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>Not sure how I got that result! I could not reproduce it. Both vfp9 and vfp7 giving CP850. So I've used cpzero and reset the cp to 1252 in the salesdet.dbf and it has definitely speeded things up in my test routine; vfp9 is now similar to vfp7 over 60 iterations. I'll do more on it tomorrow and let you know how I get on. Many thanks for the pointers. I would never have thought of code pages as the isssue.

Hi Barry,

I'm glad it got resolved.