Lets talk about Amicus 2008 Premium

I have been back from the Amicus consultant conference in Toronto for about two weeks and have been doing a lot of Amicus 2008 Premium. A lot means:

• A fresh install of Amicus 2008 Premium for a 5 user firm in New Orleans.
• An upgrade from Amicus 7 to Amicus 2008 Premium for a 10 user firm for a firm in Jackson, MS.
• A Pilot install for Amicus V+ to Amicus 2008 Premium for a 15 user firm in Baton Rouge.

As some of you might know Amicus X and Amicus 7 were not the easiest programs to install and support.  Lots of written off hours and some unhappy clients.  I have stuck with Amicus for so long because hands down it is the most intuitive piece of legal practice management software out there.  Law Firms have high turn over and it is not practically to spend 8 hours which each new staff member on how to use one piece of software.  Most legal staff can get the core concepts of Amicus with an hour or two of instruction.     

These 2008 installs went very smoothly.  Warning: This is my experience in a two week period, so my frame of reference is not that great. 

PCLaw Link:  Very easy for me to setup.  Pretty much followed the instructions and it worked perfectly.  I remember Amicus 7 being a pain in the neck. 

Outlook, Contact Calendar Task Link:  Had a lot of problems initializing it.  Once I got it working, no issues.  My problems dealt with Vista and a user who had Calendar entries with descriptions that read like novels.  With the help of tech support, I fixed these issues.  None of my consultant friends have any issues with this link, just me.

Speed:  Pretty good, nothing like the lags in X or 7.

Stability:  Great.  The only time Amicus crashed was when I was importing 10,000 contacts into the system on 3 different machines at the same time, which I should not have been doing anyway.

Email:  Easy to setup and maintain.  No issues.

Document Generation: No Problem.

The Library:  Come on, no one uses the library!  Actually, Our firm does use it to store menus of restaurants near the office. 

SQL:  To me, this is the big time saver.  It is very easy to go into the actually database and make changes firm wide without having to go to each user's workstation.  It was impossible to do this with the old Amicus Database

I once described Amicus 7 to a consultant friend as the really hot girl that you start going out with and think she is really cool and then suddenly discover she is completely unstable.  (Caveat Lector, I somehow always date this girl, so I always use her in analogies).  Amicus 2008 Premium is the hot girl you start dating and suddenly realize that it is time to take her home to mom, quit playing the field and make the investment for the long hall.  Software divorces are pretty messy, especially with children involved, so I don't make this statement lightly.

Before I install Amicus 2008 Premium at a firm, the staff and I spend a lot of time planning and running pilot programs.  This is not software you just decide to buy and install on the same day.  Spend the time getting everything ready.

Not be a complete brown nosier, but I would also cut Gavel and Gown some slack for Amicus X and Amicus 7.  Microsoft spends more on R&D then most nations GDP and they have put out some less then stable software like Windows ME.  (I can't say Vista because all my experiences have been pretty good)

Comments

[Laresa]

Hi Craig:
How long does a typical install of the '08 upgrade from '07 take on one server and one work station? We are a small firm in San Francisco and when I say small I mean, one attorney (Paul) and one paralegal/secretary/file clerk/manager, i.e., me. It took our IT guy 10 hours and cost $1700!! Doesn't that seem outrageous? Just curious about your typical time frame for installation as this seems so inordinate to me. Thanks.