Sage 200 UKI Ideas Portal
When are we going to get Sage 200 as a 64 bit app? There have been plenty of requests for the Sage BI and Outlook integration to support 64-bit but the truth is, the core product needs to be 64 bit. The latest Microsoft Visual Studio version 2022 is now 64 bit and as a result, even developing in VS 2022for Sage 200 is becoming difficult as the form designer in VS 2022 does not work correctly with 32 bit forms - a known issue that Microsoft are yet to fix !! Its not going to get any easier unless Sage switches to 64 bit as well. Come on everyone - lets push this so that it finally happens !!!
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The main issue is that ultimately the Sage 200 shell of a system only has access to just over a gig of memory.
While there are probably only a couple of processes in native Sage 200 that use this (big imports/year end) the third partly applications that are written within the shell are getting hammered by this limitation. Its also clearly a regular problem for larger sites with lots of users and transactions (especially list views).
We have lost one large client with Sicon MFG because of this exact issue and have a few others that it causes daily issues for who are looking at alternatives for this specific reason.
The issue is that memory hungry processes (explode and create WO from BOM – 114 levels at one client) utilise this memory and you can literally watch them chew through it in process manager until it hits the limit (about 1.2gb) and then errors.
3rd parties such as Sicon are now having to write memory intensive apps outside of Sage 200 (and for other reasons) such as the Graphical Planner as trying to do it in app just wont have enough resources.
Thus whilst i note other comments here that 64 bit wouldn't make a massive difference to core Sage day to day for the average client, Sage's decision to outsource vertical applications means its an essential change to protect the future of the product in our opinion.
I think there are a few thinks that are regularly associated by users/others as being limited by the product architecture. The key issues that seem be raised constantly are below, I'm not sure if a 64-bit rewrite would improve these but would suggest these are some shortcomings from the current desktop application:
Screen resolution support - Working with higher resolution displays/monitors and supporting text size other than 100%
Performance of list views and screen loading. Especially larger customers, seem to get to the point where increasing resource makes little difference
Compatibility with Office 64-bit suite particularly with Outlook
As technology advances, more focus is being made on 64-bit architecture so there is always the risk that at some point there may be a forced move towards 64-bit, it would be preferred to approach this in a managed way before anything mandates a move to 64-bit that could be more rushed
Don't think Sage BI needs to be a consideration on this as expect to be removed at some point due to more modern/available solutions such as Power BI / Marketplace Partners
I'm not sure there's much of a need for this. Contra a previous comment, there's unlikely to be any performance gain from going to 64 bit. The client software at least barely cracks 300MB of RAM utilised even when outputting large reports (32 bit applications are limited to 2GB). Not convinced there's much call for 64 bit integer math in Sage 200. Can send reports to Microsoft 365 Excel 64 bit without issue. The server software being limited to 32 bit may be more of an issue.
I agree 100%, Sage needs to get to 64 bit. It needs to stay current with technology.
In terms of this idea there seem to be 2 main asks:
Sage 200 windows forms cannot be rendered
Making Sage 200 Desktop running as a 64 bit application
In terms of point 1 this was due to an early Microsoft Version Studio 2022 this is not a Sage 200 application issue, it has now been resolved by Microsoft. You can find out more on this Microsoft learn page.
As we won’t be delivering point 1, we want to make sure that we understand what is being requested. Beyond the Windows forms issue is the request to make Sage 200 application 64 bit? If so we’d love to know more about why you’d like us to do this so please reply to this post.
I couldn't agree more.
The default installation for Office 365 is 64 bit, anyone developing any form of reporting in Excel would absolutely benefit from the additional capabilities that a 64-bit version of Excel offers.
Even if it's just having the option to install either version, this would be better than the limitations we have now.
64-bit Excel is a no-brainer for Finance departments, so financial organisations of all people should be well ahead of the curve to cater for 64-bit. We shouldn't have to revert to 32-bit just to make an add-in work. 64-bit has been here for years and years.
This is definitely needed! We recently switched our Microsoft packages as an organisation to 64-bit and now we can't create the invoices and remittances we used to produce and send in outlook from Sage, such a pain!
Thanks for the comment Richard, if you note the categorisation of the idea is its under install rather than reporting. If customers want this, then we need to understand the demand.
This is genuinely essential to the future of Sage 200 and shouldn't be in a vote with better ways to post receipts etc. Everyone needs to vote and get this circulated around their businesses.