Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Bible

Installing Analysis Services

This section details the various ways in which Analysis Services may be installed along with key options available within the different modes supported.

Analysis Services, in this release, supports three different modes of operation. These modes include Multidimensional and Data Mining (the default mode), Tabular, and PowerPivot for SharePoint. As a result, ensuring the correct mode is selected during installation is important because the only available option to change the mode is to uninstall and reinstall Analysis Services selecting the wanted mode. These server modes ultimately determine which features will be installed for use, and as might be guessed, they each support different usage scenarios.

See the Microsoft Technet article Feature by Server Mode or Solution Type (SSAS) at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh212940.aspx for details about the various features supported by each of the Analysis Services server modes.

As with other SQL Server Services, Analysis Services can install multiple instances on the same server, and often this is used to support multiple server modes. It is often best to install the Multidimensional and Data Mining server mode as the default instance for the server. Another option is to create instances for each server mode employing a naming convention that would assist in knowing the server mode of each instance. ...