System Requirements: Standalone specification
Overview
This article provides a set minimum and recommended system requirements, both hardware and software, for standalone computers operating the current suite of CCH Software products. The article is aimed at assisting in the choices made before installing the software as a new customer or when upgrading or replacing existing hardware and/or software.
The article has two distinct sections: Notes & Warnings and System Requirements. Notes & Warnings provides more generalised advice for certain aspects of system design, as well as covering software components that have reached end-of-life or are approaching end-of-life.
Guidance is provided for standalone computers with the aim of assisting suitably qualified IT staff or staff with respected IT knowledge and experience in deriving a supported platform for CCH Software products.
Where multiple CCH Software products are being deployed we would always recommend that additional advice is sought from the CCH Software Installations & Technical Services Team to ensure that all objectives in terms of deployment support and performance are met.
Notes & Warnings
General Recommendations
- Disk hard drive space required on standalone computers at runtime: 70-80 MB per program
- Free disk space required on standalone computers at installation because of the use of temporary directories and temporary files: 20 GB or above
- A Solid State Disk (SSD - SATA3 or NVMe) is recommended for optimal system performance
Unsupported Environments
- Home Editions of Windows
- Windows 10 Home
- Windows 11 Home
End of Life
The following operating systems and software have reached end of life and are consequently no longer supported:
- Windows 95, Windows NT4, Windows 98, Windows 2000 and Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 R2
- SQL Server 2000 (including Microsoft SQL Server Desktop Engine), SQL Server 2005 (including SQL Server 2005 Express), SQL Server 2008 (including SQL Server 2008 Express), SQL Server 2008 R2 (including SQL Server 2008 R2 Express) and SQL Server 2012 (including SQL Server 2012 Express)
- SQL Server 2014 (including SQL Server 2014 Express)
- Microsoft Office 2000, XP, 2003, 2007, 2010 and 2013
- Internet Explorer 8, 9, 10 and 11
Future Support
- N/A
Approaching End of Life
-
- 14th October 2025
- Microsoft Office 2021 (Retirement as part of Modern Policy)
- 13th October 2026
- SQL Server 2017
- 12th October 2027
System Requirements
CCH Central/CCH SecTAX/CCH Trust Accounts
The below information is also valid when deploying the following modules of CCH Central:
- CCH Accounts Production
- CCH Audit Automation (SQL)
- CCH Autofill
- CCH Campaign Management
- CCH Corporation Tax
- CCH CGT & Dividend Scheduling
- CCH Document Management
- CCH Email Marketing
- CCH Fee Protection
- CCH OneClick
- CCH Personal Tax
- CCH Portal
- CCH Practice Management
- CCH Reporting
- CCH Review & Tag
- CCH Scan
- CCH Workflow
- IFirm
System requirements - standalone computers
The requirements in the following table apply to standalone computers. Minimum and recommended specifications are provided as a guide only and should be used in conjunction with requirements for non-CCH software applications to compile a specification capable of supporting the set of applications that will be running concurrently on the system to meet an expected level of performance.
|
Component |
Minimum Requirement |
Recommended Requirement |
| Processor (CPU) | Dual-core 2.5 gigahertz (GHz) or equivalent | Dual-core, or more, with a clock speed of 3.5 GHz or faster using an Intel i5/i7/i9 or AMD Ryzen 2000/3000/4000/5000/7000 CPU. The latest generation of CPUs are recommended. |
| Physical Memory (RAM) | 8 gigabytes (GB): 64-bit Operating System | 8 GB +: 64-bit Operating System |
| Hard Disk Drive | 20 gigabytes (GB) available | 20 GB or 20% free space available |
|
Display Device |
A monitor with a resolution of 1280 x 1024 or higher Default/Normal dots per square inch (DPI) recommended Default/Normal fonts recommended |
Same as minimum |
|
Physical Internet Connection |
10 megabit per second (Mbps) download speed. Downloading the complete CCH Central suite over a 10 Mbps connection will take approximately 1 hours. |
14+ Mbps, or faster, download speed on a ADSL 2+ connection. Downloading the complete CCH Central suite over a 14 Mbps connection will take approximately 45 minutes. |
|
Operating System |
Windows 10 (64-bit) Windows 11 (64-bit) Note: Choose a business-orientated edition of Microsoft Windows. Home and Core editions are not supported. |
Same as minimum |
|
Database System |
The Central Suite Installer (CSI) installs the following pre-requisites in a standalone environment:
|
Same as minimum |
|
Internet Browser |
Opera; Microsoft Edge; Mozilla Firefox; Apple Safari; or Google Chrome |
Same as minimum |
|
Microsoft .NET Framework |
3.5, 4.8 and 6.0 For .NET 6 the Desktop Runtime and ASP.NET Core 6.0 Runtime are required |
Same as minimum |
| SQL Server Native Client | 2012 (CCH Audit Automation SQL) | Same an minimum |
|
Additional requirements |
Certain functions within CCH Central use integration with Microsoft Office. The currently supported Microsoft Office versions are:
Integration is typically implemented between the following Office applications:
Choose the appropriate edition of MS Office to enable the entire suite of functionality. 64-bit Office only supported if running Central 2020.3 or later with MS Office 2019/2022. PDF functionality requires the presence of PDF viewer software such as Acrobat® Reader® or an Internet Browser with built-in PDF reader functionality. Client Portal and CCH OneClick solutions for mobile devices such as phones or tablets operate within iOS (ver. 10 or above) or Android environments only. Regional & Language settings within the Operating System (at System and User level) must be set as English (UK). |
Same as minimum |