From the Desk of Janet Barclay

In a previous job, I had the opportunity to work with ACT! 6.0 and was really impressed with its features and ease of use. I downloaded a free trial for my own use, but quickly decided to stick with Outlook because even though it didn’t have all the bells and whistles offered by ACT!, it had other functions which were more important to me, such as the ability to use multiple email addresses, rules to organize incoming messages, and the junk mail filter. (Current versions of ACT! may do some or all of these things - I have not been keeping up.)

When I bought Office 2003 several years ago, I insisted on the version which included Microsoft’s new Business Contact Manager, thinking it would be the best of Outlook and ACT! combined. I was wrong. I tried it out, uninstalled it, installed it and tried it again at a later time, only to end up uninstalling it once and for all. (By the way, the program is so huge that each install and uninstall took hours!) In terms of functionality, I didn’t like the fact that you couldn’t click on a contact in an email message and add them directly to your BCM contacts; it would only allow you to add it to your Outlook contacts, then you would have to either move it or copy it. Technically, it never worked the way it was supposed to - if I tried to generate reports, it usually crashed or gave me an error message.

When I bought my new notebook computer earlier this year, I ordered Office 2007, and Dell installed it on my computer prior to delivery - including Business Contact Manager. I didn’t expect I would want to use it based on my experience with 2003, but decided I would leave it on until I had a chance to try it out and see if the earlier problems were resolved, and maybe I would start using it in 2008.

For the most part, I have been very happy with my computer, but was very disappointed in the speed, considering that I had upgraded the processor and RAM. I thought about uninstalling Windows desktop, which also came preinstalled, because I’d found that Google desktop really slowed down my old computer, but I was finding it a useful tool and decided it was worth the sacrifice in speed. Lately, it seems that my system has been getting slower and slower - whether it really was, or whether my patience was wearing thin, I’m not sure - and decided it was time to take some action. I’m not sure what inspired me to do this, but I decided to Google "business contact manager" and "slow" and discovered that this is a common problem. I found several message boards where it was discussed, and one in particular said "unless you absolutely need it, uninstall it," so I decided to give it a try, and I was amazed at the outcome. Now, instead of waiting 15 or more seconds for Outlook just to load when I open my laptop, it’s there instantly! I am of course kicking myself for not trying this months ago - think of all the time I’d have saved - not to mention the aggravation!

So my advice to you - if you are thinking of installing BCM - DON’T! If it’s already on your computer and you’re not happy with the performance of your system, uninstall it. It will be well worth the 15-20 minutes of your time!