Problem
VinPower. Check for Updates No Longer Supported / Upgrading to VinPower 2.5

Solution
This article is no longer relevant. To upgrade to the latest VinPower which came out in version 2.1.59 and above of DeskLot, use DeskLot to Check for DeskLot Updates to update to at least version 2.1.59 of DeskLot. From there, DeskLot will automatically instruct you on what files to download to update the the new VinPower DLL system.

Prior to DeskLot version 2.0.71, DeskLot installed VinPower version 1.2. ESP Data Solutions, the maker of VinPower has done away with the previous method of checking for VinPower library updates and has released a new version of VinPower, version 2.5. In this version they have also corrected some other known issues.

To update DeskLot to use the latest version of VinPower, do the following:

1ST, backup your files to be safe as you will be uninstalling DeskLot. Under normal circumstances, uninstalling DeskLot will not remove your user files BUT, BE SAFE, BACKUP. You can do this by clicking File and then Backup Data from the main menu within DeskLot. This will ZIP up all files in your "c:\Program Files\WalkTheLot DeskLot\" folder into a ZIP file in the folder you choose.

In Windows, open Control Panel and select Add/Remove Programs. Find DeskLot by WalkTheLot.com and remove it.

Open "My Computer". Open "Local Disk (C:)". Find and open the folder "Program Files". From within the "Program Files" folder find and open "WalKTheLot DeskLot". Within this folder, locate and delete all of the following files if they exist. "VP_MOTOR.BIN", "VP_TRUCK.BIN", "VP_TRAIL.BIN", "VP_BASIC.BIN" and "VPSYSTEM.BIN". This step is very important.

Download the latest installation of DeskLot, save the setup file to your local hard drive and then install it.

If in the rare chance any of your files are not there, simply open the ZIP file you backed up to previously and restore any MDB (Microsoft Database) files located in it to your "c:\Program Files\WalkTheLot DeskLot\" folder.

Check that VinPower is decoding VIN's. If so, proceed. If not, please contact support.

Open DeskLot.

From the main DeskLot menu go to "Vin Decoding/ESP Data Solutions Add-Ons/Check For Library Updates" and click "Go".

IF YOU GET A MESSAGE THAT VINPOWER IS NOT REGISTERED, do not fear. This message just means that per this new version your contact information is not in their database that is used to confirm subscriptions. You will be presented with an option to register. Click Yes to register, submit your contact information and give it a day or so for them to confirm your subscription and update their database.

NOTE: As of 3/25/2004, we have noticed from time to time that the VinPower check for updates function can behave spuratically. Since this new release, we are still proving, testing, and solving any potential problems so details are a bit unclear at this point since we are at this stage. Sometimes we got messages that our copy was up to date, sometimes we got messages that we needed to register again, and in the worst case we got to download updates on some occasions and those updates caused our copy of DeskLot to not be able to open due to a permission denied error. We are working with VinPower support to resolve any issues. In the case of the Error Code 70 Permission Denied error after downloading library updates for VinPower, we located and had to replace the downloaded copies of VP_BASIC.BIN, VPSYSTEM.BIN, and VPX_WMI.BIN (if you ever need to do the same you may click the links above to download the files and save them in your "c:\Program Files\WalkTheLot DeskLot\" folder). Also, make sure that the files "VP_MOTOR.BIN", "VP_TRUCK.BIN" and "VP_TRAIL.BIN" do NOT exist in your "c:\Program Files\WalkTheLot DeskLot\". This step is very important. If you run into challenges, please let us know the specifics as well as any steps you took toward a resolution so that we may echo this information back to VinPower support.