloggers seem to have dubbed it, I don’t think that rolls of the tongue, so I’ll just use Quicken Essentials). This article will be the culmination of my adventure into Macintosh personal finance software. I didn’t set...

I’ve entered my last transaction into Quicken 2007 for Mac. I’m tired of the interface, it’s the last PowerPC application I have on my Macintosh (I want to uninstall Rosetta), and it’s clear to me that while no alternative solution is perfect, I have to move forward. The two leading candidates for me to move to are Quicken Essentials 2010 for Mac and iBank. This will be my review of iBank. Both products will be reviewed from the perspective of a Quicken 2007 for Mac user, so bear that in mind as you read them. The Quicken Essentials 2010 for Mac review will be published after the February 25th launch of Quicken Essentials, at Intuit’s...