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Data must be on C:\ drive

Richard Starrett

I have used Quicken on a Windows PC for many years. I have always kept my data files on a separate HD in my PC and all the program files on the C: drive, which is an SSD. Lately, Quicken has been unusably slow and I spent a couple of hours with service people to try to identify why. Tried establishing an entirely new data file, also reinstalling Quicken. That did not work. Finally, one guy suggested that I cannot have my Quicken data files on any other drive but the one where the Quicken program files are stored. I have used a separate drive for Quicken data files for 20 years, but that seems to be working. Even though my D: drive is a fast local HD in my PC, storing the data files there somehow made the current Quicken version unusable. With the data file moved to my C: drive, I am not having issues.

I wish Intuit had let me know about that issue.

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Comments

Sceptic

@Richard Starrett It sounds like moving the QDF file to your C: drive resolved the performance issue, so that was a useful troubleshooting step. However, I am not aware of any Quicken requirement that the data file be stored on the same drive as the Quicken program files. Many users have historically stored their data file on a different local drive without issue. I would wonder whether there is something specific about the D: drive itself (performance, health, antivirus interaction, etc.) that is contributing to the slowdown rather than the drive letter alone.

bsantelli

Keeping the data file on the c drive is definitely not a requirement. You were misinformed if that's actually what they said. Now if they said it would be better to have it on an SSD instead of a conventional hard drive, that's a good suggestion but also not a requirement. My quick and file is rather large, I have it on my SSD for that reason. Also I don't know how long you've had quicken and how large your data file is, but you may want to consider pruning it if it's getting too large. There are a few tools within quicken to do that.

Chris_QPW

Intuit hasn't owned Quicken for something like a decade now. They sold it off, the new company is called Quicken Inc.

I have heard of people having problems when they have installed Quicken was installed on a drive other than their primary one, but like the others have said this is the first I have ever heard of anyone having problems storing their data file on a different SSD.

It suggests that something else is going on, but since it is more likely a system problem than a Quicken problem, it isn't hard to see why if Quicken Support accidentally hit something that worked, they would just stop at that. And yes, I'm sure that there isn't another program that reacts like that, and as such might look like a Quicken problem and in a way, it is, but it is most likely the fact that Quicken is using some old API that almost no other program is still using, but is still "valid" that has some strange interaction on your machine.

Richard Starrett

It does seem strange. I use a newer PC with an i7 processor and 32 GB of memory. The drive where I store data files is a built-in 6TB serial ATA drive in good health according to CrystalDiskinfo. I have no issues with MS Office data stored there or other programs. All I can say is that moving the Quicken data to my SSD C drive instantly solved all my issues, having done nothing to the data file itself. It was the Quicken support tech with whom I spoke who told me that Quicken's data has to be on the same drive as the .exe file. Before that I had attempted to repair the data file, reinstalled the entire Quicken program, restored the online download of various accounts, etc., etc.

Sceptic

One possible explanation is that the SSD itself is providing significantly faster access than the 6 TB SATA drive. Even if the D: drive is healthy, Quicken may be more sensitive to storage latency than applications such as Office. Another possibility is that something specific to the D: drive environment is affecting Quicken's performance.

In any event, it sounds like moving the data file was an effective solution. I would just be cautious about concluding that Quicken requires the QDF and program files to be on the same drive unless there is documentation from Quicken that specifically states that.

Chris_QPW

Frankly, I suspect some kind of interaction that is causing hardware a "wait".

I take @Richard Starrett's statement "unusably slow" not as "it is 1 second longer", but something that is much slower. If this is a true statement one has to think back to when you first switched off of a hard drive to an SSD. Yes, it was much faster, but not going from "unusable" to "usable".

And there is just how Quicken even Windows uses that drive. When Quicken first starts it reads part of the data, but not all of it. It reads accounts as you open them but then caches them. Depending on where you see this slow down you should be able to tell if it is really the drive or more likely the system/Quicken getting hung up on reading very little amount of data, pointing to some other problem.

And the reason I mentioned Windows is because it isn't "static" in this, it does a lot of file caching. Most people's data files are smaller than what your web browser uses for RAM for just a few open tabs.