[Hidden-tech] ACT! 4 to what?

Matt Lampiasi mattl at florenceit.net
Wed Jan 18 13:30:45 EST 2006


I just did an upgrade from an older act (4.0 I think it was actually) to 
the latest version owned by Sage. In our case db corruption forced an 
upgrade because the built in db tools  wouldn't fix the problem, support 
ensured me that the next verison (6) had better tools , and they 
recommended I download the fully functional act 6, run the db repairs 
until errors were gone, then continue on to version 7 . Each step 
required a db conversion, and didn't go EXACTLY as planned, but it 
worked out. You'll certainly have issues on the custom fields if it has 
been modified, however you should be able to do field mapping for the 
custom stuff. A note that the new version is an absolute, embarrassingly 
intensive resource hog. It installs its own little sql server as well. 
On decent hardware you should be ok. Maybe you can buy act 6, and of 
course  you'll need the network license if more than one pc. Pre-sales 
support was pretty good and I can't think of any outright lies they told 
me ;). We did make it to our new version ok, stepping briefly on 6, then 
to 7 with no major problems. Fortunately we had our db errors resolved 
(don't even ask me why the customer didn't report db errors for 3 
months), and everything converted ok even templates/letters etc 
(thousands of records).

It's slower than heck though. You can download each version, copy your 
db and run sample upgrades at no charge for testing. They let you grab a 
100% functional product that expires after a while unless you buy.
If they're worried about time converting from one act to another, the 
conversion (as I'm sure you know) will take longer converting to a 
different program, which is certainly possible, but time consuming.
As you said, with only a few hundred contacts it doesn't make sense to 
have you do any sort of data conversion more complicated than an upgrade.

Jonathan Dill wrote:
>   ** Be a Good Dobee and help the group, you must be counted to post .
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>
> Greetings,
>
> I have a customer who has an ACT! 4 database--this was set up long 
> before my time, and historically, that was something that they 
> maintained on their own.  However, now they are wanting to share the 
> database and have been running into problems with ACT locking up on 
> Windows XP.  I have tried adjusting some of the OpLocks settings, but 
> that has not fixed the problem.  So, now they are asking me what to do.
>
> Does anyone have any experience with upgrading from a really old 
> version of ACT to something more current?  Is it possible to get legal 
> copies of eg. ACT 2000 instead of whatever is the latest?  How about 
> migrating from ACT to a different platform?  They only have 240 
> contacts, but it looks like there has been some customization to the 
> database at some point.  Or alternatively, recommendations of ACT 
> consultants could be helpful, although the work will be done in 
> Maryland, and I don't think they are going to want to pay for travel, 
> but working remotely may be a possibility.
>
> I'm guessing with 240 contacts and a limited budget for this, they 
> might just end up re-entering the data into a new system, unless an 
> upgrade to a newer version of ACT may work seamlessly.
>
> Another (ugly!) idea is to put ACT 4 on a box which is running Windows 
> 2000 Server and run Terminal Server in Application mode to run ACT, 
> but I am not sure if TS CALs for Windows 2000 Server are still 
> available, and they only have the 2 admin CALs that come with W2KS.
>
> Thanks,
> Jonathan Dill
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-- 
Thanks,

Matt Lampiasi, President
413-303-9167 or http://florenceit.net
Florence I.T. - A Community I.T. shop.





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