-
Corel X3 Software, help and advice needed, please?
Hi All,
Just joined the site in the hope that someone out there might be able to help. Technically I’ve been retired for 5 years but hung onto the Roland cutter/printer ‘cos it’s now worth next to nothing and anyway I still thoroughly enjoy doing the odd “Can you just for friends and the many village events (when we could have them)!”
However, I’ve always managed to bumble along with my good old faithful X3 but unfortunately, my computer has finally died, and although I’ve run X3 on a window’s 10 machine before it only worked because it started life as a window’s 7 and then upgraded to window’s 10 when Microsoft was giving away the upgrade for free.
I’m sure you’re ahead of me with my question! How to load X3 onto a brand new window’s 10 machine? The computer guy who’s sorting out the new machine for me, says it won’t load and despite referring him to lots of article on dare I say it ‘Google’ he says “No can do”.
Can anybody help? I’m too old now to learn to use whatever the latest Coreldraw is and worry that my many useful files going back years won’t be transferable.
I await your replies with eager anticipation.
Thanks,
Harry
-
12 Replies
-
Hi Harry
Welcome to the boards, mate…
Did he tell you, why he thought the software would not work?
i.e.
not compatible with windows 10?
the disk is scratched?etc.
-
I seem to recall upgrading from 12 to 15 (X5) because it wouldn’t work on my new win 10 machines.
Have a look on eBay, you’ll pick up an old X5 / X7 for very little. You’ll notice little difference between X3 and even the newest 2020 version I’m using now, many improvements too! -
Thanks for that, Hugh.
I’ve looked on eBay and there’s one at the moment, so I’ll keep an eye on that. Will I be able to access all my old files directly? My computer guy found a “Home and Student Suite 2019” download for £95! Would that allow direct use of old files? Having said that I’d prefer the x5 as you’ve used it successfully.
-
Hi Robert,
It seems he’d have to go into the ‘register’ and apparently that’s risky and also likely to cause other functions not to work properly. That certainly seems to be a concern mentioned on Google. He was adamant that the whole exercise would be far too unpredictable and likely to lead to problems in the future.
-
Corel X3 isn’t compatible with Windows 10, due to a change in windows and will have no support even if you can get it running with registry hacks.
Just install it on a Windows 7 or Windows 8 machine!
-
-
Hi Colin,
That was my suggestion to my computer guy but he simply said Win 7 or 8 was no longer available.
Anyway, I’ve come to the conclusion that a second-hand copy of Corel X5 or Corel X7 will be my best bet, as suggested by Hugh.
Thanks for confirming that Corel X3 is not compatible. -
Hi Harry
I’ve got Corel X3 and it runs on Windows 10 home edition 64 bit.
I haven’t used it in years and I don’t know its limitations but it seems to run ok and prints to an OKI printer.
It was loaded on my computer when I upgraded to Windows 10 from 7 therefore it sorted itself out.
I don’t mess about with registry etc but a recent 10 upgrade stopped my e-mails working and a tweak in registry sorted it, after a search online on how to do it.
Good luck.
Fredc. -
Thanks Fred,
Interesting that you had the same situation. I’m afraid ‘the registry’ is something I know nothing about and it seems something to avoid. My computer is just another tool to me just like my woodworking and metalworking tools. But at least I know how sharpen/mend and otherwise maintain those !
-
Thanks for all your help and advice so far. I’ve now managed to obtain a Coreldraw X5 Graphics Suite. On reading the installation instructions it mentions “registering”. Not being very computer savvy and not installing a second hand cd before, is that something I need worry about i.e. compromising the previous owner or me for that matter ?
Would be grateful for your thoughts.
-
Good question, I’m not sure if it will affect anything if you don’t register. You may ‘have to’ to use it but I’m sure I just used to tell it to remind me in 30 days!
You can have a single disc on two pc’s and it’s unlikely the previous owner is still using it. I had mine on two pcs and two laptops for years when I had it. You can’t do that on the subscription service though.. two copies only, you have to delete the old before upgrading the new !
-
Thanks Hugh,
I took my chance in the end and it seems “registering” is an option and not actually necessary to load the programme. It did take and age to load and eventually got stuck on what I think must have been a “graphics library” (only guessing). I did stop it but it seems the programme itself is all there, my only problem now is to sort the “Menu Bar” so that it can be easily read ? At the moment the titles only show when the cursor passes over each one. It appears to be white lettering on a white background. Any thoughts
However I must thank you again for the advice on going for X5. I’ve just got to fathom the ‘little differences’ between the two programmes.
-
-
-
X3 is pretty old now and certainly the newer versions are specifically written for 64 bit and Windows 10. Early versions could be nursed along but from what I’ve heard could be a little quirky. If you are looking for older versions the numbering changed from X number to 2017 to the current version 2020.
If you are intending to use macros be aware that student versions do not support VBA and this is required for macros and also includes some plotting utilities so they won’t load directly into Draw. Its worth visiting the Corel site to see what is and isn’t included in the Student versions. Strictly speaking the licence doesn’t allow commercial use.
If you want to retrieve old files you can download a trial version of 2020 open and save your files as pdf. Once your trial had finished these could be opened in Inkscape, a very capable and free vector drawing programe. Providing your plotter utility can import eps or pdf files you could use Inkscape for basic jobs.
Log in to reply.