Data structure and data limits

[Anonymous]

Hi 

How is the data stored/structured in BI?

Is it stored in tables like Access, as an example?

Are there any data limits?

Thanks

Andy

[GuyInACube]

The following post talks about Data Model limits within an Excel Workbook.  

https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Data-Model-specification-and-limits-19aa79f8-e6e8-45a8-9be2...

I don't know that this is the same within Power BI Desktop as we actually use an AS Tabular instance instead of the in-memoy engine like we do in Excel, so you may have more flexability.  

Is that what you were looking for?

[Anonymous]

Hi

Thanks for your prompt reply

Your answer refers to Excel, doesn't BI have its own database?

Thanks

Andy

[GuyInACube]

We use the Data Model.  Excel is one of the containers of the Data Model.  Power BI Desktop is another and then Analysis Services Tabular.

[andre]

@Anonymous just to add to Adam's last comment, the engine that we know as Power Pivot in Excel or what we sometimes call a model in Power BI Desktop is in fact Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services.  When you open up Power BI Desktop or Power Pivot, you effectively instantiate a Tabular instance of Analysis Services.

SQL Server 2014 is running inside Excel 2013 Power Pivot and SQL Server 2016 is running inside Power BI Desktop.  So, if you want to understand practical limits of Power Pivot or Desktop Data models, you can simply look up limitations of the respective versions of Analysis Services.