Converting Date to Number formats

[Steve]

I am looking for advise in two converting dates to number
formats.

I am downloading a zip file that unzips into .txt format.
I then open the .txt file into Excel 2000 with the fields
delimited by a tab. The file opens in Excel giving me time
information that is displayed as 40:25:00 (40 min 25
seconds). I would like to take this information and
convert it into a number format 40:25:00 becoming 40.4
minutes. This is were I am having difficulty.

Although the information visually appears as time when I
go to format it the formula tool bar (likely I have the
wrong name but it is next to the = sign) displays
1/1/1900 4:25:00 PM. In the event of a large number of
minutes like 618:00:00 the formulat tool bar displays
1/25/1900 6:00:00 PM. I think that Excel is reading the
information as hours and adding it to a starting point of
01/01/1900. Other than that I have no idea as to how to
make the conversion. Can anyone make suggestions ?

 

[Peo Sjoblom]

Steve,

assume you have 40:25:00, to get 40.4
Just multiply with 24 and format as general
It's obvious that excel sees it as 40 hours and 25 minutes but that doesn't
really matter since the decimal value should be the same, note that if you
want to convert it back to real minutes (excel minutes that is) you have to
divide by 1440

 

[Steve]

PEO

Thanks for the quick answer. Sometimes the simple
solution is right before your eyes but we just cant see
it. Thanks for your looking at it and cutting to the quick

Steve