I am using Quicken 2006 Deluxe. I use it on my desktop computer running under Vista. I would also like to use it on my laptop computer (with Win XP-home edition) when I go on vacation this summer. What is the best way to copy or impory files from one computer to another, especially considering that one will be under Vista and the other will be under XP?
Quicken will have to be installed on each computer, of course, but the data files should transfer seamlessly between Vista and WinXP. Use any convenient transfer media (a USB flash drive might be best) to get the data files from the folder on one computer to the other.
Just remember that what Quicken calls a "file" is actually a set of related files, which we often call the Quicken "fileset". This means the MaryL.qdf and any other MaryL.* files (or QDATA or whatever name you've chosen). If you use Windows' Copy command or other such "generic" tools, you'll need to remember to include the full fileset. Quicken will automatically handle all of them as a single Quicken "file".
So, just use Quicken's Copy (or Backup) command on one computer to put your up-to-the-minute Quicken file onto the flash drive. Then on the other computer, use Quicken's File | Open (if you used Copy) or File | Restore Backup File (if you used Backup) to load that file. Use the reverse procedure to go back to the first computer, being SURE that the file you are moving back is up to date with ALL transactions during the interim.
If this is a one-time or infrequent transition between the two computers, it's probably best to copy the files from one HD to the flash drive, then from the flash drive to the other HD (and back again later). But if you will be swapping between the computers several times, it may be more convenient to operate from data files on the flash drive, making sure that each HD has a current backup updated after each swap.
Caveat: I haven't actually done this, since I have only one computer. (I do keep at least one backup on a flash drive.) But others here should be able to point out anything I've overlooked.
"R. C. White" wrote in news:qKudncpkZ5sZEbDVnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@posted.grandecom:
RC's procedure works fine. I use computer A (under Vista Home Basic) regularly, and back up semiautomatically (wired network) to a directory on an external drive on another computer. If I rename and copy those backup files (all of them), I can just run the file set on the other computer.
Thanks, RC and Han. I have obviously done something wrong. I used the backup method that RC listed because I am very unsure about how to copy files into programs under Vista. It is simple under XP, but Vista "frowns" on copying files into the All Programs area. I do keep my backups in separate directories -- a backup folder on the primary hard disk (drive C:\) and also on alternate external hard disks.
I backed up to a flash drive from Quicken on my desktop computer. When I tried to use backup restore on the laptop, Quicken reported that some files were missing. Next, I used backup from the laptop to try to restore to my desktop (all data was correct, so this was not going to cause me to lose anything). Same thing! Quicken reported that some files were missing. And yet...I was using Quicken's own backup procedure.
I am using Quicken 2006 Deluxe -- Vista on the desktop and XP-Home edition on the laptop.
A couple of points. First off, you don't "copy files into programs". Secondly, why do you insist on putting your data (your Quicken database) where the code (the Quicken program) is? Thirdly, how exactly did that "frown" manifest itself?
How, exactly, did you do this "backup"?
What, exactly, did Quicken report? Not your rendition but the actual words!
(Why is it that people insist on paraphrasing the messages they are given? What they just like to introduce a extra party or misinterpretation? Or is it that they enjoy having us guess?)
Huh?!? Didn't you just get through saying that Quicken reported that there were files missing?!? But you went onward anyway?!? Or is this some other backup?
Yes. First explain exactly what you are doing, every step, every error message. Don't invent stuff, interpret stuff or abbreviate stuff, OK?
You do know that even when you create a Quicken backup there are multiple files involved. My guess is, and guess is what I need to do, that you created a backup and then copied only some of the files there. That would be in keeping with Quicken's message that there are files missing.
"MaryL" wrote in news:482f105e$0$4044$ snipped-for-privacy@news.suddenlink.net:
I do agree with Andrew DeFaria that your description is imprecise. That hinders our helping you .
I have gone either way at different times, using the backup function from within Quicken (either 2006, 2007-trial, or 2008): desktop with XP Pro --> laptop with Vista Home Basic or laptop with Vista Home Basic --> desktop with XP Pro
in either case I have specifically backup to a location well allowed by the operating system, and specified as a backup folder. Files were always identified by a date suffix (MyData2008-05-17, or some such name). Then files were copied using Windows Explorer to a data folder (usually one branch "up" from the Backup folder, but not necessarily), and renamed to make it more intelligable (but probably only to me!). Then the other computer's Quicken was started (same year's version, fully updated) by double clicking the qdf file from that computer. That has always worked without any error messages, at least for me.
Here are the steps I took: While in Quicken (checking account, using QDATA.QDF), I backed up (not copied), as follows: Ctrl-B > L:\Quicken Backup. Drive L is a Memorex thumb drive. I have a folder on that drive named Quicken Backup. Using this method, files have always backed up to the folder. I never restored until this attempt, so I can't guarantee that they are correct. Numerous backups were in the folder, so I deleted all of them and started over again when I encountered this problem. The following filenames were listed (each one with an underscore and the date plus the number 17 before the three-letter extension): QDATA.QDF, QDATA.QEL, QDATA.QPH, QDATA.IDX. Thus, the files were QDATA_20080517.QDF and similar filenames for the other files.
I notice when I open Quicken on the desktop, the name is simply QDATA.QDF where I am asked for my password. However, when I open Quicken on the laptop, the name is QDATA followed by an underscore and the date plus what appears to be a backup number, thus: QDATA_20080517.QDF.
First, I backed up from Drive C on the desktop computer to Drive L and then attempted to restore to the laptop, as follows: From within Quicken on the laptop, I selected File > Restore Backup File. I selected E:\Quicken Backup\QDATA_20080517. (There was a number 1 followed by a space immediately to the left of the name.) Drive E, of course, is the drive letter where the same thumb drive is placed on the laptop computer.
Instead of installing, this error message appeared: "One or more backup files is missing."
I tried this several times, with the same result.
Next, I decided to try the process in reverse to see if I would get the same error message from my desktop. That is, I deleted everything on Drive E, then backed up from the laptop to Drive E (using exactly the same procedure as shown above). When I used File > Restore Backup File from within Quicken on the desktop, I received the identical error message: "One or more backup files is missing."
I have not used the copy command to move the files. However, I do regularly backup (using CTRL-B) to different disks so that I would not lose all my data if something were to happen to one of the disks.
After I saw your most recent message, I double-clicked on the qdf file
*directly from the thumb drive.* That seems to have copied/restored everything into the Quicken program on the laptop.
Do you have any idea what I am doing wrong when I when using the Restore Backup File command? Is double-clicking on the qdf file directly from the USB drive really a correct way to do this? (That is, I had used My Computer to access files on the thumb drive and double-clicked on the qdf file at that time.)
"MaryL" wrote in news:482f5b26$0$4066$ snipped-for-privacy@news.suddenlink.net:
I must admit that I only tried once to do the "restore" and it didn't work (I don't remember the error message). After that I have always done almost the same as what you describe in the quoted portion, except:
I always select the files that comprise the full backup set in My Computer under Z:/.../.../Backup/XXXX_20080517.QDF. This is the external drive on my desktop, and XXXX is the name I give here to the full set. In my case the full file set includes the extensions IDX, NPC, QDF, QEL, QTX and QPH. Since I haven't used the tax-related export since March
2006, the QTX file is old (!!), and probably totally irrelevant, as is perhaps the NPC file. After selecting these files I copy and paste them into the working directory of the laptop (NOT the backup directory), and rename each of them to YYYYY.ext (so I delete both the underscore and the date suffix). Then I launch the resulting file set by doubleclicking on the relevant QDF.
Instead of XXXXX and YYYYY I use other, more descriptive names, but I limit them to no more than 7 characters, with the last one NOT a number, so that Quicken can make the automatic backups and can add a trailing digit to it that is easily seen. These automatic backups go in the backup directory under the working directory. If you keep launching the latest backup, and let Quicken make its automaic backups, you pretty soon will have a directory path like D:/.../Backup/Backup/Backup/Backup/Backup/Backup/Backup/ with files in each of them that look the same.
dialog box that says "File restored successfully. Open the file by choosing Open from the File Menu."
What just went on here? Well Intuit, in it's effort to make backups more reliable, have introduced concepts and the like that inevitably make things more complicated than necessary, all in the effort to spare people from learning or understanding what a file system is or how it operates. This File: Restore from Backup merely copied the fileset of QDATA_20080517.* from C:\Backup to wherever you happen to store your Quicken database. For example, if I now select File: Open, I see no only my normal Quicken database (named Home) but the copied backup set, i.e. Home_20080517. The difference between the two Quicken databases? One has an extra deposit for $0.01.
So I could open Home_20080517, inspect it and if I deemed it OK, I could do File: File Operations: Delete to delete my old Home Quicken database then probably File: File Operations: Rename to rename Home_20080517 -> Home.
No, it opened the Quicken database residing on the thumb drive. As I said, there's really no difference between an active Quicken database and a backed up one.
Let's get the backup and restore thing working from one machine before we introduce thumb drives and multiple machines...
Again, you just opened a Quicken database that resided on a thumb drive. It really has little to do with copying Quicken databases from one computer to another.
Question of curiosity however: Can you open this Quicken database from the laptop? From the desktop?
Andrew DeFaria wrote in news:482f8084$0$87067$ snipped-for-privacy@news.qwest.net:
Now I am confused. Making a backup from within Quicken now has generated duplicate files with the same time stamp and also with filenames Qdata_20080517 in both the original Qdata data directory and in the newly made Backuptest directory, at least after the (succesful) restore. So Restore just makes a copy of the backup file set in the original data directory, and you would have to rename the file set to get the original filenames back. Hmm. That may increase safety, but also confusion. Let me go and undo this and stick with my "manual" system.
That statement's kinda hard to parse for me. Note that when I say timestamp in relation to a file system, I don't mean part of a filename. Note that Quicken's backup command cannot generate duplicate files. For example, you can select File: Backup and write a Quicken database named QDATA_20080517 in say C:\Backup. If you then do that same action again you will overwrite the files in C:\Backup. You could, for example, create C:\Backup1, C:\Backup2..., C:\Backup3 and and make 3 separate copies of your live Quicken database into these three backup directories all named QDATA_20080517,.*. IOW the whole, absolute path file name must be unique.
That was my direct experience. What was yours? I mean try it out. Then you'll know. It only took me a few minutes to try.
Agreed.
There is nothing really magical about the Quicken "file" system (and I use the term file here deliberately) except to say that it's really a database system. Databases tend to be a collection of files that are related and must always be dealt with as a whole. If Intuit didn't keep referring to Quicken databases as a Quicken "file" then perhaps confusion would be reduced. In general, if your Quicken database's name is QDATA then the set of files involved in that database is QDATA.*. Alas though the neophyte computer users today don't even know what an extension is let alone the wild card of "*" standing in for any and all characters after the final dot.
Note, the exception I've just noticed with the rule that your Quicken database is
Andrew DeFaria wrote in news:482f8c55$0$89384$ snipped-for-privacy@news.qwest.net:
Sorry it wasn't clear. I did 2 things before looking at te contents of directories: Backup and restore. Of course the backup file set was like QDATA_20080517.*. My confusion came when the restored database was also QDATA_20080517.*. And it came into the original data directory where there was before my operations only the set of files Qdata.*. My suggestion would be to make them appear in a Restore directory, so as not to jumble up the original data directory with many new, restored datasets. Also, an option to overwrite the original with the restored, keeping the name of the original would be handy, IMO. That used to be the way restore worked a number of versions ago, and silly me, I expected the overwrite (with a question of overwrite or new file name during the restore process. Why did that option get discarded?).
I did and my results confused me. see above for a more in depth explanation.
Yes, I continually run into this at work, where silly me is supposed to correct others' mistakes and give "advice". Of course no ione understands me, really, and I am getting tired of explaining ...
I did lose attachments in copying my database. It is really STOOPID that during backup and restore, the old attachments from many versions ago, and now again since 2006, are not copied. The in-database references to them seem to be, because I get "attachment not found" type errors.
Sorry I did not look at this again. I am familiar with these terms etc, I think. Is you old site still up, because I alwaysthought there was a wealth of relevant info there.
This is consistent with the way restores have always worked, in Quicken and with all other restores I have dealt with.
I think Andrew already answered this.
I'd add that I don't think creating yet another directory to hold restored, but not renamed, files would be a net benefit. I think it would add even more confusion.
I think you misunderstood the option, or the conditions that triggered it: the option is still present. One file "overwrites" a second file when it has the same name as the second file. As I mentioned above, a restore, copies the backup file to the folder you designate and gives the copied file the same name as the backup file name. If a file with such a name already exists, then you get the option to overwrite.
So if you "restore" from a backup file named QDATA_20080517, the restored file will have the name QDATA_20080517 ... and no overwrite would occur unless you already had a file named QDATA_20080517 in the folder in which the restore was directed to copy the backup.
Intuit would have had to alter traditional restore procedures to produce the result you want.
Please note that Quicken is consistent: it treats its own "automatic" backups the same way as its date-suffixed user-created backups. If you restore from BACKUP\QDATA1.QDF, that restore will not offer to "overwrite" QDATA.QDF. I don't recall anyone complaining about this treatment of the automatic backup files.
I don't find Quicken's treatment of the date-suffixed backup files confusing, but I don't find those files provide any useful benefits for me either ... and actually they make a lot more work for me.
And for unsophisticated users, the evidence continues to indicate they clearly pose problems.
Then you haven't worked with many backup/restore programs.
The whole concept of "restored" here in this Quicken example is foolish. There is no restore happening, there's simply a copying of data. Most restore processes archive, compress or otherwise change the storage format of what they are backing up. Take ntbackup for example. You can use it to back up your whole computer - I do so nightly. What you'll get on the other end is one large file, which is hardly the same as the original files.
The Quicken backup process just copies the files from one place to the other and optionally tacks on a data. Whop T do! The restore does the copy in the other direction without adding a date. And, of course, the tiny bit of smarts if you happen to be overwriting an already existing database.
Intuit doesn't have a traditional backup to start with! Hell Intuit doesn't even have a traditional database to start with rather a home grown one that does nobody, save Intuit, any good.
Indeed. It's not hard to understand with a little poking around. Your data, however, all of your data that is, is important and you should back up all of it. I do, every night, everything on my PC. I also let Quicken create it's automatic backups as well as backup periodically when Quicken asks. This way I have a history of backups to try should something go terribly wrong.
Unsophisticated users will always be confused no matter what you do. Ignore them! They are that 20% rat hole you can poor all of your development money into.
I'm not sure the number matters, but there have been quite a few over the years.
Seems to me you're interchanging the terms "backup" and "restore". "Restore" would "de-compress" the data if the "backup" had "compressed" it.
But that has nothing to do with the comments I made. My contention is that both backups and restores are essentially logical "copies" of the data (so a "restored" file should be an exact duplicate of the file originally backed up), and that the "backup" file name, is the name given to the "restored" file ... regardless of whether there was any data compression utilized in the backup.
Logically: you have exact copies of all the original files. It may look like one file to Windows, but for all intents and purposes, it's multiple files to the backup/restore software.
For purposes of my comments in this discussion, it would make no difference at all if the Quicken backups were compressed: when the backup is restored, the restored file: a.) is an exact copy of the originally backed up file (assuming you've never opened the backup, and it has not been corrupted); and b.) has the exact same name as the backup file name.
That is true for every backup/restore in my experience.
One of the reasons I don't care for the Quicken date-suffix option is the type of problems that have been reported by users employing it ... without any significant benefit; since as you have noted, the date a file was created, and the date it was modified, are already easily available. If you ask Quicken to "Find Quicken Files", it will list all your Quicken data (QDF) files (including backups, if desired) with their date/time stamps. You can get the same info from Windows Explorer, where you can also sort the results by date/time.
But that's the point - there is no difference between a backed up Quicken database and a regular Quicken database.
But you see that's the whole point that I was making that you seem to miss. It's not that they are 'logical" copies of the data rather they are *exact* copies of each other. No other backup software that I know does that - none.
No, *actually* you have exact copies of the original files in the case of Quicken and not in the case of ntbackup and that's the point I was making.
Again, this is totally different and in keeping with how most backup software or functionality works. Quicken's the odd ball here.
No, every backup restore software changes the format of the original files into another format. Logically it can recreate the original. In Quicken's process a mere exact copy is done. That's the odd ball.
Yes, somebody needs to be hired by Intuit who understands file systems, database systems and the like.
A.) You are wrong. B.) You didn't even address what I said. Your claim does not matter to the concept of "backup" and the concept of "restore" A backup is no less a backup just because it is an exact physical copy of the original file. And a restore is no less a restore just because the backup file is an exact physical copy of the original file.
This is the end of my participation in this discussion; it no longer has any bearing on the original theme, nor any interest to me.
When attempting to explain it to people who barely grasp the concept in the first place - it sure does matter. When attempting to find space for a backup - it matters. Don't be dense.
I can show you several examples of backups in which backup software changes the format of the data from it's original form into some other form. I can only show you one example where this doesn't happen (Quicken). Give that, how the hell can you say I'm wrong?
I wasn't aiming to!
No it matters to the concept of people and their understanding.
So what. That's not what I was talking about. I was merely saying that Quicken's backup is, unlike all other backup software that I've encountered in my 30 years in the business, just a copy of the original data. It was just a statement, intended to explain what's going on. Why you trounced in and got all bent out of shape is a mystery.
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