You can upgrade to V5R3 directly from V5R1 if you want to save some headaches... If you have software support, there should be no additional cost to order V5R3 and just skip V5R2... Both new releases take up more disk space and V5R3 takes up even more than the older one... Plus there are some pre-req PTF levels you have to be at to get it to work... also for V5R3 you have to apply the license acceptance PTF's and accept the licenses before you do the upgrade. ========================================================= The key steps are no different than they've always been... for <b>any</b> system. <ul> <li>Verify that your hardware can support the upgrade. This particularly includes disk drives -- capacity and available space. Various cards might need replacement. (We have no clue what your configuration is. Only you know that.)</li><li>Verify that your clients can support any new connection requirements. (We have no clue what your clients are like -- what PC hardware, OSes, service packs and apps are used, nor what kinds of connection requests are made. Only you know that.)</li><li>Verify that your host apps aren't using unsupported interfaces for the new release. (We have no clue what your host apps are nor what they do, not to mention whether they're even properly coded. Only you know that.)</li> </ul> In general, if you don't know if you're ready to upgrade, then don't upgrade. That's really the only "key" point that ever exists, just like always. For the AS/400 line, that generally means that you need to read the <a href="http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/iseries/v5r2/ic2924/info/rzahgmtu.htm">Memo to Users</a> and check its info against your system. Not surprisingly, only you can do that. Tom

You can upgrade to V5R3 directly from V5R1 if you want to save some headaches... If you have software support, there should be no additional cost to order V5R3 and just skip V5R2... Both new releases take up more disk space and V5R3 takes up even more than the older one... Plus there are some pre-req PTF levels you have to be at to get it to work... also for V5R3 you have to apply the license acceptance PTF's and accept the licenses before you do the upgrade. ========================================================= The key steps are no different than they've always been... for <b>any</b> system. <ul> <li>Verify that your hardware can support the upgrade. This particularly includes disk drives -- capacity and available space. Various cards might need replacement. (We have no clue what your configuration is. Only you know that.)</li><li>Verify that your clients can support any new connection requirements. (We have no clue what your clients are like -- what PC hardware, OSes, service packs and apps are used, nor what kinds of connection requests are made. Only you know that.)</li><li>Verify that your host apps aren't using unsupported interfaces for the new release. (We have no clue what your host apps are nor what they do, not to mention whether they're even properly coded. Only you know that.)</li> </ul> In general, if you don't know if you're ready to upgrade, then don't upgrade. That's really the only "key" point that ever exists, just like always. For the AS/400 line, that generally means that you need to read the <a href="http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/iseries/v5r2/ic2924/info/rzahgmtu.htm">Memo to Users</a> and check its info against your system. Not surprisingly, only you can do that. Tom