Problems importing Quicken 2007 Mac data file

Henry Benson

Hi,

I'm trying to import a Quicken 2007 data file into Quicken 2019 (Mac, Premier, V5.12.3). I go to "File->New" and select "Start from a Quicken for Mac 2007 file". I no longer have Quicken 2007 so am not able to open the file to do any updates as the screen suggests. The file was last touched in 2007 and was up to date at the time.

The first time I tried the import I got a "Cannot import due to errors in the data file" (or something like that, sorry, didn't save it). No other information was provided. Undaunted, I quit Quicken, relaunched, and tried again. The second time, it crashed. The third time, it gets through the first screen, asks me about mobile setup, I said No, and hit next, and I get an error, "Data files from Quicken 2004 and earlier are not supported. Open your file in Quicken 2007 first."

I could be wrong but I believe this is a Quicken 2007 file. Info on the Mac says "Quicken 2007 Data".

Suggestions on where to go from here would be welcome. I don't need to manipulate the data, don't care if categories etc. are wrong, all I need to do is look at the registers in a couple of checking and credit card accounts. I'd try opening it in Q2007 first, if I can get a copy from somewhere. I'm also a unix/linux geek so I don't mind command line stuff if that'll get me anywhere.

Thanks!
Henry

smayer97

Sounds like the data file has some issues. If you are certain that the file is from QM2007 and not QM2004 and earlier, the only available known ways to try to fix it before import requires you to use QM2007 to either rebuild the indexes or have QM2007 create a cleaned up copy of the data file. There is no other known way.

smayer97

Glad to see that the Save a copy option worked for you.

BTW, the reason is that in using that feature, Quicken actually recreates the entire data file and cleans up internal errors, which then enable the migration to work more effectively.

smayer97

A copy of QM2007 PPC version (v16.0.x) will also still read a QM2004 data file (and much older too). It runs on Snow Leopard or earlier.

smayer97

Sounds like the data file has some issues. If you are certain that the file is from QM2007 and not QM2004 and earlier, the only available known ways to try to fix it before import requires you to use QM2007 to either rebuild the indexes or have QM2007 create a cleaned up copy of the data file. There is no other known way.

jimbaltar

I finally got my QM2007 file to convert. I talked to support. I don't remember all the steps but it involved saving a copy to the QM2007 file to the desktop. He didn't know why it worked, but it did. Call Support and ask for the rep that handled my case - Case Number: 7041187.
Good Luck. I've been using Quicken since 1998.

smayer97

Glad to see that the Save a copy option worked for you.

BTW, the reason is that in using that feature, Quicken actually recreates the entire data file and cleans up internal errors, which then enable the migration to work more effectively.

jacobs

@smayer97 You misread. He didn't use "Save A Copy" (the command in Quicken 2007), he saved a copy to the desktop. If you re-read the original post, the problem was that he doesn't have Quicken 2007 to try Save a Copy. (It's possible the support agent had him extract the data portion for the Quicken 2007 data file package, a process which has been know to work in some instances if there's something about the package preventing it from being opened by Quicken 2019.) In any case, @jimbaltar, I'm glad you were able to get it to work, and best wishes for getting used to the new world of Quicken 2019.

Henry Benson

Hi, I'm the OP. I was able to get a copy of Quicken 2007 and tried to open my data file. Unfortunately it errors with "Data files from Quicken 2004 and earlier are not supported" and doesn't load the file. So I guess my original file was from Q2004 not Q2007, even though MacOS identifies it as a Q2007 data file. It's also surprising that Q2007 can't open a Q2004 data file! But obviously that won't be addressed at this time.

I think I'm going to give up at this point. I appreciate all of your help and suggestions.

jacobs

Henry, I’m sorry you’re still blocked.

The *original* version of Quicken 2007 — the pre-Lion operating system version — could read older file formats, I believe; when they updated it to be able to run on Lion OS, they limited the range. 

So you now face the more daunting prospect of finding a harder-to-find copy of Quicken 2005 or 2006 AND a computer which runs the Snow Leopard (or earlier) operating system. So it’s possible, but the effort it would take may not be worth it. Sorry!

smayer97

A copy of QM2007 PPC version (v16.0.x) will also still read a QM2004 data file (and much older too). It runs on Snow Leopard or earlier.

Henry Benson

Thanks again for the advice! That's too daunting a task. :-) I was able to get most of what I needed (restaurants and sites visited on a vacation, FWIW) by poking at the data file using the unix 'strings' and 'hexdump' commands.

Technical details for anyone who cares:
The actual data file is Contents/Data File (note the space) under the top level directory.
strings "Data File" will display the payee and memo along with some other stuff.

Then look at the data with 'hexdump -C'. For example:
000bf880 00 00 10 a1 00 00 00 b8 1f 00 00 b8 1f 00 07 d3 |................|
000bf890 04 15 ff ff f9 e3 08 7a 00 00 08 d0 03 02 00 00 |.......z........|
000bf8a0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................|
000bf8b0 00 53 68 65 6c 6c 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |.Shell..........|
000bf8c0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................|
000bf8d0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 47 61 73 00 00 00 00 |.........Gas....|
000bf8e0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................|

"Shell" is the payee, "Gas" is the memo. I guess the other fields are encoded somehow. I knew this was in April so I looked for an "04", and I see it two lines up and one byte over (33 bytes) from the Payee. The next byte over is the day, in hex. I confirmed this by looking at other nearby purchases. So I bought gas from Shell on April 21. That was all I needed so I stopped there.

Hopefully that helps somebody with something...
Henry