Hello,
I’ve definitely a newbie. I started using Blender September 2010. I started with 2.49b then bought a new computer and installed 2.55 Beta. Now that 2.56 Beta is out, I am not sure what the steps and precautions are to upgrade to the “latest” version. Do you uninstall/re-install, install over current installation or is there a upgrade/update function within Blender? I really did not find any documentation on upgrading your installation. Only what would seem to be a clean or first time installation. So for me it is not very clear. Would someone be kind enough to post here the instructions? I would like to keep all my .blend files and my current user preferences to use in the latest Beta version. BTW- where might I find the user preferences and what is the file most likely called?
The answers to this will likely be helpful to many new users!
Rich, you can install over the old instalation, and everything will work just fine. Also, you can download .zip - ed version. Just unpack it anywhere and it will work too. Afterward, if you are happy you can overwrite old files with the unzipped ones and it will work too… So, everything goes - Blender is amazing that way!
If you visit www.graphicall.org, you can download best and newest build for your computer. For those I would advise to unpack them in a new folder and overwrite old files if everything works (lots of experimental builds there)
Also, your user preferences are stored in a folder called config. Mine is located at C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.56\config, the key file is the startup.blend.
