SQL SERVER – OLE DB Provider ‘Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0’ for Linked Server ‘(null)’ Returned Message ‘Unspecified Error’

There are many situations where you have to create a linked server to Microsoft Excel and read data from there. While doing that, I encountered an error and in this blog, we would discuss how to fix OLE DB provider ‘Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0’ for linked server ‘(null)’ returned message ‘Unspecified error’

Below query can read data from excel in a shared location.

SELECT * FROM OPENROWSET(
'Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0'
,'Excel 12.0;Database=\\\\FileServer\\ExcelShare\\HRMSDATA.xlsx;HDR=YES;IMEX=1'
,'SELECT * FROM [EMPMASTER$]')

This was failing with error:

OLE DB provider ‘Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0’ for linked server ‘(null)’ returned message ‘Unspecified error’.
Msg 7303, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Cannot initialize the data source object of OLE DB provider ‘Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0’ for linked server ‘(null)’.

SOLUTION/WORKAROUND – OLEDB

Based on my search on the internet, we were not seeing DisallowAdHocAccess registry key under.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL14.MSSQLSERVER\Providers\Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0

We then executed below command and key got created automatically.

USE [master]
GO
EXEC master.dbo.sp_MSset_oledb_prop N'Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0', N'DisallowAdHocAccess', 0
GO

After this, we were able to read data from excel without any error.

If you find some other solution, please share via comments.

Here are a few other blog post related to the same subject:

• SQL SERVER – Quickest Way to Add LoopBack Linked Server for OpenQuery
• SQL SERVER – FIX – Linked Server Error 7399 Invalid authorization specification
• SQL SERVER – Linked Server Error: TCP Provider: No Connection Could be Made Because the Target Machine Actively Refused It
• SQL SERVER – How to Create Linked Server to SQL Azure Database?

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Published by Pinal Dave on SQLAuthority. More of my work at pinaldave.com.