another Quicken 2003 question

Unless there's more to the picture, I recommend going with what's easiest.

Windows XP is on its last leg. MicroSoft is no longer officially supporting it (or they're about to pull the plug). Installing Q2007 on your XP laptop doesn't make sense unless you've got concerns about using the Win7+Q2011 laptop.

Here's what I think will be easiest:

1) Copy your Quicken 2003 file from the XP laptop to a flash drive 2) Copy that file from the flash drive to the Win7 laptop. 3) On the Win7 laptop, open Q2011 4) Within Q2011, open the Q2003 file that you just copied to the new laptop.

Quicken 2011 should convert your file from there.

After the upgrade, review the information in the upgraded file to make sure it all looks OK. You should be able to look at your files on both laptops at the same time to make sure the balances are all the same.

Please be advised that once the file is upgraded to Q2011, you won't be able to do the reverse & open the Q2011 file on the old laptop running Q2003. I don't know of any reason why you'd want to do that, but just want to make you aware of it.

What I've described above should leave you with two (2) copies of your Q2003 file (backups), but you're still free to create another backup, if you want.

Won't work. For anything older then Q2004, you have to go thru the intermediate step of converting to Q2004 first.

See this:

db

OK. Hopefully, you still have your Q2003 install disc, just in case something goes wrong, you'll need to reinstall it.

New plan:

1) make a backup of your Q2003 file 2) From the XP laptop, follow the link above, in danbrown's post 3) On that web page, look for the link to download Q2004 (it's in the 2nd bullet of the "What do I do" section) 4) Download Q2004 onto the XP laptop & install it 5) Open Q2004 & it should automatically upgrade your file to Q2004 6) copy the converted Q2004 file from the XP laptop to a flash drive 7) copy the file from the flash drive to the Win7 laptop 8) Open Q2011 9) Open the copied file & it should covert it to Q2011

You should still be able to do the comparison.

thanks to you both. I regularly backup my Q files by copying to an external hard drive. Would you recommend using the Quicken back-up?

When I first started researching this, I thought I had seen something about an interim upgrade to Q2004 (which I think Intuit is offering for free) before proceeding to any of the newer versions. Of course, the Intuit website discusses this in terms of buying 2014.

I am well aware of the issues that once you upgrade, the files cannot be opened under a previous version. Once upon a time, I used to upgrade Quicken fairly regularly, even if not every year! ANd yes, I do still have my Q2003 install disk! I chose to freeze my app software on the XP machine coz it was old, small (memory & hard drive) and slow; but the time has come.

Again thanks so much.

It will be a while before I migrate from the XP to Win 7 machine, but I will post a 'status' report.

Rex's Mom wrote: (all deleted; just want to post on this same thread!)

To John Pollard (especially, but also to anyone who might know)....

Is there any inherantly MAJOR difference between the Quicken files from year to year, other than perhaps a simple release indicator? I ask (only curious) because this whole thing about going through interim releases seems strange to me if all Q needs to do is update some local field. If, of course, the database really is THAT different from year to year, I suppose handing around from release to release needs to be kept to a dull roar and not have to support so many down-leveled releases.

OTOH, I would think it would be to Intuit's best interest to make migration from ANY release to the current one as easy as possible.

(But what the hell do I know? Retired from IBM software labs last year after 3 decades plus and forgot about everything computer-wise since. This is my disclaimer for dumb questions and answers in the future.)

Hi, Andrew.

YES, there IS a big difference - ONE TIME.

Most years, there is just a minor shuffling, so that Q2014 can easily read Q2011 files, for example. But there was a major change in the data file format. You've been a Quicken user long enough to remember that transition, I'm sure, Andrew.

Here's the text of the message to Mom that I drafted last week - but didn't post because DanBrown had already (on 5/22/14) posted the link with the full explanation:

The 2003-2004 transition was a one-time deal. (I forgot what year it happened and think it was much later, but 2003-2004 sounds right, so let's go with that.)

Quicken changed the long-time format of the Quicken data files. Remember when we had multiple files with extensions like .QXT, .IDX, .QEL, etc.? (For a list of which extensions were used in each year, see:

Microsoft and everybody else referred to each of those as a separate "file", and still refer to them that way. But Intuit called the whole group a single "Quicken file". Then, in that transition year, Intuit changed and combined all those files into a single much larger file with a .QDF extension. While Q2003 could read a Q2002 "file", because it recognized the whole group of related files, later Quicken versions cannot do that. So we have to use Quicken for the transition year to let it convert the multiple-file group into the single-file

That problem exists for only the one transition year. Once the conversion is made, any later Quicken should be able to read the combined .QDF file.

So, Andrew, we all need(ed) to make the one-time transition to the single-file data format. In the case of that one year, "...the database really is THAT different from year to year".

RC

-- -- R. C. White, CPA San Marcos, TX (Retired. No longer licensed to practice public accounting.) snipped-for-privacy@grandecom.net Microsoft Windows MVP (2002-2010) (Using Quicken Deluxe 2014 R 7 and Windows Live Mail in Win8.1 x64)

Rex's Mom wrote: (all deleted; just want to post on this same thread!)

To John Pollard (especially, but also to anyone who might know)....

Is there any inherantly MAJOR difference between the Quicken files from year to year, other than perhaps a simple release indicator? I ask (only curious) because this whole thing about going through interim releases seems strange to me if all Q needs to do is update some local field. If, of course, the database really is THAT different from year to year, I suppose handing around from release to release needs to be kept to a dull roar and not have to support so many down-leveled releases.

OTOH, I would think it would be to Intuit's best interest to make migration from ANY release to the current one as easy as possible.

(But what the hell do I know? Retired from IBM software labs last year after 3 decades plus and forgot about everything computer-wise since. This is my disclaimer for dumb questions and answers in the future.)

I'm not sure we've got the question answered yet.

Your link indicates that the file consolidation happened in Q 2010, much later than Q '04.

What's in the Q '04 import process that allows an '04 file to be upgraded to '14?

There are, also, occasional database layout changes, to accommodate new features or new methods of handling things.

It's MORE than just a date semaphore.

db

Rex's Mom wrote: (all deleted; just want to post on this same thread!)

To John Pollard (especially, but also to anyone who might know)....

Is there any inherantly MAJOR difference between the Quicken files from year to year, other than perhaps a simple release indicator? I ask (only curious) because this whole thing about going through interim releases seems strange to me if all Q needs to do is update some local field. If, of course, the database really is THAT different from year to year, I suppose handing around from release to release needs to be kept to a dull roar and not have to support so many down-leveled releases.

OTOH, I would think it would be to Intuit's best interest to make migration from ANY release to the current one as easy as possible.

(But what the hell do I know? Retired from IBM software labs last year after 3 decades plus and forgot about everything computer-wise since. This is my disclaimer for dumb questions and answers in the future.)

------------------------------------------

I think the way to approach the problem is to follow Intuit's advice ... as noted here:

[I think that advice already does "make migration from ANY release to the current one as easy as possible".]

Ah yes, that is true. I *do* remember that now that you bring it up. I should have as well. You might remember I kept the unofficial documentation of what all those file types were for and what they maintained and had posted it in this NG many times.

I also thank the others who also appended their thoughts as well. Good, as long as it's not a marketing decision to make people run through the hoops and is indeed a technical one, I'm happy!

(Actually, RC, like you as retired now, I'm MORE than happy!)