Initialization of the data source failed - Excel 2016

1
votes

I'm trying to refresh a query in Excel 2016 (new install) and I get the above error. I've looked around, the problem seems quite common, but none of the answers seem to fit my issue.

In Excel, I have a couple of tabs of data in Excel tables. I use Get & Transform to import these tables into Power Query from where I generate 4 further tables of data, which are uploaded to the Data Model. I then create 3 relationships and generate 3 pivot tables with a single slicer to operate the tables.

When I come out of Excel and go back in and select "Refresh All", this is when I get the error:

Initial of the data source failed.

Check the database server or contract your db admin. Make sure the external db is available and then try the operation again. If you see this message again, create a new data source to connect to the DB

The data source is the excel workbook. I tried re-creating the Power Query queries etc, but to no avail.

Repair on Power Pivot also didn't work.

Given it's a new install of 2016, which comes with Power Query and Pivot as standard, I'm not sure where to try next.

Any help much appreciated.

1
powerpivotpowerqueryexcel-2016
Have you tried it on a non new install? I know the first thing I do on any new install of Excel/PQ is set it to "Ignore Privacy Settings", because this never fails to break something for me. Normally my issue is due to references to external files on a network, but I'm sure there are other things that setting can break. – Wedge
Yes, I should have explained in my initial email. I tried it first on my own PC, which was an upgrade of a previous Excel version, and then I tried on another user's PC that had a fresh install of Excel on an entirely new build PC. Typically, I am not in the office today, but I'll give the Ignore Privacy Settings a try when I am back in. Thanks for your response. – RicoS321

1 Answers

-1
votes

I ran a repair on my installed version of Excel 2010, and that seems to solve the issue for me, I've seen sometimes when the user has multiple versions of excel installed library references can get broken, resulting in this error.