3 basic Power Pivot questions

[bromberg]

1) Is Power Pivot made for the home user or is it intended for small to medium businesses?

2) The download size is ≈121MB; does that include the SQL Server and do I need SQL Server?

3) Is there any Excel utility that can examine and report on the contents of a cell? I recently had what visually appeared to be valid dates in about a dozen cells (of a table with only 3700 rows) which turned out to be invalid and consequently a date filter used by the pivot table failed. (Through trial and error I was able to determine the dates in error til I finally got the date filter to work by replacing these dates).

Since Excel was not at all helpful in the error message it issued, I'm wondering if there is an Excel Debugging utility?

Thanks,
Dan

 

[Matt Allington]

1) It is intended for anyone that needs to analyse data and is well within the reach of a good Excel Power User

2) no and no

3) a difficult question! Yes you can use the ISDATE() formula to check this, but then again you Re only likely to try that if you suspect a problem. I suggest you investigate Power Query as a data load and cleansing tool

 

[bromberg]

1) It is intended for anyone that needs to analyse data and is well within the reach of a good Excel Power User

2) no and no

3) a difficult question! Yes you can use the ISDATE() formula to check this, but then again you Re only likely to try that if you suspect a problem. I suggest you investigate Power Query as a data load and cleansing tool

Matt:

Thanks for your reply to my questions and the Power Query suggestion.
Tell me, I know Power Pivot is 121 MB and I assume Power Query is huge as well, I have the space for them but am concerned that loading these 2 add-on will slow down my Excel to a crawl Have you noticed any performance degradation when using these 2 add-ons?

Dan

 

[scottsen]

I really dont think you would notice any slow down -- and if you did, you could just disable the addins when not in use.

 

[bromberg]

I really dont think you would notice any slow down -- and if you did, you could just disable the addins when not in use.

Scott,

Thanks - that's what I was hoping you would say.
Regarding how to disable a specific add-in, I see where the MANAGE drop-down menu (under FILE | OPTIONS | ADD-INS) has a DISABLE ITEMS choice; is that how I would disable a specific add-in or does that disable all add-ins?

Or is there am easier way to disable the POWER PIVOT & POWER QUERY add-ins?

Thanks again,
Dan

 

[JimMatthews]

You need to go to File\Options\Addins\Com Addins and deselect the ones you don't need. But I am with Scott - I don't think you will have an issue

 

[TimRodman]

It maybe takes an extra second or two for my Excel to load, nothing significant. Here are my specs:

 

[scottsen]

I typically add the "Developer" ribbon to Excel, making it a bit easier to get the Addins.