Premiere Pro 24.1 update causes older productions to fail to load...

[zeitlosmedia]

My Premiere Pro got auto-updated from 24.0 to 24.1 (even though i had auto-update turned off, but that's another story), and now I cannot open or edit any of my film! 

I've been working for months on this project, and had to update Premiere a few times, but the Production was always able to update - but not anymore.

First, the "Production Upgrade" was freezing my machine - so I deleted all video & audio cache files (and the partial upgraded Production folder the upgrade had created), restarted, and tried again...

This time, it upgraded the Production and successfully created the new folders, but when I try to open ANY of the new files, it tells me I have to Upgrade the AGAIN...

This is the loop I'm stuck in. No matter how many times I upgrade the Production, it tells me I need to upgrade it again to open.

[zeitlosmedia]

I've downgraded to 24.0 and even uninstalled and re-installed Premiere and Creative Cloud - but I STILL cannot open any of my 24.0 Project files from my Production. 

I upgraded this Production to 24.0 on November 3rd - and all was working fine since then until now.

Now, I cannot open or edit any of my files anymore. They're stuck in a perpetual loop of "these need to be upgraded".

[zeitlosmedia · Accepted solution]

I fixed the issue thanks to another post in these forums:

This assumes you have 7-Zip installed. It’s free and awesome and why would anyone not have it! 

Also, that you have a COPY of your project that you will be converting.

++++ Make a Copy of your project with a New Name in the same folder as the original ++++

•      1) Right-Click the COPY of the project and from the 7-Zip menu select “Open Archive”

•      2) In 7-Zip there is one file same name as the project – Right-Click the file and select EDIT*

•      3) On the fourth line change the Version = “??” Change the number portion to “1” Save and Close

•      4) 7-Zip will ask you if you want to update that file in the archive, Select <OK>

That’s it! When you open the project Premiere Pro will say it is from a Previous Version, and will give it a new name as usual.

*Of note, on step 2, the bigger your project the longer it takes to open.

Thank you to @MyerPj for the answer in this thread. 

ADOBE - you customer support was utterlym useless and wasted my time.

[MyerPj]

You're welcome 🙂

Open a Premiere project in an earlier version