how many records can an access database hold?

[sarah ziebell mann]

Hi,

I work in a museum that uses an access database to manage
its collections. We currently have about 15,000 records
in our database (each record contains only basic
information - nothing fancy) and are finding that the
database has decreased functionality. Some searches seem
to go awry, etc. Is there a general rule about how many
records an access database can hold?

Thanks, Sarah

 

[John Vinson]

Some searches seem
to go awry, etc. Is there a general rule about how many
records an access database can hold?

15,000 is very modest. 15,000,000 is getting a bit bigger than I'd be
comfortable with Access, though I know of bigger databases.

Have you been regularly using Tools... Database Utilities... Compact
and Repair? Are your tables properly indexed?

 

[Dirk Goldgar]

Hi,

I work in a museum that uses an access database to manage
its collections. We currently have about 15,000 records
in our database (each record contains only basic
information - nothing fancy) and are finding that the
database has decreased functionality. Some searches seem
to go awry, etc. Is there a general rule about how many
records an access database can hold?

Thanks, Sarah

In terms of records, 15,000 is paltry. However, if you're storing
images in your database, you can quickly bloat the database up to its
size limit of 2GB (1GB for Access 97). If that's your problem, the
solution is to store the images externally, as files in folders, and
store only the path to each image in the database. You can set an image
control's Picture property to that path whenever you want to see a
picture.

If that's not your problem, then you may still find that, over time,
your database "bloats up" and must be compacted. However, that's less
likely to be your problem than if you had pictures stored in there. How
big is your database file now? With only 15,000 records in your main
table, storing only basic information, it shouldn't be all that big.

What sorts of specific problems are you having? There can be other
problems in databases that aren't related to the size at all.

 

[sarah ziebell mann]

thanks, john and dirk, for your replies. i'll have to
find out some additional information from the database's
main users in order to answer the questions you pose.
thanks again!