Illustrator CS4, new Pantone color books, color channel issue

Since I installed the new Pantone color books, I've been running in a major issue which will affect our whole production line.
If an Illustrator CS4 file contains a Photoshop CS4 image which is using an "old" Pantone color in a color channel, it cannot be opened and I get an error message "File is unreadable". If I replace the "old" Pantone colour with its new equivalent in the color channel in Photoshop, the file can be opened normally.
In our work environment, this means going through all our images to check which one is using a color channel. A painful and time wasting procedure. Furthermore, if one of our suppliers doesn't have the new color books, they won't be able to open any of the files, both Photoshop and Illustrator, so they have no way to revert back to the old Pantone.
Is there another way to fix this?
Thank you

More on the Pantone PLUS saga, hoping to get some input from the users of this forum. I find their silence deafening, to say the least. This is a serious issue, that will cost our agency hours and hours of work if it isn't addressed. And we've already wasted hours of troubleshooting and discussions on how we could resolve it.
We're actually testing a workaround: using both the old and the new libraries in Illustrator. After consulting our suppliers, we've learned that this is what they also do. For them, it's a one shot to get the file to print. For us, it means cheating with files that will get edited again in the future. And the Pantone installer removes the old Pantone books from the Adobe folders for a reason which is mentioned on the download page:
The reason that the PANTONE Color Libraries that had been built into Illustrator need to be removed and replaced with the PANTONE PLUS Color Libraries is that, in Illustrator, a PANTONE Color can only have one data point with which it is associated. In the short term, in order to benefit from the new colors and data associated in PLUS, the PANTONE Libraries that are installed with Adobe Illustrator are removed and replaced with the new PLUS Libraries.
http://www.pantone.com/pages/Pantone/Pantone.aspx?pg=20721&ca=1
I worry this may lead to another bunch of issue, knowing how easily AI files get corrupted. What I need to know is:
What is the exact meaning of the Pantone warning about the "one data point per color?
What are the long term implications of using both Pantone libraries in an Adobe file? Or in the Adobe app?

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[email protected]

Kelly,
And so I went in to each of my colors and manually changed them to RGB. I also changed my document format to RGB.
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JET
That was smashing!!! I'm so glad it's not me just being thick.
2010/1/24 JETalmage <[email protected]>
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>
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>
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>
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>
JET
>

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Hi All,
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HI this is good. But i have already seen this.
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Thanks!
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And it worked!
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Hi all.
Screenprinter here. Trying to migrate my way into CS4. No such
luck so far.
Way back in Illustrator CS2 I used to be able to place a PSD file with Spot Channels,
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Illustrator CS4, new Pantone color books, color channel issue

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