I'm upgrading from 2016 Ultra Plus Pak to 2018 UltraPak.

Both involves USB HD.

How is 2018 going to know about 2016 for the upgrade? Does 2018 have to see 2016 to complete the process??

Hope I've made this clear enough.
Thanks for your time.

Is this a purchase price question, or an installation question?

Assuming installation, you should always install a new version over the old one, in the same place. This preserves your custom settings, user styles, and Bonus Pak purchases.

Note that a great feature of 2018 is that, during installation, it will do a clean-up of your /BB folder, wherever it is, to reorganize almost all of the files out of the root folder. This is a great addition to the program. But it doesn't affect installation steps; it runs automatically.

Or are you asking about something else?

I think he's asking, will his computer recognize that it's legit an upgrade? I don't think PG works like that. They can check your purchase history on their side. BIAB just installs. If you have older versions, it'll move some files into a folder just for that version; otherwise, everything stays the same.

GREAT! I hadn't even NOTICED THAT! but now I need to note which files are where for later recall (which I'll forget - )

Larry

Thanks for the responses. Yes this is/was an installation question.

One (new) USB drive is going to replace the (old) USB drive.

So... I can just insert the new USB and continue with the Setup program and keep the old USB as a spare / backup. And install any of the Extra's that I purchased from the old USB drive.

Right??

EDITED: "I think he's asking, will his computer recognize that it's legit an upgrade?" Tom Smith --- yes

OK, that's clearer. I don't know if a purchased update will install by itself into a new place. I believe, with no particular evidence, that it must be installed over an existing BIAB. But PG Music Sales will know for certain.

What exactly did you buy?

No purchase yet, still pondering which upgrade to get.

The current 2016 Ultra Plus Pak USB has only 30 GB left. If I install / add 2018, not sure how much disk space I'll have left on the USB drive which is why I'm pondering getting 2018 Ultra Pak USB to replace the older (2016) USB drive.

Thanks.

You get the upgrade price because PGMusic should have a record of your previous purchase(s) to verify that you qualify for the upgrade pricing. If you bought it from a retail store, I suspect you will have to provide proof of purchase to get the upgrade price. You would have to discuss that with PGMusic.

Assuming they haven't changed it this year, for installation, the hard drive you receive is a complete package (but possibly minus any special add-ons that may have been received over the years), and it doesn't have to "see" the previous version installed on your computer to use it. It's like buying the 2018 version as a first time customer, but with an upgrade price (hope that made sense). You will also receive a new authentication code to use.

You do have several installation options. If you use your 2016 version from the USB drive and don't plan on going back to 2016, you could install 2018 on top of your 2016 drive, then use 2018 as your backup. I'm pretty sure if you have 30GB left, there should be plenty of space for the new content from 2017 and 2018 (which you currently don't have).

If you run it from your computer's hard drive, similarly, you can just install over your 2016 installation and then keep the 2018 USB as a backup.

JFord: that's the answer I'm looking for. Great explanation.
Many thank you's.