Huge backups - how to trim?

Question

Hello, 
 Our backups are becoming huge - 42GB's at the moment. I believe this started happening when we started attaching pdfs/scans. Is there anything we can do to decrease the size? Trying to run a data verification and it takes 1 or 2 hours to do the backup before I can proceed.

StephenC · Accepted Answer

To determine whether or not the attachments are the reason for the huge backup size, make a backup and uncheck the "Include attachments in the backup" option. 
 If that is the source of the problem then you probably need to look at what resolution is being used when scanning documents. Files sizes grow geometrically as resolution increases. Your scanner probably defaults to at least 600dpi. But In most cases 150dpi is good enough, and you could try lower resolutions to see if they're good enough for you. Gray scale or black & white scans will also be much smaller than color.

Erzsi_I · Answer

Hi MikeDavalos , Thanks for reaching out. KB 38449 may have some insights for you related to "why it take a long time to back up my company?". Alternatively, Data services for Sage 50 US i s something provided by the Expert Services team which may be of interest to you. 
 Setup your Sage Expert Services consultation for Sage 50: 
 
 Call 888-701-8989 (voicemail only) 
 Email us at ExpertServicesSage50US@sage.com 
 Schedule time with a Sage 50 Expert via the online scheduler 
 
 Hope this helps! Erzsi

Best Business Strategies · Answer

I have never seen a 42 GB backup. You must have a fast computer. I have a feeling you may be backing up your backups. I would suggest moving them to a backup folder under the company folder. (You will need to create it) 
 We also offer purging. Our service is with a data specialist that has been doing this for many, many years. Let me know if we can be of some assistance. 
 Shirley Byard, President, BestBusinessStrategies.com 304-233-2612

StephenC · Answer

The only way would be to get rid of the attachments. Your choices are to go through each transaction deleting the attachments and replacing them with smaller files, or just wipe out all of your attachments at once. If you wipe out all attachments then you would have to go back and manually attach new smaller files unless you can live with losing those attachments. 
 The procedure from the knowledgebase to wipe out all attachments is: 
 
 Make a backup of you data. See Article ID 10264: How to make a backup in Related Resources. 
 Find your company data location. See Article ID 10199: How to locate company directories in Related Resources. 
 Close Sage 50 . 
 Browse to your company data location. 
 Rename ATTCHMNT.DAT to OldATTCHMNT.dat Note : Depending on your computer settings you may not see the .dat extension of the file. 
 Rename ATMNTBDL.DAT to OldATMNTBDL.dat 
 Remove the folder ATTACHMENTS from the directory. If confident that the attachments will never be needed associated, the Attachments directory can be deleted. 
 Re-open your company in Sage 50. 
 You will receive the following message: Could not find file <file name>. Do you want to create a brand new, empty file? Referencing Attchmnt.dat and ATMNTBDL.dat. 
 Select Yes. 
 Confirm the attachments are no longer present on transactions.

The only other thing I can think of is to leave the attachments as they are but not include them in your Sage 50 backup. If the backups you do from Sage 50 are your only backup that would be a significant risk, but still better than no backup at all. If you have another system wide backup that includes your Sage 50 data, then using the Sage 50 backup without attachments might be an acceptable compromise.

Sage 50 US

Huge backups - how to trim?

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