We have CS Cart 1.3.5 and have developed a store with 144 categories and subcategories and almost 2000 separate products, each with a complicated description. Can someone advise on the following:
Should we hire a developer, or
Should we hire CS Cart Support
Also, what should we upgrade to: 2.1.1, 2.1.2 or 2.1.3 and why?
We are most concerned about all our descriptions being upgraded correctly.
Where can I go to find a list of the upgrade features of each edition (in simple language)?
Can anyone give me a ball park estimate of the cost.
First question I would ask is what is the basis for your reason for upgrading?
Product stuff will migrate okay. Images will have some problems.
I would get quotes from a couple of people here and then a quote from cs-cart too. But I think you’re going find you’re going to get a minimum quote with a lot of “it depends”…
There are a couple of people here whom I know are experienced. That would be JesseLeeStringer and SnoRocket. There may be a couple of others too.
But core advise is always “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. And if you don’t have a compelling reason to upgrade (like some set of features that you just have to have), you might be better off staying where you are.
i did the upgrade and i find 2.1 to be alot more flexable then 1.35 better options for promotions, better way to manage your design, overall the backend looks alot better.
the only thing i dont like is the product search and searching for people who ordered individual items .
Thank you each so very much. Your answers were music to my husband’s ears. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is his matra. And we are experiencing great success. I think we are going to take your advice for the moment. However, could you give me a little more idea of what I would get with the upgrade for my type of store. I have tried to read the knowledge base and have trouble with the computerize. Mucho thanks, Diana
Suggest you go to the demo store as a customer and as an admin and simply “play around”. You may find compelling reasons but if you are making money with your current, make sure you assess the risk of going to something new from a business perspective.
I truly don’t want to come across as the Devil’s Advocate here, however, depending upon how you view this, in many ways 1.3.xxx is already broken.
I don’t have time to verify this, however, my bet is that you would have a real fun time ever becoming PCI compliant running that old of a version, several have been successful on the 2.xxx versions, CS does claim the later versions to be PCI compliant.
Just one other quick example is that the USPS ApI (still being used on older versions of CS-Cart) is being sunsetted in August, knowone really knows if CS will offer any type of patch to continue rcvng USPS realtime rates, that will be a serious issue for many old version users.
I think it is pretty safe to say that there will come a time when CS completely stops supporting 1.3.xxx in every way!
I’m doing the 1.3.3 to 2.1.3 upgrade right now. I use USPS for my shipping and I want to get a head start before the post office will turns off the old rate API. Sure there are issues 2.1.3, but nothing like what was in 1.3.3. I’m hoping to go live later with 2.1.3 later this week.
Larry, there are also alot of improvements which have been added since 1.3, many of which are no longer really mentioned, such as 1 page checkout, the built-in landing page, huge improvements to the cache system, and at least 100 more that I can’t remember at the moment!
Going from 1.3 to 2.1.3 in one big jump has to be overwhelming in noticing just how much has changed! :eek:
Now I am concerned with the replies about USPS and continued support. We use USPS exclusively and have always had problems trying to make our shipping estimates match our products. We usually just tell the customer that we will refund overcharges.
Any other comments? I guess I should ask one of you to help us with a quote. How do I go about that? Thanks Diana
[QUOTE]We usually just tell the customer that we will refund overcharges. [/QUOTE]
As Dr. Phil would ask, “And how is that working for you?”
[QUOTE]Any other comments? I guess I should ask one of you to help us with a quote. How do I go about that? Thanks Diana[/QUOTE]
Just yell out “QUOTE ME” & click your heals together 3 times…
And then as “T” suggested, contact either or jesselee stringer or snorocket here in the forums (& pray that you have not incorporated alot of custom modifications into your old site!).
Before I seriously start looking for quotes, I know I need to be able to tell a Guru exactly what kind of computer, server, etc I have. Could you tell me what I need to find out and how to find it, i.e. PHP, MySQL, etc. Thanks, Diana
We took the move on one of our sites from 1.3.5 sp4 to 2.1.2 and the upgrade worked fine. Our other site was unable to be “upgraded” from 1.3.5 sp4 to 2.1.2, probably because of the amount of custom changes we made over time. We have not upgraded to 2.1.3 yet because we are waiting for some of our mods we’ve bought to make sure they will work with it.
There are a lot of good changes, but there are also some changes that are just not as good. Even simple things like the navigation in the new admin is just not as good in my opinion. Overall the changes are very much worth it.
In regards to 1.3.5 sp4 being PCI compliant, we didn’t have any problems with scans on that version. Is there some other issue?
I would not worry too much about those details as either of the guys mentioned can easily figure out those details.
For starters I would have my admin login details as well as the FTP login details to your site handy.
PS: I am sure they will both go easy on ya, so don’t worry![/QUOTE]
But those details do matter.
I did one at the beginning of this year (1.3.5 - 2.1.2) and definitely underbid it. I had trouble just changing images from file to db and as soon as I ran into that, I said “Nope”. I ended up copying the files and db and doing the upgrade on my server then moved it back to theirs. What should have been about a 2 hour job ended up being about a 10 hour job.
[quote name=‘pushpins’]Before I seriously start looking for quotes, I know I need to be able to tell a Guru exactly what kind of computer, server, etc I have. Could you tell me what I need to find out and how to find it, i.e. PHP, MySQL, etc. Thanks, Diana[/quote]
Realistically, Tell me where you are hosted and I’ll do my own maths. There are many circumstances that affect how websites are upgrade however all of them come back to experience within different systems
[quote name=‘The Tool’]But those details do matter.
I did one at the beginning of this year (1.3.5 - 2.1.2) and definitely underbid it. I had trouble just changing images from file to db and as soon as I ran into that, I said “Nope”. I ended up copying the files and db and doing the upgrade on my server then moved it back to theirs. What should have been about a 2 hour job ended up being about a 10 hour job.[/quote]
I believe the mantra of “Don’t fix what ain’t broke” can be replaced with “I told ya so” (Bad hosting environment is one similar to hostmonster… ehhhh)
[quote name=‘Struck’]Larry, there are also alot of improvements which have been added since 1.3, many of which are no longer really mentioned, such as 1 page checkout, the built-in landing page, huge improvements to the cache system, and at least 100 more that I can’t remember at the moment!
Going from 1.3 to 2.1.3 in one big jump has to be overwhelming in noticing just how much has changed! :eek:[/QUOTE]Yep, I know. I would have upgraded sooner, but l’ve been putting off wanting to hack the usps shipping section with my best fit box routine to utilize flat rate boxes and dimensional weight over 12 inches. I also need to write a destination sales tax routine as that is what we are required to use in Washington state.
(Bad hosting environment is one similar to hostmonster… ehhhh)