Exactly Phil, not enough detail.
Until and unless OP can tell us exactly what the goal is here then we're just guessing...
The transactional method is a good approach and one I use against my data as I don't use the cascade-delete in my relations between tables so it's very handy to be able to roll-back the changes if one of the records somewhere cannot be altered.
BigO56,
A) The secondary backend is only to hold a temp table, the user wouldn't even be aware of its existence if handled properly.
B) perhaps you can provide the needed details?
As you can see, we now have two viewpoints on what it is that you are attempting, is it:
1) You are attempting to preserve the original data
or
2) You are attempting to validate changes before committing/saving them to the records.
or
3) Something else?
C) Please review our FAQ on how to ask a good question:
How to ask "good" questions --
You have the "Brevity" aspect down; however, your posts are lacking the needed "Technical Details." IN this case IMHO, you need to provide us with the concept behind this data manipulation.
D) You should also read:
home > topics > microsoft access / vba > insights > database normalization and table structures
From the two posts here, it gives me the impression that there is a basic design flaw.
++ It would be helpful to know how experienced you are with Access, VBA, and database design.