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Opening an old dwg file with AutoCAD 2013

Printed From: CAD Forum
Category: EN
Forum Name: AutoCAD
Forum Description: Discussion about AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT, viewers, DWG and DWF formats, Design Review, AutoCAD 360, add-ons
URL: https://www.cadforum.cz/forum_en/forum_posts.asp?TID=9170
Printed Date: 16.May.2026 at 09:40


Topic: Opening an old dwg file with AutoCAD 2013
Posted By: chiveve
Subject: Opening an old dwg file with AutoCAD 2013
Date Posted: 22.Apr.2013 at 14:32
Can anyone advise what the best way is to open an AutoCAD 1.4 (Yes 1.4 :-)) file in AutoCAD 2013?


Replies:
Posted By: John Connor
Date Posted: 22.Apr.2013 at 15:33
Use OPEN?

Why would you expect there to be a problem?  It's a DWG file which is the native file format for AutoCAD drawings.  There couldn't possibly be anything it it that 2013 couldn't deal with.

Now if you were trying to open a drawing created with 2013 in version 1.4 THEN you would have a definite problem.

Anyway, AutoCAD is not Inventor.  Files created with previous releases can be opened with no problem unless of course the file is corrupted.  Is the file on your hard drive?  A floppy disk (if so 5 1/4 or 3 1/2)?  Other media?


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"Humans have a strength that cannot be measured. This is John Connor. If you are reading this, you are the resistance."

<<AutoCAD 2015>>

Posted By: chiveve
Date Posted: 22.Apr.2013 at 18:06
Hi John, I recently received a couple of hundred electrical drawings which were done many years ago and have tried opening them on various versions of AutoCAD including LT 97, as I remember having previously had a problem opening LT 97 files on newer versions of AutoCAD. AutoCAD 2013 just does not open these files.
Today I tried opening them in my recently installed AutoCAD 2014 and actually got a message saying "Cannot open old file format"!
The files are stored on a hard drive and I doubt that they can all be currupted.

Posted By: John Connor
Date Posted: 22.Apr.2013 at 18:27
Yes, files can be corrupted even if they are stored on a hard drive.  Happens more often than one would imagine it should.

Find, download and install DWG TrueView.  See if you can open one of the old files with that program (it is free from AutoDesk).  If you can then you can do a "save as" to a newer DWG file format.

My oldest files go back to Release 9 and I can open them in 2013.

Are you sure they were created with AutoCAD and not one of the other programs AutoDesk had at the time?


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"Humans have a strength that cannot be measured. This is John Connor. If you are reading this, you are the resistance."

<<AutoCAD 2015>>


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