Crystal vs Access

[mooreman]

Where can I get a good comparison of Crystal Reports vs Access. Whis is easier to utilize. What other options are out there for a simpal ODBC report writer???

 

[danman77]

Hi there. I read your question regarding Crystal Reports vs. Access. I'm not sure you can get a 'comparison' between these two as they are different types of programs (Access is a database program, Crystal is a data-access and report writer). I have worked with both and, for report writing, I much prefer Crystal Reports as it is extremely flexable offering report outputs in Word, Excel, HTML, Comma-delimited, PDF, etc. Access is a nice little database (although I hate what they did to it in Access 2000) and I often use it as a 'back-end' database to applications created with Visual Basic. Crystal Reports (Developer) gives you an Active X control you can add a to your program and provide reports to those users who do not have Crystal Reports which they can output to any of the formats mentioned above.

As far as ease of use goes, Crystal takes a little getting use to if you already know Access, but I find the whole Crystal package much more flexable. There is lots of support out there for this product as well.

As far as other report writers go, you can also look into 'Brio Reports', which is a powerful reporting tool from Brio Software. I am not familiar with others that may be out there.