The Neat Company Forums

I was given instructions on how upgrade to 4.7.7 by support at Neat Co.  I have Windows 7 and followed the instruction on how to upgrade to the latest version.  One little problem.....after uninstalling my old version and installing 4.7.7, everything I try to open Neatworks I get an error message>

"Neatworks cannot access the Neatworks database in c:\programdata\The Neat Company\Neatworks\database.

 If the error continues, please call customer support to resolve this problem"

I have sent several message to customer support, but they do not respond.  Does anyone have any ideas on how to get this to work again?  I am running SQL 2005 on my machine, but that didnt stop me from running 4.0 sp3.  I am not sure if its confused about having SQL on the machine or not.  I was NOT using SQL 2005 as the database for the prior version of Neatworks.

 Any help would be great.......wish this was better supported.

Bob

Hi, Bob

Version 4.7.7 does work on Windows 7.  The message you're seeing is fairly specific, and usually indicates that there were some permissions issues during install.

Does the folder listed in the error message exist, and does it contain 11 files?  We've most often seen this when Windows is unable or unwilling to provide an appropriate path for the Common Appdata folder, which defaults to C:\ProgramData on most Vista and Win7 machines.  If that happens, our installer ends up putting a "The Neat Company" folder at the root of C:.

If that folder exists there, copy it to C:\ProgramData.  Note that this is distinct from C:\Program Files, and may require that you turn on display of hidden files and folders.

We no longer use the SQL Server architecture, so the presence or absence of another SQL instance won't matter to us.

Wow, I have to manually change the folder structure after a fresh install?

 I have uninstalled everything and started from scratch. Removed all folder structures in Program Files and ProgramData regarding The Neat Company and Neat works.   After the fresh install,had to enter product key and  the same issue happened.  The installshield did NOT create a database folder which the application is looking for.

I do have a new folder created by the installshield entitled C:\ProgramData\The Neat Company\NeatWorks

 But no database folder.  

I am on about week 2 with formal support emails, they have only responded saying they could open my jpg screen shot of the error :) 

 Do I create a folder called database????  Where are the database files kept and I can move them to this newly created folder.  I REALLY would like to start using the product instead of troubleshooting a develpment installshield problem.

Hi, Bob

This is pretty much environment-specific; it's not necessary on a normal installation.

What's your incident number?  Our support group will usually just send you a link to a .zip containing the missing content and tell you where it should go - this is a pretty easy fix, and I'm surprised it's taking any longer than one email.

 I finanally got the answer back from support with a zip file that I had to extract and copy the files to my hard drive.  It now works.

 I can confirm that I tried this on two seperate machines running windows 7 and had the same issue.  1st machine was an upgrade to Windows 7 Ultimate and the second machine was fresh install of Windows 7 Enterprise.  Just really frustrtating that it took 3 weeks to get it sorted out.

 Thanks for the help.

Regards,

Bob

Hi, Mike,

I am seeing the same problem with NeatWorks Version 4 SP3a on my machine running  Windows XP SP2.  I was able to install NeatWorks without a problem, but it fails to run with an error message "NeatWorks cannot access the NeatWorks database in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\The Neat Company\NeatWorks\database".  I checked that the folder exists, and confirmed that there are several "image" files in this folder. I asked Customer Support for help, and Roy told me to change the permissions of C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data to Full Control.  The error still pops up.  Does the Zip file referenced in this thread help fix the problem?  Please help.

I have the same problem too

I need that zip file to fix my installation

very unhappy

I called tech support this afternoon and automated responses  says this company is closed for the rest of the week  for the holidays!!

I don't think that is legit-- they should have a ways for people to receive tech support- you cant close down support for 4-6 days!

 NOT a great experience so far with a $ 400 piece of equipment...

Unless someone is staffing the bulletin/discussion board or support email over holiday I give this company LOW  LOW support eval.

Will be blogging about it as well-- I was hoping to have a winner product here!...not good so far for this company's rep

 I am on windows Vista-- and there is no database directory AT All in the appropriate area or elsewhere... I installed and uninstalled 4 times with reboots in between...to make sure I did nothing wrong

had all tsrs off entirely and antivirus as instructed...  and antispyware what is the deal?

I hope I am pleasantly surprised and someone IS staffing their electronic support...

Geek goddess

Toshi:

Hi, Mike,

I am seeing the same problem with NeatWorks Version 4 SP3a on my machine running  Windows XP SP2.  I was able to install NeatWorks without a problem, but it fails to run with an error message "NeatWorks cannot access the NeatWorks database in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\The Neat Company\NeatWorks\database".  I checked that the folder exists, and confirmed that there are several "image" files in this folder. I asked Customer Support for help, and Roy told me to change the permissions of C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data to Full Control.  The error still pops up.  Does the Zip file referenced in this thread help fix the problem?  Please help.

Hello All

 Did anyone know how to solve this issue.. I have the same

/Per