Steps to connec to SQL Server 2012

[constantLearner]

Here's the problem I am facing:

I have an SQL Server 2012 database hosted on a remote machine which can be accessed from another remote machine. I need to connect to the SQL Server 2012 database using PowerBI desktop version.

Can anyone help me with the steps.

[v-yuezhe-msft · Accepted solution]

Hi @constantLearner,

Adding to other post, you can follow steps below to connect to SQL Server from Power BI Desktop.

1. Open Power BI Desktop, select the Get Data>Database>SQL Server Database option as shown in the following screenshot.

2. In the connection, enter your SQL Server name and the database name. For differences between Import and DirectQuery, please check this article. There are also advanced options to specify the timeout if the query takes long time to execute and an option the specify the SQL Commands.

3.Select the authentication method to connect to your database. If you use a SQL login rather than a Windows login, please choose Database in the following screenshot and enter your account and password.

4. You will receive a message about the connection. It does not support encrypted connection. Click OK to accept the unencrypted connection.

5. Select tables to load into Power BI Desktop from the navigator.

For more details about the above steps, you can also review this similar blog.

Thanks,
Lydia Zhang

[ankitpatira]

@constantLearner As long as from the machine where power bi desktop is installed you're able to talk to machine that is on another machine (where your database is), you don't need to do anythign except open power bi desktop and connect to database.