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Posted by Jeff on June 6, 2007, 4:31 pm
Please log in for more thread options John Pollard wrote:
> Jeff wrote:
>>> Jeff wrote:
>>>> Running Quicken Deluxe 2006 in Windows XP.
>>>>
>>>> My Quicken data files are getting large enough that they are
>>>> causing a
>>>> significant slowdown in Quicken's operations whenever it
>>>> need
>>>> to
>>>> accept a downloaded transaction on my poor PC. It does not
>>>> help that
>>>> I keep my Quicken data files in an encrypted folder on my PC
>>>> which
>>>> probably adds time to the processing.
>>>>
>>>> So I would like to reduce the size of my Q files to speed up
>>>> operations. I have data that goes back many years and I
>>>> would
>>>> like to
>>>> archive some of these years with the ability to access them
>>>> again -
>>>> on the rare chance I would need them again. How do I go
>>>> about
>>>> doing
>>>> that?
>>>> BTW, what are the QEL and QPH files which alone measure over
>>>> 10 and 7
>>>> MB respectively in addition to the main data file of 35 MB?
>>>
>>> My first choice would be to make sure my hardware was not
>>> involved in the slowdown; once you archive, it will be
>>> increasingly difficult to maintain access to the archived
>>> data.
>>> Before I archive to increase response time, I'll buy some
>>> better
>>> hardware.
>>
>> I do not think it is a hardware thing because the notebook I
>> am using
>> is only 1 year old and not a cheap basic model. It even has 2
>> G Ram
>> without using Vista. The hard drive is regularly fragmented
>> and I
>> have the same trouble when I use Quicken on my desktop PC
>> which,
>> though older, is also not a relic. It may have to do with the
>> files
>> being on an encrypted drive but I need to have that for
>> security.
>>
>>> I think R.C. already mentioned that the QEL file contains
>>> data
>>> relating to online features; in and of itself, I don't think
>>> it
>>> is a cause of slowness.
>>>
>>> And I think R.C.pointed out that the QPH file is your price
>>> history; it definitely can be involved in slow response time.
>>> Someone in the Quicken Forums just posted that they wrote a
>>> program that would clean out the price history of unwanted
>>> prices ... you might try asking that poster if they would
>>> share
>>> the program.
>>
>> I will do that. Thanks for the pointer.
>>
>> Would the accumulated price history in the QPH file consist of
>> data I
>> may have accidentally downloaded at one time from Quicken or
>> it that
>> data Quicken acquires from the monthly broker downloads which
>> obviously give the security prices at the times of purchase
>> and sales?
>
> There are at least 4 ways prices get in your price history:
> Quicken quotes/historical-price downloads, Quicken updates from
> your financial institution holdings downloads, the entry of
> investment transactions that involve a price ... if there is not
> already a price in your history for that date, and user manual
> updates of the price history.
>
>>> Baring getting help from some other program, you could do
>>> some
>>> manual pruning of the price history your own, though it could
>>> be
>>> a bit cumbersome.
>
>> Just so I know what that data consists of, where and how do I
>> do that.
>
> The most straight forward method is to Edit Price History and
> delete the prices you do not need. You can apply some logic to
> choosing the prices to delete, such as deleting prices that date
> prior to your ownership of a security or after you sold all
> shares of a security. Possibly deleting non-month end prices
> for periods for which you only look at month end market values.
> Etc.
>
>>> Before doing anything, if you'd like to test to see what
>>> effect
>>> the price history is having on processing your downloads, try
>>> backing up your current data to a new folder (to create a
>>> test
>>> file), using Windows to delete the QPH file from that new
>>> folder, have Quicken open the file in the new folder - then
>>> do a
>>> download to that new file (which will have an empty price
>>> history when you start the download). Since the only change
>>> you'll be making to the data (before the download) is to have
>>> an
>>> empty price history, you should get a feel for what the
>>> effect
>>> of your price history is on your download processing speed.
>
>> Excellent idea. Will definitely do that. But, just for the
>> record
>> and to avoid a misunderstanding, it is not the download speed
>> that is
>> the problem especially as I have a very fast internet
>> connection.
>
> Sorry, my phrasing was not good (should have said something
> like, " ... your downloaded transaction processing speed" or
> your "Accept speed"). I did/do understand the problem you're
> having; none of my suggestions were addressed to the actual
> download time ... just to the "Accept" time.
>
>> Where the problem lies for me is that
>> a) when "accepting" each downloaded sale transaction
>>
>> ("Accept dopwnloaded transactions into transaction list", and
>> I click
>> on "accept" on each one to accept it)
>>
>> Quicken takes a number of seconds to process "each" accepted
>> transaction before I can move on to the next one to accept and
>> these
>> seconds add up if one has a lot of transaction to "accept"
>> every
>> month.
>> b) certain busy accounts definitely take much longer to open
>> within
>> Quicken than others - which though a nuiscance, I could live
>> with
>> because it only affects certain accounts and is a one time
>> delay.
>
>>> My guess is, as you have already noted (or implied) that the
>>> majority of your slowness is on account of investment data of
>>> one sort or another.
>
>> That is the only place I am having trouble: accepting
>> transactions on
>> certain busy investment accounts
>
>>> If that's true, your ability to improve your response time by
>>> archiving may be quite limited. Just using Quicken's
>>> archiving
>>> capabilities only works in chunks of data that can be defined
>>> by
>>> a range of dates; that works fine for non-investment data,
>>> but
>>> not so well for investment data.
>>
>> I was afraid of that. It is in some investment accounts that
>> I am
>> having trouble. The rest are OK.
>
>> By your using the term "archiving" above, I assume you mean
>> the year
>> end reduction function. Correct?
>
> Yes. But that feature seems to be broken in the newer versions
> of Quicken. The suggestion has been to use the Quicken "File
> Operations > Copy" feature, rather than the Year End feature.
> But both suffer from the same limitations for your purposes.
>
>>> Still assuming the major problem is in investment data; other
>>> than just pruning your price history, I think your best bet
>>> would be to work out some system where you decide which old
>>> investments you no longer need - such as you sold the last
>>> share
>>> 5 years ago - and manually delete all the transactions for
>>> those
>>> (and their price history which is not deleted automatically
>>> by
>>> Quicken).
>>>
>>> [Actually, if you get to the point of wanting to delete
>>> investment transactions, I think Q2006 has a way that you can
>>> delete multiple investment transactions at once. You can
>>> post
>>> back if you get to that point.]
>
>> I guess this form of deleting removes them forever rather than
>> archive
>> them for later availability.
>
> Yes it does; but what I forgot to mention in my previous post is
> that you can just keep a backup, prior to deleting any data, for
> your "archived" data.
Thank you very much John. That helps explain a lot.
Jeff
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