Entering transactions is very slow after a Quicken update

wrb · February 5

I am running Quicken Classic Business and Personal on Windows. I just updated Quicken to the latest update (Version - R60.20, Build 27.1.60.20). After an update to Quicken, entering transactions take a very long time - over 30 seconds per transaction. This has been occurring for the past year, or so. My file is very large, as it contains everything since I created a new file in 1990. I do not wish to downsize the file.

The transaction slowness starts after the Quicken update is done, and ends a couple of days later. Normally, it takes about 5 seconds for Quicken to process a transaction. When a Quicken update is done it can take 30-45 seconds. Then 2-3 days later transaction updates go back to about 5 seconds.

Has anyone seen this? Is there a maintenance function that can be performed on the Quicken database file, such as, balancing the binary tree in the database?

Thanks.

RalphC · February 5

I am not experiencing any latency in downloads using the latest software update release. I would suspect a data file corruption issue. My first troubleshooting step would be to validate and super validate the data file.

Quicken Jasmine · February 5

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20475056#Comment_20475056

Hello @wrb,

Thanks for bringing this information to our attention. You can review the instructions below if needed to follow @RalphC's suggestion! It is recommended to save a backup before proceeding.

Validate:

File
Validate and Repair File...
Validate File
Click OK
Close the Data Log
Close Quicken (leave it closed for at least 5 secs)
Reopen Quicken and see if the issue persists.

If the issue persists, proceed to Super Validate. If the issue is resolved after performing validation, then please disregard the instructions to Super Validate.

Super Validate:

File
Hold CTRL + Shift and click Validate and Repair File...
Super Validate File
Click OK
Close the Data Log
Close Quicken (leave it closed for at least 5 secs)
Reopen Quicken and see if the issue persists.

Let us know how it goes!

wrb · February 8

RalphC - This update issue has been happening for over a year. I just now decided to take time to report it.

jd45 · February 10

I am seeing this same problem with entering transactions after the last update. I have run supervalidation and no improvement. Hope this improves over the next few days, but why is this happening?

UKR · February 10

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20475801#Comment_20475801

Does this slowness issue apply to storing transactions in banking account registers or investment account registers?

Please provide more details about your Quicken data file.
I'd like to know if you have account registers where a single account is approaching or exceeding 16,000 transactions.
What is the file size, in KB, as shown by Windows File Explorer?
And I'd also like to see the "File Information" window (See below)
Is any cloud backup software (Dropbox, MS OneDrive, etc.) actively accessing your Quicken data file while Quicken is running?
What is the complete path and file name of your Quicken data file (e.g. C:\Users\username\Documents\Quicken\QDATA.QDF)?

How much total RAM do you have installed?
How much of the available RAM is in use after Quicken has started? Windows Task Manager will give you this information. 80% or higher?
What version of Windows are you running?

About file size and number of transactions:
You can find out how many transactions you have in your data file by doing this:

Click Tools / Account List. This should tell you how many transactions you have in each of your accounts in an optional column, "# of Transactions".
If this column is not shown in the Account List, click the Options button at the bottom of the Account List window, then click "Number of Transactions" to add the column.
To obtain File Information: Click Help in the Menu Bar. Shift+click About Quicken and it'll give you a File Information box. Please capture an image snapshot of this File Information box and attach it here.
The Windows Snipping Tool can be used to capture a partial screen image and save it to a file of file type PNG or JPG only.
To attach the image here please review
How do I post a screenshot in the community from a mac
How do I post a screenshot in the community from windows

Quicken Jasmine · February 13

Hello @wrb and @jd45,

Are you still needing assistance?

Let us know!

wrb · February 15

Jasmine, UKR,

Sorry for the wait, I do transaction updates weekly.

I just updated to the new version of Quicken (R61.17, Build 27.1.61.17), and transaction updates are taking over 20 seconds. To be clear, this is when I accept a transaction that has been downloaded, or enter a manual transaction.

When this happens, it gets better after a few days. I have not seen a reason why transaction updates take a long time following a Quicken update, and then gets better.

I have Validated and Super-validate the file with no improvement.

Regarding UKR requests, some of the information contains sensitive information, so I will provide redacted information:

The slowness impacts pretty much all registers.

The register with the most transactions contains about 6800.

The Quicken data file is 253000 KB in size. It is in a special directory reserved for Quicken on the C: drive, which is solid state.

I do not store and information in a cloud service, except for what Quicken does behind the scenes, that I cannot turn off (but would like to).

I have attached a snippet of the File Information pop-up.

I am running Windows 10 Pro.

Thanks

UKR · February 16

Thanks for the File Information.
As far as slowness entering transactions is concerned …

Are banking transactions slow?
This might be caused by the large number of Categories you have.
How many category levels deep do you nest subcategories (the maximum is 16 levels)?
For every transaction you add, change or delete, Quicken has to calculate rollup totals thru all the levels, from the sub-sub-sub-…-category up, level by level until the highest level is reached at Income or Expense. That takes time.
Where possible, consider reducing subcategory levels. Consider deleting unused categories.

To a lesser extent, reducing the number of entries in the Memorized Payee List might help speed things up a bit.
To trim the list and keep it in shape please do this:
In Edit / Preferences / Data Entry and Quickfill make sure you have a checkmark at
[√] "Remove memorized payees not used in [xx] months"
and set [xx] to something like "18". Do not set it to zero. IMHO, you should set the number to 12 or higher for best results, so that once-a-year payees don't vanish.
Restart Quicken for the change to take effect and housekeeping to clean up the Memorized Payee List.
Check the File Information box again to see the reduced count.

Are investment transactions slow?
You have over 6000 securities on file.
How many of those do you actually currently own?
How many of those have you not owned for a number of years?

If you're an active trader and/or your current investment account has many transactions pertaining to sold and no longer held securities you may want to consider this:
Archive Investment Transactions
For a couple of years now, a new function has been available in Quicken, Archive Transactions. It will split your investment account register into two parts, leaving only those securities' transactions where you currently hold >0 shares in the active register. The rest is moved to a new Archive register within the current data file.
Having less transactions in your active register might improve performance.
Please read and carefully follow instructions here: How To Archive Investment Transactions To Improve Performance
Eventually, after a couple of years, you might consider splitting your data file in two, with all the archived investment transactions moving to an archive data file and none remaining in the active data file.
For correct historical reporting remember to add the new archive register to your report selections.

wrb · February 17

Hi UKR,

Thanks for getting back to me. Your advice is very helpful, but it does not explain why transaction updates take 20-30 seconds after a Quicken application update, but then go back to <5 seconds after a couple of days.

For example, starting this morning, inputting or accepting downloaded transaction is now taking <5 seconds, when on Saturday and Sunday, they would take >20 seconds.

This is the issue I am trying to solve.

Thanks again.

UKR · February 18

Over the weekend, what other programs were running while you were trying to work with Quicken?
- Harddisk Defrag?
- Antivirus full system scan?
- Full system backup?
- Windows System Update (download and install)?
- Other CPU or harddisk I/O-intensive programs?

Any of the above typically will make my system run like Monday morning rush hour traffic on the freeway: S.l.o.w.

wrb · February 19

Nope, I only use this pc for quicken and excel, and of course downloading transactions. Please remember this was not a 1 time occurrence. It happens every time the Quicken application is updated.

wrb · February 19

And only when the Quicken Application is updated.

I run task manager when this occurs, and the CPU is barely used, there is usually 3+ GB of memory available (out of 16 GB), the disk drives have almost no activity, and the network is not used.

mtbdog · February 20

Same problem here. I have data going back to 2000. During that time I've had a couple of different checking accounts, several savings, 30 different credit cards, 10 investment accounts, 20 retirement accounts. These are SWAG numbers, but there's a lot!

The program is so slow, not just transactions, but opening Quicken also. Entering transactions: moving from field to field takes 2 or 3 seconds. Selecting a category from the dropdown is very difficult because of the lag. After entering the hour glass is going for quite a while. Example: yesterday I sold 10 stocks. Today I accepted the downloaded sales. Took over half-hour to get them all 10 of them accepted. Ridiculous.

I should mention that I take care of mother's finances, which are much simpler, and only 5 years of data. Quicken is as crisp and fast as it can be.

Ben_Dover · March 16

Same problem here. It's become painful to work in Quicken. Transaction going back until 1994 to present. Seemed to slow when it went subscription based.

wrb · March 18

The slowness appeared again after the latest update.

I guess Quicken does not have an answer for this issue.

Entering transactions is very slow after a Quicken update

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