Backing up database/restoring from backup

[yayvb]

I'm sure this has been asked many times, but I would like answers specific to my question anyone. Thanks!!

Ok, my site is running vb 3.5.2 which is more up-to-date than I've seen some people's websites. But soon I will want to upgrade, and my site is heavily hacked!!

I tried a standard upgrade on one of my other sites which was hacked slightly LESS than my live one, and of course it died so I had to remove the database and reinstall. In other words it wouldn't do the upgrade, database problems if I remember correctly.

Now there must be a way for me to upgrade from 3.5.2 hacked to 3.5.4. If I backup the database, I don't want to just wipe the site clean, upload the new database and voila. I imagine the database from 3.5.2 would give errors if restored onto 3.5.4.

Where do I find out more info on this? I didn't find anything specific to this in this forum, although I'm sure it's here.

[Reeve of shinra]

a) I'm not sure why you had a problem running the upgrade. My forums have a ton of hacks but that was never an issue... anyhow, I doubt that will be a problem now.

b) if the upgrade fails, drop the db and restore the backup. It wont restore it into the 3.5.4 db, it will be a 3.5.2 db.

Just make sure you keep your 3.5.2 files handy to reupload if its needed. (I usually rename forums to forums-old and then upload the new files to forum).