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Interactive (Flash) Financial Calculators using Crystal Xcelsius

I like the look of the interface BUT the motion of increasing decreasing (up and down) isn't intuitive right away. I was trying to rotate it for the longest time and didn't get anywhere.
 
what did you think of the other calculators? do you find them to have some value?

i debated about the radial vs vertical control of the dials and gauges, however i always felt that vertical was easier to control over the radial.
theres a lot of elements that can be manipulated that isn't always intuitive too.
unfortunately the mouse disappearing on the dials and gauges is something inherent with Xcelsius
 
Can't work the dials.

When directly entering percentages, it's not clear they must be entered as decimals. If the default value is "6.00%" you would think entering "5" would change it to 5%. It has to be entered as ".05". The up/down buttons on the decimals should adjust the values in tenths, not hundreds.

On the Retirement Analysis option, the "initial investment" dial has too low of a max value, especially compared to the $1,000,000 allowed for annual income. I don't understand what "Monthly Annuity from Investment" and "Monthly Interest Investment" are supposed to mean.

On the Vehicle Finance option, the "Finance Period" should allow 1/2 years, and it should go out farther than 6.

On the Mortgage Affordability option, I don't understand what the difference is between "Monthly Deductions" and "Monthly Expenses".
 
thanks for the input yeah its not too intuitive sometimes when some dials work while others are just purely informational. the input into the text fields can be a little trouble some as well unfortunately some of those things can not be modified in the Xcelsius software. thank you for your other comments and i will make some of those changes that you suggested. The monthly deductions and expenses was a way for me to have someone input both % and a $ (at the center of the dial you can switch between % and $) but there's no real difference. The way i looked at it was the deductions would be what my income would look like after taxes, insurance, etc. and the expenses would be my monthly expenses, food, gas, gas, and more gas, etc.

thanks for the input i greatly appreciate it.

mike
 
Overall it looks nice and clean. The dials were somewhat counterintuitive, but they work pretty well once you get the hang of it. Like Kranky said, some of the descriptions are not clear, and I'd expect the interest box to be entered as a percentage, not decimal value.

Also, on many screens/displays, (for example on the mortgage refinance screen, in the payment history box), you have "principle" listed instead of "principal". Principle is a rule or ethical standard, principal is the original amount on the loan.
 
Yeah 200k is way high for my area on home prices. Also, I got really frustrated while trying use the dials so I gave up.
Looks really good though.
 
Something like the down payment (principal amount) dial is not accurate enough. I don't want 19.9% or 20.6%. I want 20%. Looks good overall though.
 
Originally posted by: kranky

On the Mortgage Affordability option, I don't understand what the difference is between "Monthly Deductions" and "Monthly Expenses".
Click to expand...

Deductions are things like taxes and stocks purchased taken from your paycheck.
 
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