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The Best at Home and on the Road

Computing at Home

Best Personal Finance Software: Intuit Quicken Deluxe 2000; 800/446-8848, www.quicken2000.com

Best Tax Software: H & R Block Financial's Kiplinger TaxCut Deluxe; 800/457-9525, www.taxcut.com

Best Reference Software: Microsoft Encarta 2000; 888/218-5617, www.encarta.com

Best Game: Electronic Arts The Sims; 800/245-4525, www.thesims.com

Best Ink Jet Printer: HP DeskJet 932C; 800/552-8500, www.hp.com

Best Personal Laser Printer: Brother HL-1240; 800/276-7746, www.brother.com

Best SOHO Networking Kit: Intel AnyPoint Home Network; 877/649-5817, www.intel.com/anypoint

Keep your home office in order with some useful software and hardware. Intuit's Quicken Deluxe 2000 ($59) offers such features as employee stock option tracking and e-mail alerts about FTC stock-sale or purchase filings. H & R Block Financial's Kiplinger TaxCut Deluxe ($40) includes access to federal and state returns. A flat fee of about $20 gets you an advance of up to $5000 on any refund due from an electronically filed return.

As Casey Stengel used to say, "You can look it up!" That's surely true if you have Microsoft's Encarta 2000. For just $99, it has a 42,000-article encyclopedia, a dictionary with audio pronunciation, and an Interactive World Atlas that lets you magnify images to the level of street grids.

After working for 3 or 4 hours in the hot sun, your guys need a little recreation. We recommend Electronic Arts' The Sims ($50). Players create and develop the lives of virtual people, balancing their personalities and guiding them to success in friendship, finance, and romance.

Whether for statistics, fan mail, team logos, or lineup cards, there are always reasons to print. The $199 HP DeskJet 932C is our favorite ink jet printer, with an attractive if bulbous design, clear text, quick printing speed, and lifelike color graphics. For a personal laser, we recommend the Brother HL-1240. This $299 model prints clear, sharp text fast.

Now that you have your system ready to go, the best way to get everyone in the house online is the telephone line-based Intel AnyPoint Home Network. For $69 per PC, the parallel-port version networks two computers and delivers fast enough performance to handle multiple streaming audio and video applications.

On the Road

Best PDA: Handspring Visor Deluxe; 888/565-9393, www.handspring.com

Best Gadget: Think Outside Stowaway Keyboard; 760/431-9090, www.thinkoutside.com

Best PC Card Modem: 3Com Megahertz 56K Global GSM and Cellular Modem PC Card; 800/638-3266, www.3com.com/mobile

Best Wireless Communication Device: Research in Motion BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (model 950); 519/888-7465, www.rim.net

Best Projection System: InFocus LP330 Dragonfly; 800/294-6400, www.infocus.com

This year's mobile tools use innovative designs to help you take your home-field advantage with you on the road. For starters, consider a personal digital assistant. Although Palms still dominate the PDA market, the $249 Handspring Visor Deluxe stole the limelight this year. It does everything Palms can do and also offers the Springboard module for a useful hardware add-on such as a digital camera, a modem, or an MP3 player. The Visor comes in a guava-colored case.

Want to tote a keyboard with your Palm or Visor? Check out this year's best gadget, Think Outside's Stowaway Keyboard. This full-size $100 keyboard accordions down to the size of a PDA, making it easy to respond to e-mail or type notes while you bounce along on the team bus.

For notebook users looking to connect, we recommend 3Com's Megahertz 56K Global GSM and Cellular Modem PC Card. It's a bit expensive at $199, but this speedy performer is wireless, phone-ready, and both Windows- and Linux-compatible.

If you want to go the distance on the road with constant e-mail access, consider Research in Motion's BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (model 950). The $399 pager-esque device lets you send and receive e-mail, check your calendar, or (for an additional $40 per month) surf the Web--all remotely. The screen is small, but a QWERTY keyboard and lightweight construction make this unique device functional.

Perhaps your mobile mission requires a presentation that delivers. For $5499, the InFocus Dragonfly LP300 projector weighs in at a trim 4.8 pounds and comes loaded with a manual zoom, built-in speaker and video inputs, and a convenient wireless remote control device.