I want to be able to protect large chunks of my workbook, so that the cells
can't be written over. However I do need to be able to allow some external
data queries, filters and a subtotal funtion to operate (without me taking
the protection on and off every single time).

From the attempts that I've made so far it looks like it isn't possible to
achieve the data manipulation I need with sheet protection. Is this right?

If so, is there any other way that I can protect my reports output without
limiting the ability to view and manipulate the data?