Re: Going from a DB using SQL_ASCII to UNICODE - Mailing list pgsql-admin

"Dion Almaer" <dion@almaer.com> writes:
> When we try to import the data from a SQL_ASCII dumped db, into the new
> UNICODE db, everything freaks out.

I'm no expert on this stuff, but I think what you need to do is add

    set client_encoding = sql_ascii;

to the top of the dump file.  (As of fairly recently, pg_dump will
automatically add such a SET, but I'm pretty sure 7.4.2 won't.)

If that doesn't help, then what you have is actually not valid UTF-8
data, and what you'll have to do is figure out what encoding it's in and
specify that instead.  If it's in a mishmash of different encodings,
you're in for some pain :-(

            regards, tom lane