Classic Kitchens & Baths is not in the business of tracking expenditures and compiling tax information, so when owner Steven Strano discovered Intuit QuickBooks' easy-to-use accounting software, he was delighted to realize he could spend more time designing and building clients' kitchens and bathrooms instead of tracking cancelled checks and 1099 forms.

"With the Check Reconcile feature I save a lot of time vs. looking through bank statements and cancelled checks," said Strano, president of the Littleton, Massachusetts-based firm. "Now I have perfect bookkeeping. I print checks that look much better and more professional. I can also print 1099 forms, which saves time."

Strano was using Microsoft Excel and OneWrite before he bought QuickBooks Pro 2008. He also looked at Microsoft Money and PeachTree but decided on QuickBooks software after concluding that "it [was] the best deal out of all the ones I checked."

Despite the software's wealth of capabilities, Strano was up and running within a few hours, helped by QuickBooks' built-in video guides, he said. Classic Kitchens & Baths does not use the software's inventory feature, and Strano found the customer delete feature to be "a little strange."

Overall, Strano rated QuickBooks 2008 Pro a perfect 10 out of 10.