Newbie Had To Restore Computer - really needs help..

I do have a folder called BACKUP and in there there are files idx.qel.qph,qtx and another that says Quicken QDF data file BUT they are not the most recent files - that is the problem! And then there is something called Q04files but that also does not seem to be recent. These are all on my E drive (external Maxtor). I use Windows XP and there seems to be nothing on the C drive except for the Quicken program 2006. I did last month's books on the C drive and everything seemed successful that they were on that drive.... T

"Terri" wrote in news:ne6dnREprrPRtAzbnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:

I general it is a good idea to separate data files from program files.

If you copy all those just found file sets (all those extensions!) to a new directory, you should be all set.

Do a rename of those copied files; for example to ter0707.* . This leaves 1 more character for the added number added to the backupped files before you exceed the 8 character limit of the old DOS).

Now make a shortcut to the renamed qdf file. Then set Quicken to:

Prompt for a backup each time you close Quicken.

Set the path to the backup file to whatever you want (I use the default which is the BACKUP subdirectory in the directory where the qdf file is). That means there will be a new subdirectory in that new directory where you just copied and renamed your newly found April files.

Use some utility such as Karen's Replicator to dail make another backup of your most recent data set to a totally different drive, using the option to make a new directory each time, named with the date in the directory name. I believe that Quicken now may be able to do something like that, but my setup is rather old.

HTH

Hi, Han.

Yes, there certainly should be. I've been reading all the posts since my original reply to Terri and her first reply to that, and I'm surprised that nobody else mentioned that missing space. I suppose I should have made it clear in the first place, but I forget that some folks haven't been using personal computers as long as me. ;^}

Now I'd better go back up-thread and see if I can get things back on track.

RC

Hi, Terri.

As others have pointed out, my instructions were not as clear as I thought they were. I forget that most computer users today did not grow up on MS-DOS. Let's try again...

The command to search all of Drive C: for .qdf files would be: "dir C:\*.qdf /s/a"

Don't type the quotation marks, of course. There should be spaces after "dir" and after "C:\*.qdf", and nowhere else, except that a space between "/s" and "/a" is optional. The asterisk (*) is a "wild card" that stands for ANY filename. So it could be "QDATA.qdf" or "Terri.qdf" or "MyData.qdf" or any other name of your choice. (QDATA is Quicken's default filename, but most of us change it for our own files.)

From some of your other replies...

nor Qdata with numbers...

You would use "dir e:\*.qdf /s/a" to do the search on Drive E:. And, as Laura pointed out, you probably won't see any "QDATA1" files. But if YOUR file is named "Terri.qdf", then you should find "Terri1.qdf" and some other "Terri1.*" files, plus probably sets named "Terri2.*", "Terri3.*", etc.

I don't know what that might be. Perhaps it is not related to Quicken at all, but just similarly named.

Laura asked in one reply:

not, then something is not correct with your search query.

She is correct. If you did the "dir..." search correctly, the BACKUP folder should show up, with the default five SETS of backup files > I do have a folder called BACKUP and in there there are files

idx.qel.qph,qtx and another that says Quicken QDF data file BUT they are not the most recent files - that is the problem! And then there is something called Q04files but that also does not seem to be recent. These are all on my E drive (external Maxtor). I use Windows XP and there seems to be nothing on the C drive except for the Quicken program 2006. I did last month's books on the C drive and everything seemed successful that they were on that drive....

The Q04files folder holds YOUR data files from the time you upgraded FROM Quicken 2004 - probably to Quicken 2006. Check the dates of the folder creation and the files in that folder. They should all be the same date, and that should be the date that you installed Quicken 2006. By now, of course, they are hopelessly out of date, and you should be able to find much newer versions. When your current problem is solved and you know you won't need those files again, you probably will want to delete that whole folder.

The "idx.qel.qph,qtx" files are really "Terri.idx", "Terri.qel", "Terri.qph" and "Terri.qtx", right? (Actually, you've never told us the name that you use for YOUR data files, so I'm just using "Terri" as an example. Whatever name YOU chose will be combined with those extensions.) You didn't mention the "Terri.qdf" files, but of course there should be one of those, too, for each of the sets.

In that folder, the "Terri5" set should be the oldest and "Terri1" should be your most recent. It SHOULD be no more than a week old, or at least, no more than a week before this problem started.

keep that in Program Files??

You'll get different answers from different experts on this question, Terri. As Han said, it's a good idea to keep DATA files separate from the executable application files. By default, Quicken installs qw.exe and the other program files into C:\Program Files\Quicken folder, then puts your data files into the same folder, but you can change your data folder that to any folder on any drive in your computer - and probably should. Quicken will create the automatic BACKUP folder as a subfolder in that data folder.

RC

OK - the best I could do was to restore to the end of April for two accounts and way back to Sept 2006 for the third....

Now - one more silly question. When I go to Quicken and go to File-Open it takes me to my external hard drive when I want it to go right to the folder I made in My Docments on the C Drive. How do I get Quickn to recognize the C drive when I go to Open.

I want to thank you all for your help - you were all wonderful. I think at this juncture I am better of re-doing a month rather than spending even more time trying to restore it.

Anxiously awaiting a reply regarding the File-Open problem! Terri

My entire Home Inventory is gone - any way to get this back???? Every expense from my home was in there.... T

"Terri" wrote in news:QeqdnS9J2tM87gzbnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:

IMHO (in my humble opinion), that is best done from within Quicken so that the whole shebang of files gets renamed or copied to a new file name.

"Terri" wrote in news:7YOdnY9hlPvg6QzbnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:

Wasn't the home inventory a different extension from all the other quicken files, and really dating back to Q2000 or so?

Han wrote in news:Xns9967CAC829B77ikkezelf@199.45.49.11:

And, to repeat myself, it is really best to make a shortcut to the file with the qdf exoension that you want to use. For instance I have 2 shortcuts to the 2 Quicken files I use most often (our own stuff, and "books" for a charitable association).

Keep your program in C:\Program Files. You can keep your data files anywhere on your hard drive you want. My preference is to keep ALL data files I create in My Documents. This makes for easy backups.

Just select File>>Open and then click on the My Documents icon on the left side of the Open Q file window. You basically just navigate to the exact location of your files.

As for renaming your files, select File>>File operations and select Rename, select the file to be renamed and follow the prompts.

That might be correct but it still will be in the same location as the QDF file.

Home inventory is actually a totally separate application from Quicken - despite the fact that there is some limited communication between the two.

Your home inventory file was never backed up when you did a regular Quicken backup ... if you wanted your home inventory file backed up, you had to initiate that backup while you wer in the Home Inventory application (it always reminded you to do so when you exited Home Inventory).

Not only is the Home Inventory file not backed up when you do a Quicken backup, but it also has no other relationship to your Quicken data. It has a different file name (default=QHI.IDB) than any of your regular Quicken data files. It will continue to reside in the same directory (folder) as your Quicken

*application* unless you tell Home Inventory to put it elsewhere. And if you chose to backup your Quicken home inventory file ... only you know where you put it (though it would still have the ".idb" extension, unless you also changed that).

If you never backed up (or renamed) your Home Inventory file, it most likely still resides in the folder where you originally installed Quicken, and will still be named QHI.IDB.

R.C. - I thought so too when I first read your original postt, but tried without the space, and it worked for me. Me thinks that the '/' is a delimiter between the 'f' and the switch 's'.

R.C. or Han, did either of you try it (START-->PROGRAMS-->COMMAND) this way without the space?

--------------------------------------------- Regards -

- Andrew

I just did and it works the same way as run>>cmd. You end up at the same spot in dos.