As for the upgrade process and keeping all of the data? ABSOLUTELY! That's the point of the process identified here:
http://www.zen-cart.com/entry.php?3-...d-of-upgrading
As for the forced php upgrade? They sent out messages possibly more than a year ago that the php version was going to be increased and that effort should be taken to prepare the site to support that upgrade. This is also a reason why Zen Cart has been upgraded so much over the last several years. The intention being to support continued use in new server environments.
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