Sage 100

We're doing our best to guide most clients to Sage 100cloud by month-end. One client especially has been complaining about report speed and wondered if moving from Advanced to Premium would help. They have an unusually large number of transactions AND they use Job Cost. We're already using CS ODBC. Recommendations?

Last I heard, the SQL database will allow the reports to FLY though I have heard the transaction posting is a bit slower. There are alternatives for them. DSD has a SQL database that mirrors the PVX tables and @DanBurleson does the same thing with an Access DB. Just be careful that solving one problem does not create others.

Custom reports: there is no comparison to Premium / SQL (hours vs. seconds). Work table reports will not see a similar benefit in a switch to SQL because the data still needs to be prepared by the business object.

What a dilemma. If the Journals and Registers are the same speed, I might as well stay at Advanced and do the Customs in SQL. We've already got that in place for Job Profitability using an Access Frontend.

I do many of my custom reports via Access PTQ's. As you know, you can put the report on the custom reports menu and no one knows the difference.

I've moved a couple to Premium and there are a few minor gotchas (need to re-do all SOTAMAS90 ODBC connections to point to SQL on every workstation if you have anyone using an ODBC connection for a report NOT on the Sage menu). However, I think for someone with a large number of transactions that Premium is the way to go. My customer who had similar issues with speed called me to say that they indeed noticed a slight performance boost. I always caution the users that they should not expect a night/day difference in speed for transaction processing. Where they will see the pickup is anything connected via ODBC. As Sage seems to put less and less attention into releases I predict we will create more reports to meet customer needs. I automatically suggest Premium if (a) the customer doesn't have modules like WO which aren't read yet and (b) the customer has large table sizes, years of transactions, multiple companies, etc.

Another benefit to SQL: data security. No keyed file errors from crashes and the data files are never directly accessed via workstations, meaning lower vulnerability to crypto virus.