Conditional formatting based on multiple criteria

Question

I don't know if what I wrote in the title is specific enough to what I'm looking for, anyway, I'll try and explain as much as possible here.

I have two sheets, one is the layout, the other is the database.

The layout is a layout of computers in an office, and in the database I have various information about those computers (e.g. manufacturer, processor, etc).

What I'm looking for is a way to change the colors of the cells in the layout sheet based on the data in the 'db' sheet.

This is the first sheet, where numbers are the ID's of the computers. On the second sheet, I have more information about each number.

This is from the second sheet, the 'db' sheet.

What I'm trying to do here is change the colors of the cells in the first sheet based on information on the second sheet and based on the dropdown selected.

For example, in the pictures above, I have chosen 'computer' which needs to change the color of the cells based on the manufacturer given in the second sheet.

I would've posted a formula that I'm currently working on, but the problem is I'm very new to conditional formatting and currently am completely stumped on this problem.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

This might not be exactly what you're looking for but it's on the right path. I'm not sure if "Dell" and "HP" are supposed to be dynamic results of the data validation or? Either way...

  =AND(VLOOKUP(C2:C,INDIRECT("Sheet2!A2:B"),1)=C2:C,VLOOKUP(C2:C,INDIRECT("Sheet2!A2:B"),2)="Dell",$D$3="computer")

and

 =AND(VLOOKUP(C2:C,INDIRECT("Sheet2!A2:B"),1)=C2:C,VLOOKUP(C2:C,INDIRECT("Sheet2!A2:B"),2)="HP",$D$3="computer")

Be sure to reference C:K in the Conditional Formatting Rules. That way you can avoid having to repeat the process for each column.