Excel - File not loaded completely - error message

This is normally caused by trying to load a large csv file into an older (pre 2007) version of Excel - rest assured the data is still available. Older versions of Excel were limited to reading in 255 variables. That happens to include all versions of Excel prior to version 2007. You can test this yourself by opening the .csv file in a text editor rather than in Excel. So, how do you access the remaining data if you do not have Excel 2007 or later?

Using the SPSS native .SAV data file that ought to be located in your byVariableName data folder. SPSS has no problem with big data files.

With a little effort, you can import the .csv file into SPSS like this:

Rename the file from .csv to .txt. Then, in SPSS, select:

File > New > Data
File > Open
Files of type > Tab-delimited (*.dat,*.txt)
File name <select your file>
Predefined format? No
Delimited? Yes
Variable names at top? Yes
First case = Line 2
Each line represents a case? Yes
All of the cases? Yes
Delimiter? Comma (uncheck all others)
Finish

You can always look at the data directly in any text editor. If the file is especially large and difficult to read in its raw form, try a powerful free text editor like PSPad from www.pspad.com.

Or you could always upgrade to Excel 2007 or later.