Leave referencing cell blank if referenced cell is blank but has a formula

Question

I've searched through so many forums on here to find exactly what I'm looking for but haven't found what I needed.

Basically I have a workbook with cells that reference another workbook. Column A cells fill the date from the other workbook as does column B. I'd like for cells in column C to have an "X" if the cell in column A has actual data in it and left blank if it does not. The problem I'm running into is that Excel is putting an "X" in all of the cells in column C because it's reading that Cell A has a formula in it to pull the data from the other workbook.

Current formula: =IF(OR(ISBLANK(A5>"")),"","X")

I've tried isblank, not, etc, nothing seems to be working. Below is an example of what it's doing:

The problem

What I want

Answer 1

The OR() function typically works with more than one condition. You want to see if either A or B is blank, but you only test for A.

IsBlank() returns true if a cell is blank. You only need to pass it a cell, nothing else. You are using a cell compared to a blank string as the argument, which is not correct syntax.

Try this:

=IF(OR(A5="",B5=""),"","X")

On the other hand, pre-filling a column with a formula is not good data architecture. You can turn the data into an Excel Table object with Insert > Table and enter the formula for the existing rows of the table. Then the formula will automatically be applied to new rows that are added or inserted.