Need upgrade help

Currently running Opera ver. 9.27 build 8841.

Would like to upgrade to a more recent version, but don't want ver. 11.52.

Would one of you more knowledgeable souls be willing to help me out ?

The main thing I'm concerned about is my email. I think I read somewhere that there was a change in the way emails are stored between v. 9.27 & now.

Also, I have another little problem I'd like to resolve, sorry but, it requires a bit of history. When I built this computer it had a 160 gig HD, which I divided into 4 partitions C:, D:, E: & F: (yes it was dumb !). Later on, when C: began to fill up I decided I needed to move stuff from C: to E: . Some of the stuff I moved was program files & among that was Opera.

Several years ago 2 640 GB hard drives replaced the old 160 GB drive (got plenty of disk space now), so now, what I'd like to do is to go to a newer version of Opera installed in C:\Program Files along with my emails, bookmarks & whatever I'm forgetting.

Please help me avoid the landmines !

There was a change to email, especially between 9.x and 10.x, but you should be able to import older Opera version emails into newer versions. However, you can't necessarily go back the other way if you decide to revert the versions, so be sure to back up your old email files to a safe place before doing it.

Regarding drives, etc., how you go about the new Opera installation will impact what Opera can automatically "see" and reuse in terms of old-version Opera files. In an Opera installation, the program keeps a record of where your various personal Opera files are located (in older-version cases, these paths were stored within the opera6.ini file, but not in current versions' operaprefs.ini equivalent). If you reinstall Opera into a different-named folder or drive than the installer-prompted one (which usually will be the existing or last version's *:\***\***\Opera folder that Opera gets from the registry), you will probably have to manually use Opera to import your old bookmarks, emails, contacts, and feeds files from the old location into the new one after installation. That is, Opera will treat a new install to a new drive and/or folder as a wholly new and independent one, unrelated to anything before, so you'll have to use the import feature (or else manually copy and possibly rename the old files into the new location) to bring the old files in.

In any case, be sure to make backups to a safe place of all your old Opera personal files before uninstalling any old Opera versions or importing files into the newer versions, just in case bad things happen to good data. Otherwise, if things go sour, you'll risk having to create one of those "Opera installation ate my personal files" topics in these forums.

Actually, the safest thing to try would be to leave your old Opera version installed in place, while simply installing the newer Opera version to a new-named location by editing the prompted drive/folder name during install. Then later import or copy the personal files you need over to the new installation (being sure to safely back them up first). If all goes well and the new Opera version satisfies you, you can just uninstall the old version. If it doesn't work out, you will still have the old version in place for use. Or simply leave the old version in place regardless. I currently have 3 versions of Opera on this system I'm typing from, going back to 10.63, and on another system I have 5 versions going back into the 9.x family... all can run independently of or simultaneously with the others.

Thanks for the response blackbird71.

Do you have any recommendation for recent versions ?

I notice you're using Opera 11.52 & 10.63 among others, which do you like the best & why ?

My reason for avoiding v. 11.52 was due to several negative comments I found here.

Originally posted by warthoglxxv:

... Do you have any recommendation for recent versions ? I notice you're using Opera 11.52 & 10.63 among others, which do you like the best & why ? My reason for avoiding v. 11.52 was due to several negative comments I found here.

I prefer 11.52, though for reasons not necessarily typical. I don't use all of Opera's bells and whistles, so many of the later feature additions don't matter to me one way or another (SpeedDial, Mail, Sync, Unite, etc). But I want my browser to be fast, secure, and up-to-date compliant with as many standards as possible. Opera doesn't apply security patches to old versions... it bumps the latest version's version number as it incorporates security patches there. So to stay secure and still use Opera, I need to have a pretty much current/latest released Opera version on my system - particularly for browsing in harm's way. That said, there are times when new browser versions break old websites, and I keep older versions around for just such occasions, though I limit their use to relatively benign or safe sites for security reasons. On my system, 11.52 is somewhat faster than 10.63, and I've not had any of the problems with 11.52 that some users have had (at least, that I can see with the way I use Opera).

Because Opera has been gradually redesigning/modernizing major portions of the browser's innards over recent versions, there naturally have been some problems for various users along the way. Normally, when a major new Opera version release hits the Internet, I hang back and watch what happens with other users before upgrading my systems. For that reason (and because of the more numerous user "teething problems" I observed), I held off migrating to the 11.xx family all the way until version 11.50 - at which point the version dust had settled from my perspective enough to risk trying it. Since then, the updates to 11.52 have been essentially security patches, which I usually incorporate immediately upon release. I also spend time reading the Opera Desktop Blog for user comments about new release candidates to get a feel for the kinds of user issues that might be involved... and some version candidates are clearly more stable than others.

Once 11.60 is released, I'll wait for a time monitoring these forums to sense whether there are user problem patterns that are likely to affect or be of concern to me. Many kinds of user problems, if they really are Opera bugs, may not affect me and how I use Opera (eg: OperaMail problems are of no concern to me); whereas others (eg: memory leaks, etc) do get my attention. Eventually, I'll install it or a successor version... but it will go in as a parallel or stand-alone install (independent of my other Opera versions on this system), since there's enough significant changes in it from 11.52 to warrant that precaution.

In any case, there's no reason one cannot use more than one Opera version on a system - opting for both an old trusted but less-secure version and a new, fully-secure, higher-speed (but perhaps slightly less stable) version.

Okay Blackbird71, I'll go with v. 11.52 .

Heard what you said about security & newer versions. Have been pushing my luck by not upgrading more frequently. I think I'll try to move a little closer to your philosophy.

So I'm off to do my upgrade.

Will report on success or failure.

Thanks for the help & arrivederci !

No problem with bookmarks or email account settings.

BUT, the email messages are a different story.

The documentation provided by Opera is below :

!Importing messages
!
!Follow this procedure to import messages, contact information, and settings from
!other email clients:
!
! 1. Select Mail and Chat Accounts.
! 2. Click "Add" and select "Import email".
! 3. Select which email client to import from.
! 4. If Opera has not located the correct folder, click "Choose" to select the folder
! the messages are located in.
! 5. Select which account to import into; choose "<new account>" to import to a
! fresh account.
! 6. Select whether to import settings, contacts, messages, or a combination.
! 7. Click "Import" to start importing.
!
!Imported messages are treated as follows:
!
!Your old folder tree is put under "Labels" in the Mail panel.
!Messages in your old Outbox, Sent, Drafts, and Trash folders are put in the corresponding views.
!All old incoming messages (from your inbox and folder tree) will appear in the Received view.


I get through step 3 okay.

At step 4 it is apparent that the program is looking for account info from the 'accounts.ini' file, IT IS NOT LOOKING for email messages & there is no 'CHOOSE' to click on. Looking for the 'accounts.ini' is a little strange because the accounts have already been set up.

HELP !!

Blackbird ???

Somebody ??

I am not sure what to do with email. I had no problems with older versions to import all email without problems.

I was to warn you that if you use Facebook, Google reader, docs, Blogger, Wordpress, read the Guardian, etc you may have problems with 11.52.

v 11.60 was released.