CDR Import

[Tong]

so no corel import? i want to buy designer but lack of this feature is like a bummer

[John Rostron]

I used to use Corel Draw X7. I found that exporring as either pdf or svg then importing into AD gave acceptable results. True, I did need to do a little tweaking, especially of text and re-ordering objects, but most obects came over OK. Overall, svg was better than pdf.

 

I suspect that any cdr import in AD woud be unlikely to be any better than this!

[RSI]

Very sad, I bought Affinity Designer (for Windows) and now find that it can't import my old CDR files.
And apparently this is not planned either... very, very sad and at the same time incomprehensible!

 

[dominik]

35 minutes ago, RSI said:

Very sad, I bought Affinity Designer (for Windows) and now find that it can't import my old CDR files.
And apparently this is not planned either... very, very sad and at the same time incomprehensible!

 

Hello @RSI, welcome to the forums.

I understand that it is inconvenient for you not being able to directly import 'old Coreldraw files'. But please take into account that it is not very likely that Affinity products would be able to read and translate any older Corel file format because they do work very differently. It would take a huge amount of time to program this properly and I'd rather see this time spent on features unique to AD.

I suggest you investigate some kind of external conversion of your CDR files and then bring them into AD. PDF might be a good start to try and see if this transfers your old desgins well. There are several (free) online services that do this kind of conversion. E.g. Zamzar (https://www.zamzar.com/converters/image/cdr-to-pdf/).

And in regard to the fact that you already bought AD, there is a refund policy if that is an option for you.

d.

[RSI]

34 minutes ago, dominik said:

Hello @RSI, welcome to the forums.

I understand that it is inconvenient for you not being able to directly import 'old Coreldraw files'. But please take into account that it is not very likely that Affinity products would be able to read and translate any older Corel file format because they do work very differently. It would take a huge amount of time to program this properly and I'd rather see this time spent on features unique to AD.

I suggest you investigate some kind of external conversion of your CDR files and then bring them into AD. PDF might be a good start to try and see if this transfers your old desgins well. There are several (free) online services that do this kind of conversion. E.g. Zamzar (https://www.zamzar.com/converters/image/cdr-to-pdf/).

And in regard to the fact that you already bought AD, there is a refund policy if that is an option for you.

d.

Thank you for your help and information.
 

I would prefer not to convert my old data via an online service.
So I guess I will look for a tool that does this as well as possible.
Since I don't use CD anymore (my last version doesn't work properly via Windows 10), I unfortunately can't export this directly via CD either.

 

[dominik]

3 minutes ago, RSI said:

I would prefer not to convert my old data via an online service.
So I guess I will look for a tool that does this as well as possible.
Since I don't use CD anymore (my last version doesn't work properly via Windows 10), I unfortunately can't export this directly via CD either.

Not to do this via an online service is a viable requirement for some files. I do understand this.

You are not alone with the need to reuse old files that can not be accessed anymore. There have been some discussion about this here in the forum. Some users came to the conclusion that it can be most efficient to recreate old designs because convertion and fixing things afterwards turned out to be even more laborious.

Good luck.
d.

[RSI]

Yeah, I've had the thought of redoing it in AD as well, that will probably be even better for some things.
So, let's see how it will be...

[megalonzerg]

I have been using Corel Draw since version 5. It has always been overall the best vector program till version 12 which broke a lot of things and also became rental software, so that if Corel Corp went away, I would no longer be able to install it on a new or upgraded computer since they started requiring internet authorization. So I went back to version 11, the best version they ever made, and have used that till now.

Unfortunately, our IT people are requiring everyone to "upgrade" to Windows 10 "for security reasons" and Windows 10 refuses to allow version 11 to be installed (that makes it a downgrade in my world). So I am being forced to use the current version of Corel Draw which is a stripped down shadow of what I am used to with 11. It has gotten so complicated and awkward to do simple things and so cluttered with useless handles, cryptic icons, hard to read and badly arranged interface, and worthless options stacked on top of useful ones, that all it does is get me angry and make me feel like I am wasting half my day nursing its deficiencies.

I contacted our IT department about getting me a trial version of Illustration's current version, thinking it could not be as bad as current Corel, but someone told me to try Affinity Designer instead. Watching some tutorials on YouTube I can see that it will probably do what I need and be easy to learn, but I do have 40 years of .CDR files that I would want to be able to convert to Affinity whenever one was needed, and probably 100 or so that I would need to convert right away. If I could import them directly into this program I would buy it today without further research. I know I am not alone in feeling abandoned by the current idiots in charge of Corel Corp.

So, for now, I will keep looking for information others have posted on the ether about moving from Corel to Affinity. Thanks to everyone for information.

[pruus]

Have you tried Libre Office? This program can read CDR files. Not always great, but better than nothing.

Link:  https://www.libreoffice.org/download/download-libreoffice/ 

you open the CDR file, than you can save it as an PDF. This file can be opened in Affinity.

I have also tried several online conversions. But I did not find one which worked every time,