I had attempted this conversion many years ago but could not migrate because investment transactions such as BoughtX, SoldX and DivX were not converted correctly. Since the Mac converter has changed considerably since then, I decided to test it again.

My Windows QDF contains approximately 48,745 transactions and has investment history going back many years. Immediately before this test, I ran Super Validate on the Windows file and it completed cleanly.

I installed the current Quicken Mac version on a separate Mac and used its “Start from a Quicken for Windows file” conversion process. I supplied a duplicate of my current Windows QDF file. The conversion used Quicken Cloud and completed successfully in approximately six minutes.

The results initially looked very promising:

• All banking account balances converted correctly except for one easily identified transfer whose destination account was incorrectly assigned during conversion. Correcting that one transaction made the banking balances agree exactly.
• All credit-card balances converted to the penny.
• Investment holdings/security values generally appear to have converted correctly.
• I spot-checked several BoughtX, SoldX and DivX transactions, and those appeared to convert correctly. Quicken Mac appropriately represented an X transaction as two transactions—for example, a Buy plus the corresponding cash transfer as a "Payment/Deposit" transaction type.

However, I then discovered that the cash balances of many investment accounts were incorrect, even though these accounts have $0 cash balances in the Windows file.

For example, one T. Rowe Price investment account was $12,021.20 lower in Quicken Mac than in Quicken Windows. The securities themselves appeared correct, but Quicken Mac showed a cash balance of -$12,021.20. The Windows account correctly has a $0 cash balance.

I traced the discrepancy through the Mac transaction history and found the cause.

Some BoughtX/SoldX/DivX transactions convert correctly into the necessary pair of Mac transactions, while others convert only the investment transaction and silently omit the companion Payment/Deposit transfer transaction.

For example, a Windows BoughtX may correctly become:

Buy security
Payment/Deposit transferring the necessary cash from the other account

But for some historical BoughtX transactions, only the Buy exists after conversion. The Payment/Deposit transaction that should supply the cash is missing. The reverse can occur with SoldX transactions: the Sell exists, but the transaction transferring the proceeds to the other account is absent.

This causes the investment account’s running cash balance to become incorrect, and accounts like Money Markets, who have many transactions receiving or sending money to investment accounts, are wrong.

Unfortunately, this does not appear to be an isolated occurrence. In just one investment account, I found approximately 12 missing companion transactions during the 2005–2007 period alone. I have numerous investment accounts and decades of transaction history, making manual identification and correction impractical.

The particularly concerning aspect is that some transactions of these same types convert perfectly while others do not. Therefore, simply spot-checking BoughtX/SoldX/DivX transactions can make the conversion appear successful. I initially thought the problem had finally been resolved because my first random samples were correct.

This also makes manually repairing the converted file risky: there is no practical way with a file of this size to establish that every missing companion transfer has been identified.

The test environment was:

Source: Current Quicken Classic Premier for Windows
Source file: Approximately 48,745 transactions; Super Validate completed cleanly immediately before testing
Destination: Current Quicken Classic Premier for Mac
Conversion method: Mac “Start from a Quicken for Windows file” using Quicken Cloud
Result: Banking and credit-card conversion essentially exact; investment securities/holdings appear correct, but numerous historical X transactions are missing their companion cash-transfer transactions

For anyone considering moving a long-established investment file from Quicken Windows to Quicken Mac, I would strongly recommend comparing the cash balance of every investment account after conversion—not merely current security holdings and total values. A non-zero Mac cash balance where the Windows account has zero cash can expose these missing transfer transactions.

I have attached sanitized copies of both the original Quicken Windows data file and the converted Quicken Mac data file to the Quicken Feedback report I sent. This should allow the development team to compare the source BoughtX/SoldX/DivX transactions directly with the transactions produced by the Windows-to-Mac converter and identify why some companion transfer transactions are created while others are omitted.

I would very much like to move from Quicken Windows to Quicken Mac, but unfortunately this conversion issue makes it impractical for my data file at this time.

I have a large number of Quicken backup files that are very old, as well as more recent ones.
Can I delete those old backup files, so that I can free up space on my PC hard drive or will that cause issues with my current Quicken Premier program and recent backups?

Thank you in advance.

I have not needed to do a file restore yet. My question is: if I need to restore, will I have any problems restoring the files from the external device? I currently do not use Quicken's cloud for backup.

Thanks

[Edited-Readability]

Any ideas how to do that would be appreciated.

Quicken handles two projects with different file names (and a common admin/operator password). Both projects live at the same bank and hang out on a single PC, but otherwise share nothing as far as their data (or purpose) is concerned. This kluge solution has worked fine since 2019. "project 1" connects to file "2501". In the process of re-acquainting Intuit with the "project 1" datafile authorization (due to synchronization weirdness), I mistakenly selected (approved) the file "1976" (from "project 2") as a component of "project 1". "project 1" needs to be a free-standing entity (as does project 2). At present, "project 1" contains data elements of both "2501" and "1976". "project 2 / 1976" is seldom started up for updates. There is no known incompatible data overlap. How to extract (prune) "project 2" from the "project 1" entity and restore their separate world views? Project 2 is relatively tiny, but there may be shared common initializers. Or not. Both have been backed up to local media within the past hour and have a long backup history.

Is it as simple as closing the "1976" component of project 1 and reloading the complete 2501 dataset?

WIN Classic Business & Personal R67.10, Windows 11 Enterprise.

TIA.

oscar.

p.s. del "project 2" and reaching into the 1976 backups is a definite possibility.

TIA.

[Edited-Readability]

Example: Quicken_Data_User1.QDF and Quicken_Data_User2.QDF > Quicken_Data_User3.QDF

Wish list: Merge Accounts, Category, Bills, Income, Transactions, Securities

Does it make any sense to delete all but the final one for each year: 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025? Or maybe just keep all files in 2026?

I'm running Quicken Classic Deluxe R67.10 on Asus Laptop w Windows 11 Enterprise

Thanks for any suggestions

I had tried creating a year-end archive with file → copy or backup using the appropriate date ranges and selecting remove files, but this doesn't really do what I need it to, I think because it says "only reconciled, non-investment, non-transfer transactions will be removed" but honestly even the stuff that meets those criteria didn't get removed last time I tried it. I thought about maybe exporting the dates I want from the current file from "all accounts" and then import to a newly created file, but I'm also trying to avoid having to set up my online services all over again in the new file, and also maybe not carry over all of the accounts that are inactive. What is the recommended way to handle this?

Current version is classic deluxe, R67.10 on windows 11, but the last time I tried the archive was a while ago.

I found it in a backup from a few days ago. I don't want to just restore the full backup, because then I'll lose everything I've done in between and there's no way to track that. It's an IRA and I could just re-download it from Fidelity, but I'd rather be able to recover all the history.

Is there a way I could export the full account from the backup and then import it in my current data set?

My 1991 file does not have a qdf file as such. Starting in 1992, Quicken did use qdf files. I have a few starter questions:

How far back can my 2026 Quicken for Windows Premier convert/import files? For years before that, what tools can I use so that these years can be imported?

Any advice? Started with the oldest? Or start with the newest?

Once I have this information I will probably use Claude AI to automate the actual process as much as possible.

They said they provided support for quicken. loaded something they could control my mac and eventually after re connection to the bank accounts. They asked me for the check to be scanned and a picture sent, later to have a real check sent. The cost $599.99.

This didn't sound right and so far I have done the following. Changed the passwords on the bank access and all accounts on Quicken app. I sent a text on the bank site that the check was to be canceled as it was attached to an email.

The tech attached this on my computer:

Quicken assistance by E-Sol

TECHNICAL DEPT +1[more scam numbers](Toll Free)

WORKING TIME : 9:00 AM TO 6:00 PM EST (MONDAY TO FRIDAY)

Agent - Dipankar Ext No - 104

Manager - Rishi (107 )

and

E Solution LLC

599.99

PO BOX 493, Lakeport, California, 95453

[scam email]

For the cost and all that, they said it was the charge for fixing my computer.

I did a virus scan on the mac as well, deleted any software added and as I mentioned, changed passwords right away, both on the mac quicken and with the bank.

Thanks

Quicken Classic Deluxe

Windows 11 Home

V. R67.7