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Upgrade from ms crm 3.0(on premise) to 4.0 hosted version RRS feed

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    My client is going to upgrade his MS CRM 3.0 to version 4.0 on hosted service provider
    Is there any guidelines to export data from 3.0 and import into 4.0?
    There is no guidánce to this kind of operation in MS CRM 4.0 implemation guide.
    Can i use MS CRM 4.0 Data Migration Manager?

    Best regards

    Mikko

    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 6:53 PM

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    Mikko -

         The bad news is that there is not any simple easy way to do this migration.  You will have to build some data migration scripts to move the data.  The good part is that because you are going from Microsoft CRM 3.0 On-Premise to Microsoft CRM 4.0 Hosted the entities and relationships are basically the same so the data migration is really simple.  The only downside is that you will lose some creation dates and modified dates and have to decide what level of activities, notes and attachments you want to move. 

       There are some pros and cons but some approaches I have seen that work pretty easily are.
    1. Use the Data Migration manager - best if you are just moving main entities Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities and not lots of other entities like notes and activities where the activity parties can get involved.
    2. Scribe for data migration - if you have a little more complex of data to move or you are unfamiliar with the data migration manager.  Scribe works really slick to move data from one Microsoft CRM to another and will probably save you a bit of time if you are doing more then just a few entities.
    3. Of course you can always write a custom application which works very well if you have a very experience developer who has done it many times before.

    Within our company we tend to do it all custom because we have reusable DTS packages connected to the CRM API's to load data but if you are new to CRM and do not have the reusable code base then the first two options are better for you unless you hire a group that has those tools prebuilt to reuse.

    For simpler data conversion I would go with the Data Migration Manager or Scribe for more difficult data conversion.  Using Scribe you need to make sure the Hosted CRM provider will allow the Scibe connections.  Sometimes scribe touches the databases in certain circumstances.

    Hope that helps

    -   Hoss
    • Marked as answer by MightyViking Thursday, March 5, 2009 5:15 AM
    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 7:11 PM
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    Hi Mikko, there's no need to bother with data migration. The process is fairly straightforward.

    We are a CRM hosting provider. We have upgraded dozens of CRM 3.0 customers (both on-premise and hosted) to hosted CRM 4.0. The process is fairly straightforward, and is just like any other CRM 3.0 -> CRM 4.0 upgrade.

    If your CRM hosting provider knows anything about CRM, they should provide this service for you (although there may be a charge). If they can't provode this service (for example, because they don't have CRM certified staff or have never done it before), then you might want to ask some questions...

    The CRM 4.0 Implementation Guide (Installing) covers the necessary steps to upgrade from CRM 3.0 to CRM 4.0. Once you have an upgraded CRM 4.0 database, you need to ask your hosting provider to deploy it for you. This should take less than 30 minutes.

    Regards, Neil
    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 9:27 PM
    Moderator
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    Mikko - 

       Neil is correct if you are not going with Microsoft hosted but instead going with a Partner hosted CRM implementation.  I assumed you were going to CRM Online as in Microsoft Hosted CRM 4.0.  Microsoft does not have a process to upload a current CRM 4.0 On-premise like some of the Partner Hosted CRM 4.0 providers.  I assumed you were talking about Microsoft Hosted because I assumed if you were going to Partner Hosted CRM 4.0 they would have given you the option to pay them to upgrade your On-Premise and then just deploy into their hosted version. 
       Thanks for the catch Neil. I should have stated my assumption on my first post.

    Later
       Hoss
    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 9:55 PM

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  • Question
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    Mikko -

         The bad news is that there is not any simple easy way to do this migration.  You will have to build some data migration scripts to move the data.  The good part is that because you are going from Microsoft CRM 3.0 On-Premise to Microsoft CRM 4.0 Hosted the entities and relationships are basically the same so the data migration is really simple.  The only downside is that you will lose some creation dates and modified dates and have to decide what level of activities, notes and attachments you want to move. 

       There are some pros and cons but some approaches I have seen that work pretty easily are.
    1. Use the Data Migration manager - best if you are just moving main entities Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities and not lots of other entities like notes and activities where the activity parties can get involved.
    2. Scribe for data migration - if you have a little more complex of data to move or you are unfamiliar with the data migration manager.  Scribe works really slick to move data from one Microsoft CRM to another and will probably save you a bit of time if you are doing more then just a few entities.
    3. Of course you can always write a custom application which works very well if you have a very experience developer who has done it many times before.

    Within our company we tend to do it all custom because we have reusable DTS packages connected to the CRM API's to load data but if you are new to CRM and do not have the reusable code base then the first two options are better for you unless you hire a group that has those tools prebuilt to reuse.

    For simpler data conversion I would go with the Data Migration Manager or Scribe for more difficult data conversion.  Using Scribe you need to make sure the Hosted CRM provider will allow the Scibe connections.  Sometimes scribe touches the databases in certain circumstances.

    Hope that helps

    -   Hoss
    • Marked as answer by MightyViking Thursday, March 5, 2009 5:15 AM
    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 7:11 PM
  • Question
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    Hi Mikko, there's no need to bother with data migration. The process is fairly straightforward.

    We are a CRM hosting provider. We have upgraded dozens of CRM 3.0 customers (both on-premise and hosted) to hosted CRM 4.0. The process is fairly straightforward, and is just like any other CRM 3.0 -> CRM 4.0 upgrade.

    If your CRM hosting provider knows anything about CRM, they should provide this service for you (although there may be a charge). If they can't provode this service (for example, because they don't have CRM certified staff or have never done it before), then you might want to ask some questions...

    The CRM 4.0 Implementation Guide (Installing) covers the necessary steps to upgrade from CRM 3.0 to CRM 4.0. Once you have an upgraded CRM 4.0 database, you need to ask your hosting provider to deploy it for you. This should take less than 30 minutes.

    Regards, Neil
    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 9:27 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
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    Mikko - 

       Neil is correct if you are not going with Microsoft hosted but instead going with a Partner hosted CRM implementation.  I assumed you were going to CRM Online as in Microsoft Hosted CRM 4.0.  Microsoft does not have a process to upload a current CRM 4.0 On-premise like some of the Partner Hosted CRM 4.0 providers.  I assumed you were talking about Microsoft Hosted because I assumed if you were going to Partner Hosted CRM 4.0 they would have given you the option to pay them to upgrade your On-Premise and then just deploy into their hosted version. 
       Thanks for the catch Neil. I should have stated my assumption on my first post.

    Later
       Hoss
    Tuesday, March 3, 2009 9:55 PM
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    Thanks guys.

    BR Mikko
    Thursday, March 5, 2009 5:15 AM