Roots Magic 7 does not run natively on the Mac. We have a separate article on issues and fixes with RootsMagic on an Apple Mac. Genealogy Quotes By Writers Installing RootsMagic on a Mac I found the the download and install to be quick and smooth on my Windows laptop. That makes the Amazon reviews a little misleading, as they will be for earlier versions. Older CD-Roms are up on Amazon, but the company no longer uses external distributers. The current software is only available from the RootsMagic website. Installing RootsMagic 7 Essential on Windows Can they be synced back up to a new Ancestry tree if they are already linked in the downloaded tree? Not to keep you guessing: the answer is yes. Part of my test involves trying to download a tree with Word and PDF documents. Photos may be attached with the free version, but Word and PDF documents can only be attached locally with the upgraded version. My only caveat is the ability to attach files to your person profiles. None of these features are relevant to what I want to achieve in this review. Most of the “missing” features seem to be around printing your tree, making customized wall charts, and creating a family website. But if you click on some menu items, it will prompt you to upgrade to get the functionality. Just be aware that the user interface appears to be the same. Their website has a very long list of differences. RootsMagic Essential is the free version of the software, and it is the version I used for this review. So, should you use RootsMagic to back up your Ancestry tree? Well, I will continue to do so. The problematic elements are probably less frequently used by Ancestry users. I also encountered some software error messages, although they did not stop me from completing the tasks. Attribution of photos copied from other trees was lost.External web links as sources were missing.Notes These Ancestry elements were either not preserved or had issues:.Uploaded photos, Word documents, and PDFs.Persons, family structure, and life events.These Ancestry elements were preserved correctly: Before we dive into the details, here is a summary of using RootsMagic Essentials to back up your Ancestry tree. So how did RootsMagic measure up? This article is a step-by-step guide and an in-depth review. To get a true measure of the quality of the backup, I uploaded the RootsMagic tree into a new Ancestry copy and compared both trees side-by-side. I also added Ancestry’s special features: comments, TreeTags, and inline stories.

I tested RootsMagic Essentials by downloading a demo Ancestry tree that included records, photos, PDFs, and Word documents.

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