Can I view wallet.dat (old school I guess Core Bitcoin client) in some other manner than downloading the entire Blockchain.
You can use a pruned snapshot that is provided by LoyceV.
His post, the
pruned snapshot download link.
If you trust LoyceV, use this but
there are reasons to not use snapshot if you believe that you have bitcoin with considerable value in that wallet file.
Do IBD is the best, safest.