Microsoft Project Reviewer's Comments
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Our original review was for Microsoft Project Standard 2003. Microsoft has released their 2007 version which works with Vista. Click on “Product Details” to see a list of new and improved features.
Microsoft Project Standard, our “TopTenREVIEWS Silver Award” is the flagship of all project management programs; almost every program we reviewed is somehow compatible with Microsoft Project Standard. The majority allow you to import your projects from Microsoft into their software. Project management software provides you with the tools to effectively manage tasks and resources so that you can complete your project on time and within budget constraints—Microsoft Project Standard will help you do just that.
Microsoft Project Screenshots. Click to Enlarge
Ease of Use:
Microsoft Project Standard has four different primary areas: Tasks, Resources, Track and Report. These sections allow you to easily navigate through the program and make finding the information you need a snap.
Project management in this program is great: you can make your project as simple or complex as you'd like. Use project management tools to keep track of tasks or task assignments or weave multiple projects together and control their every aspect.
Feature Set:
Microsoft Project Standard comes with all the standard project management tools: milestones, Gantt charts, recurring tasks, critical path methods, resource allocation and more. You also have complete control over how your project is visually represented; you can tweak colors, layout and even the look of any charts.
Another nice feature is the version tracker. This tool lets you quickly and graphically compare changes to your project plan.
Ease of Installation:
There were no problems during the installation process.
Help/Support:
Microsoft Project Standard has excellent help features, including a step–by–step tutorial and detailed help sections. The help sections are written in simple, non–technical wording, so that anyone can easily make use of the software.
Microsoft also provides a plethora of online documentation covering their product. They also offer phone and email support, though some fees might apply.
Project Management:
One task that was unique to Microsoft Project Standard was the recurring task, which makes scheduling recurring team meetings or regular maintenance simple.
Another handy project management feature is the “expand and hide” tasks tool. A project might include hundreds of tasks, which make for a long list. Microsoft allows you to expand and hide these tasks so that you can easily find what you need.
Resource Management:
Microsoft Project Standard offers great resource functionality: you can quickly create project members as well as project groups. From there, customize individual team members or assign resources to various tasks and projects.
One area that could be improved is document management. While the functionality to hyperlink documents to certain tasks is available, there is no version tracking for documents.
Collaboration:
This is the weakest area of Microsoft Project Standard; while Microsoft does support ASP modules, you need to purchase the Professional version of the product to do so
Microsoft Project Standard doesn't have a centralized collaboration center like our #1- and #3–ranked products do. There also isn't an executive dashboard function, which allows managers and executives to log in and see how the project is progressing.
Summary:
Microsoft Project Standard lets you use the tools available to do nearly anything you need with managing your project. With this program you always have complete control, which makes it possible to complete your project on time and within budget.
©2008 TopTenREVIEWS, Inc.
