Process full refresh time out in Premium PBI model

Question

Hi,&nbsp;We have a PBI model in premium, it usually refreshes in 2 hours. At times, it is timing out.&nbsp;&nbsp;The tables are refreshed as 'process full' approach. When monitored the SQL query activity, (for eg: 1 big table takes approx 20 minutes) to finish running query on SQL pool. However the process full will not complete for another 30 minutes. That means, recalc on that particular table is taking time or timing out.&nbsp;&nbsp;Is that a proper assumption on why refresh is timing out sometimes? how can I validate what is causing the timeout issues?

pborah · Answer

Certainly. What level of admin are you in your tenant? O365 admins will have access to those logs in the admin portal if I am not mistaken. But you will have to sift through quite a bit. PowerBI and Workspace admins can use PowerBI specific cmdlets in Powershell to send commands to service via the API. Doing certain things in there are restricted to PowerBI admins only. But if you are atleast a workspace admin, you will be able to do refreshes and putput verbose.https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/connect-data/asynchronous-refreshhttps://community.fabric.microsoft.com/t5/Service/Refresh-a-Power-BI-Dataset-with-PowerShell/m-p/1626795Google is your friend here.

pborah · Answer

Hi&nbsp;msft-cap&nbsp;part of it depends on your Premium instance, as in - what tier are you subscribed to. That will determine what system capacity is available to you for a big refresh. The other thing to consider is if your pbix has calculated columns (and how many of them) that are derived from columns from SQL. Additionally, it depends on if the DAX code for those calculated columns is concise or overly lengthy or complex. That takes additional system resources. Finally, is there a specific reason you are reloading the entire dataset each refresh instead of doing incremental refresh? I can certainly understand specific scenarions where such a thing is necessary. We have a few reports where sometimes the original data for an old entry gets altered in light of new information so we do a full load once a month for those reports.&nbsp;

msft-cap · Answer

Hi&nbsp;pborah&nbsp;- I am currently trying to explain the user why there are refresh time-outs rather than solving the issue. That is what they are looking for. Anywhere I can check for traffic on the server or that dataset that is causing timeouts? possible proofs to check what is exactly causing time-out during refresh.

pborah · Answer

If you are a Power BI admin or an O365 tenant admin, you might be able to obtain those logs and take a deep dive. Otherwise if you are a workspace admin for the specific workspace where that model is located in, you can try using powershell to run the refresh and have a verbose log output.

msft-cap · Answer

Great, thanks. I will check those options. By any chance, would you be able to point me to articles or blogs on these options?

Forum Discussion

Process full refresh time out in Premium PBI model

8 Replies

Related content

Recommended Deployment Process for Incremental Refresh Changes

Refresh - Premium vs. Pro

Incremental refresh process

PowerBI Premium (PPP)

Month-end Dataflow Refresh Process