External table is not in the expected format

I got this error while I was writing down a small utility to import data from excel. The error was in connection string which I used:

strdbConn = "Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;" + "Data Source=" +

                                strFilePath

                                + "; Jet OLEDB:Engine Type=5;"

                                + "Extended Properties=Excel 8.0;";

 

Now I had windows 7 x64 bit and similarly Office 2010 professional plus and the above connection string didn't work.

Resolution:

Finally you need to use the following connection string in here:

 

strdbConn = "Provider=Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0;Data Source=" 

+ strFilePath + 

";Extended Properties=Excel 12.0;";

 

And the error was resolved!