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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kaparthy, post: 61784, member: 57463&quot;]<b>Beware of Cognitive Dissonance</b></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>There is no way to answer that.&nbsp; I have reviewed the available packages several times for Coins magazine and for Numismatist and for The Celator.&nbsp; For one thing, new ones are always coming on the market. </p><p><br /></p><p>More to the point, what you will be served best by depends on (1) what you collect (2) how you collect it and (3) who you are.</p><p><br /></p><p>There are about a dozen programs out there.&nbsp; Perhaps three are easily considered &quot;world class&quot; for winning awards, being in business for ten years, and generally being successful at doing the right thing the right way at the right price.&nbsp; That said, some people are happy to use Excel or Access and in one review, I said that I could do most of what I need done in Word.</p><p><br /></p><p>Some packages are &quot;marketed&quot; for U.S. or whatever, but are so <u>configurable</u> that I set up databases for my ancients as a test.</p><p><br /></p><p>And configurability is an issue.&nbsp; If you do what &quot;most&quot; people seem to do, then the &quot;average&quot; package will be fine.&nbsp; The more different you are, the more you need to define your own field labels and attributes.</p><p><br /></p><p>Some packages come with automatic updates of prices for U.S. Coins.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Some let you append one, three, or six or more images of your coins.&nbsp; Some just give you a generic picture of &quot;A Lincoln Cent.&quot;&nbsp; Some have contact managers built in so that you can keep track of buyers and sellers.&nbsp; Some let you keep track of the buys and sells and spreads and bids and asks.&nbsp; One is designed to let a dealer contruct an auction catalog from inventory.&nbsp; You might not think you need that -- but your attorney or accountant might appreciate that format more than a spreadsheet of cryptographic mumbo AU 58 PCGS 1958/7-S/S jumbo.</p><p><br /></p><p>I will dig out and upload one of those summary reviews.&nbsp; Be aware that it is already two years old.</p><p><br /></p><p>Last warning: When someone says &quot;I bought X and it works for me&quot; run for the hills.&nbsp; That is cognitive dissonance.&nbsp; Unless they evaluated several packages against objective measures, what they are doing is justifying a choice they cannot easily change.</p><p><br /></p><p>Last last warning: You might need more than one package.&nbsp; We all collect different things and paper money is not ancients is not tokens is not Deep Cameo Kennedy Half Dollars.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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