I have a few computers.. All the drives in the machines are < 2TB. I have 3 drives in my WHS (OS 250gb), Client backups (2tb), WHS backup (4tb). My client backup drive is full.

Can I use a 4tb drive?

Can anyone offer some advice please?

I have a server running WHS 2011, for the past few years I have been running it with 2x2TB disks mirrored, a SSD for the operating system a 250GB for server backup and one empty bay.

Yesterday I removed the 250GB drive and fitted 2 more 2TB drives.

I had planned to partition them both 1.8/0.2 using one of the 200GB partitions as a server backup and the 1.8 mirrored for data storage.

WHS appears to want to use the whole 2TB as a server backup, which is not only a waste of space but leaves me unable to mirror my other drive.

Is it possible to use a partition as a server backup?

Do I even need a server backup, if I cloned my SSD onto the old 250GB drive every 6 months for disaster recovery would that be good enough, I was only saving the SSD in my server backup anyway as the other disks were mirrored. 

If I perform a full backup, using Windows Backup on a Windows 7 system, I understand that it creates a single zip of the entire backup.

But if I then perform a later backup, I understand it is an incremental backup, i.e., only the files changed or added or deleted since the full backup are affected.

But does the incremental backup affect the original zip file? Or does the incremental backup create a new zip with the changed files?

It is important that incremental backups not affect older backups, because if newer files are corrupted or hacked or maliciously encrypted, I don't want my original backup files lost.

Can't find anything in Microsoft documentation that answers this. Thanks for your time.

Dears,

We have dell server. the memory is 1.3 TB and its getting filled up. need to increase the storage space but unfortunately there is no slot available to add extra hdd on server. please suggest feasible solution to increase storage space.

there is also no backup available in our company. suggestions on this is appreciated. thanks in advance.

I've seen this issue posted before with a top level description of the solution but not a list of steps to implement it.  After upgrading my Win 8.1 Pro client to Win 10 Pro attempts to restore from client backups fail.  In Device Manager the driver does indeed provide the following info:

Windows cannot initialise the device driver for this hardware. (Code 37)

An instance already exists at this altitude on the volume specified.

So how exactly do I modify the altitude for the driver to fix the problem?  N.B. I deleted the Connector Software and re-installed just in case this easy process would fix the problem but it didn't.  I too have Rapport installed just like the person who raised this issue before who stated raising the altitude fixed the problem if that is of any significance.

Hi,

We use CommVault Simpana 10 to backup our vm's. The last two weeks two virtual machines can't backup anymore. I always see this error in the vSphere client:
An error occurred while taking a snapshot: msg.snapshot.error-QUIESCINGERROR.
An error occurred while saving the snapshot: msg.snapshot.error-QUIESCINGERROR.

In CommVault I see this error:
Unable to quiesce guest file system during snapshot creation

In event viewer I see this when the backup starts:

I already installed the latest updates of VMware on the server and the latest VMware tools on the vm's.
I also checked this kb article:http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2069952

How can I fix this problem?

We have Windows 2012 Server hosting 2 VMs - Domain Controller & RDS.  We have been doing Windows Server Backup incremental and have an ongoing issue with scheduled backups each night.  The backup shows completed with warnings and generates 2 log files.

The first log files shows:  

Backup of volume \\?\Volume{5d46f853-5db2-11e2-93e7-806e6f6e6963}\ succeeded.

Backup of volume C: succeeded.

Backup of volume F: succeeded.

Application backup
Writer Id: {66841CD4-6DED-4F4B-8F17-FD23F8DDC3DE}
   Component: ACBCD71E-A8CA-4672-B951-52C1BE8444BE
   Caption     : Backup Using Child Partition Snapshot\FMLRDS1
   Logical Path: 


Writer Id: {66841CD4-6DED-4F4B-8F17-FD23F8DDC3DE}
   Component: Host Component
   Caption     : Host Component
   Logical Path: 

The 2nd log file more often than not shows:  

Backup of volume E: has failed. Backup failed as shadow copy on source volume got deleted. This might caused by high write activity on the volume. Please retry the backup. If the issue persists consider increasing shadow copy storage using 'VSSADMIN Resize ShadowStorage' command.

Error in backup of E:\ during enumerate: Error [0x80070003] The system cannot find the path specified.
Application backup
Writer Id: {66841CD4-6DED-4F4B-8F17-FD23F8DDC3DE}
   Component: 2B4A9541-C88B-442E-9A7A-6D8A27342C11
   Caption     : Backup Using Child Partition Snapshot\FMLDC1
   Logical Path: 
   Error           : 8078010D
   Error Message   : Enumeration of the files failed.

   Detailed Error  : 80070003
   Detailed Error Message : (null)

We had been getting a successful backup once or twice a week which showed completed (with no mentioned of warnings) but now it regularly shows completed with warnings as noted above.  

We did a manual full backup of the DC to a different external drive a few days ago and that completed without warnings and the backup shows:  E: Completed 63.38 Full - VSS Copy Backup Successful, 8/27/13 3:35 PM - 4:43 PM. Data Transferred 63.38

On a side note, we can view the logs in the windows/logs/windowsserverbackup directory but when we attempt to view the details of a log file through the Local Backup Console for any log which shows completed with errors, we get a "MMC has detected an error in the snapin and will unload and then it shows Object referenced not set to instance of an object."  The manual backup noted above that was successful is able to be viewed through the Local Backup Console without this error.  

Any idea as to why this is failing during the scheduled backups?  This hosts a database that we need to have regular successful backups.

Hello guys

First post ever here! Hopefully someone here can help

I am running Windows Server scheduled backups from a Hyper-V Physical Host which is backing up the Physical Drive

I have 2 external 1.8TB Hard drives which just plug via USB into the physical host and it backs up over night

Backup Hard Drive 01 works fine - and it is backing up without a problem, however Hard Drive 02 is failing constantly

I have run a scan on Hard Drive 02 and there are no errors, this is the vent viewer log:

I am not sure what else is going on, I thought it may have been a bad backup drive but I tested it and its not finding any errors

backup Drive 01 is working fine

Hi,

I have a domain with windows server 2012R2. My network has 7 vlans and I want to bring some redundancy in my network by adding a secondary domain controller. The secondary domain controller will also be server 2012R2. I like to know if I have to make some preperations to the secondary domain controller for letting it be completely functional.

The first domain controller has 7 virtual lan cards (multi homed). Do I first have to add the same virtual cards to the secondary domain controller and add the dhcp ranges or do I only have to follow the staps according to add the secondary domain controller?

Thank you for your help!

I'm using Windows Server Backup (incremental) to backup the most important data daily. 

Lately I added another dedicated harddisk for a daily disk-rolling. 

With only 1 disk, I remember that the incremental backup hold an infinite amount of "copies", allowing to go back in time for files. Now, with the second disk added, the biggest copy-count I saw per disk is somewhere around 2. 

Both the disks have around 2 TB Free Disk Space, while the data beeing backed up is at about 350GB now. 

So, what is happening here? 

The Message Log shows that within the last 2 days, disk "01" has been used 2 times for backup - however it just reports one copy of backups available

Is it possible that "prior" copies are getting purged, when you roll the disk?

I have been running backups on a Windows 2012 R2 Server (Dell PowerEdge T420) for a few months with no problems.  We backup to a rotation of 3 RDX 1TB Cartridges but found out that Windows Backup does not support removable RDX media.  To get around this problem, we use BackupAssist which still uses Windows Server Backup in the background to complete the backups.

BackupAssist uses a single .vhd container file on the RDX and it is mounted asdrive G:

Again, this worked for a few months with no problems.

Then I ran Windows Update and about 30 updates were applied to the server.  Since then we cannot seem to keep multiple backups on the RDX Cartridge.  Before the Windows Updates, I was able to keep previous backups, sometimes as many as 98 copies.  We are backing up about 30GB of data each night.

Now, since the Windows Updates, I cannot get past 2 or 3 perhaps, and then lose all backup copies and end up with a completed backup, but only 1 backup copy and no previous backups.

We see in the error log the following error, which I believe is the cause of the problem.  Backups run at 8pm nightly.

I have 3 sites setup the same.  2 of the sites had all the Windows Updates applied and then started having this problem.  The above error was never seen until the Windows Updates.  The third site has not had any Windows Updates applied, and we currently have 42 previous backups on the loaded RDX Cartridge.

I have been working with BackupAssist support, but they state that it is simply Windows Server Backup that runs the back end and it is probably a Windows Server issue.  I have been fighting this for 2 months now.

Just wondering if anyone has any idea on the above error.

Thanks in advance to any that can shed some light on this problem.

Hi Guys, I am an MSP business owner based in Melbourne Australia and was looking for a way to clearly see the status of all the backups I am responsible for managing. I couldn’t find a solution I was happy with so I created one.

The product I have developed over the last 6 months is designed for the IT manager or the MSP business owner who has more than 10 backup email notifications per day and it does three major things:

1. You can see the status of all backup jobs from all vendors in one daily email report.
2. You will be clearly see when a backup job didn’t send an email notification (Huge risk and has happened to me)
3. Saves tech time checking multiple notifications and sends only failed jobs onto your ticketing system or your personal email. 

Let me know if you are interested in joining the beta testing many thanks. Also yes it can monitor windows backups!

Alert Centric Website

Dear All Server Expert,

We are currently having on premise AD server running Server 2008 R2. there is another AD Server2 for the redundancy being built. Both of the AD server are actually a VM residing on two different physical hypervisor servers. May I know: what is the best backup strategy applied for AD so when one of the AD is down sue to software or hardware corruption, I will be able to restore it asap from the backup.

From my understanding, I will definitely need to backup both the Hyper V server and also the VM. FYI, I am using the backup exec 2010 R3 for my backup software. From the backup exec and by selecting the Hyper V server to be backup, I can see a list to be backup below:

AD is actually part of Microsoft Hyper-V as it is the VM. I have 2 situations that concern:

1. What about when only that AD VM is fail? will it be enough if I am restoring the full image backup from the Microsoft Hyper-V? After restoring then wait till another DC to replicate over. But what will happen if this AD has all the roles?

2. What about when the physical server itself fail? if those selections above being selected, will it be enough to restore?

Thanks.

Regards,

I'm using Windows Server Backup (incremental) to backup the most important data daily. 

Lately I added another dedicated harddisk for a daily disk-rolling. 

With only 1 disk, I remember that the incremental backup hold an infinite amount of "copies", allowing to go back in time for files. Now, with the second disk added, the biggest copy-count I saw per disk is somewhere around 2. 

Both the disks have around 2 TB Free Disk Space, while the data beeing backed up is at about 350GB now. 

So, what is happening here? 

The Message Log shows that within the last 2 days, disk "01" has been used 2 times for backup - however it just reports one copy of backups available

Is it possible that "prior" copies are getting purged, when you roll the disk?

Hi there,

We have a Windows server 2008R2 exchange server. We would like to make regular backups to it. So we purchased HP Data Protector. We are able to deploy and install manually the Data protector agent on every server EXCEPT this one. When we try to install we get "The program can't start because MSVCR90.dll is missing from your computer. Try reinstalling the program to fix this problem".

Things i've tried already: 

-sfcscan

-windows update readiness tool fix

-repair Visual c++ 2008 readistributables

-uninstall and reinstall Visual c++ 2008 redistributables

-copy/paste the MSVCR90.dll from other sources, from other servers, from local server, from the internet.

None of the above worked.

Any other ideas?

Hi,

Recently setup a brand new 2012 R2 server, using hyper v to host 3 VM's, backing up with backup exec 2014.The backups are failing, backup exec stating...

V-79-40960-38521 - Snapshot Technology: Initialization failure on: "VRTSRV::\\UKBNHV01.ProCam.local\Hyper-V?Virtual?Machine\UKBNDC01". Snapshot technology used: Microsoft Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS).A virtual machine snapshot could not be created. Use the Event Viewer on the Hyper-V host to identify the cause. If the virtual machine is not properly configured, it may be necessary to use the Event Viewer in the virtual machine to identify the cause.

Looking at the Hyper V VMMS event viewer I get the error:

VSS writers inside virtual machine 'UKBNIT01' failed to perform BackupComplete to its shadow copy (VSS snapshot) set: Catastrophic failure (0x8000FFFF). (Virtual machine ID 7C31CD39-FFAD-4E04-BF92-223BC120BE1B) event ID 10172

I see there are other posts relating to this, with random answers suggesting fixes relating to disk speeds and all sorts. If i restart the hyper v's and physical server the backup will run maybe 2 or 3 times successfully before failing again. Clearly buying a server to restart it every 2 days isn't an option.

It seems apparent this isn't just a problem relating to server 2012 R2, but has carried across in all newer versions of windows server.

My Vss Writers list as follows:

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.3.9600]
(c) 2013 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Windows\system32>vssadmin list writers
vssadmin 1.1 - Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool
(C) Copyright 2001-2013 Microsoft Corp.

Writer name: 'Task Scheduler Writer'
   Writer Id: {d61d61c8-d73a-4eee-8cdd-f6f9786b7124}
   Writer Instance Id: {1bddd48e-5052-49db-9b07-b96f96727e6b}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'VSS Metadata Store Writer'
   Writer Id: {75dfb225-e2e4-4d39-9ac9-ffaff65ddf06}
   Writer Instance Id: {088e7a7d-09a8-4cc6-a609-ad90e75ddc93}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'Performance Counters Writer'
   Writer Id: {0bada1de-01a9-4625-8278-69e735f39dd2}
   Writer Instance Id: {f0086dda-9efc-47c5-8eb6-a944c3d09381}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'System Writer'
   Writer Id: {e8132975-6f93-4464-a53e-1050253ae220}
   Writer Instance Id: {89a328b7-87eb-48e2-a3e6-9d04b164ba32}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'Microsoft Hyper-V VSS Writer'
   Writer Id: {66841cd4-6ded-4f4b-8f17-fd23f8ddc3de}
   Writer Instance Id: {baa1e068-a50f-4d2e-898c-a54920ae4117}
   State: [8] Failed
   Last error: Retryable error

Writer name: 'BITS Writer'
   Writer Id: {4969d978-be47-48b0-b100-f328f07ac1e0}
   Writer Instance Id: {4986e692-ea2c-454e-813e-9e5f71854adf}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'SqlServerWriter'
   Writer Id: {a65faa63-5ea8-4ebc-9dbd-a0c4db26912a}
   Writer Instance Id: {f7f18f2b-660b-4e18-9aa1-5caa5115045e}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'ASR Writer'
   Writer Id: {be000cbe-11fe-4426-9c58-531aa6355fc4}
   Writer Instance Id: {bfa584a7-72b3-47c1-90d7-87e71074e875}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'Shadow Copy Optimization Writer'
   Writer Id: {4dc3bdd4-ab48-4d07-adb0-3bee2926fd7f}
   Writer Instance Id: {954a91e4-8c93-4f21-9ceb-53f2df3fefc5}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'Registry Writer'
   Writer Id: {afbab4a2-367d-4d15-a586-71dbb18f8485}
   Writer Instance Id: {a254fab5-d160-4a2d-9f8f-e43e7ea0708e}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'COM+ REGDB Writer'
   Writer Id: {542da469-d3e1-473c-9f4f-7847f01fc64f}
   Writer Instance Id: {d01d076a-aa1b-4998-8a5b-91b993895405}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Writer name: 'WMI Writer'
   Writer Id: {a6ad56c2-b509-4e6c-bb19-49d8f43532f0}
   Writer Instance Id: {1e7cb515-f73d-4146-838d-74605a77628c}
   State: [1] Stable
   Last error: No error

Is anyone able to explain how to trace why the Hyper-V VSS Writer gets the retryable error?

Thanks

Nick

Hi, I'm on the trail of poor backup performance to a new WD 4TB USB disk with SBS2011 (Server 2008 R2). I've reformatted the WD disks using the WD utility to enable 512 emulation. Previous backups to 1TB USB disks were fine. It looks like I have hit the 512e problem. A 900M backup on the server itself is going to take weeks to finish!

As a test, thinking that a server 2012 might handle the 4K format better, I mounted one of the new WD disks (as D$) on a server 2012 Core, it's just a Hyper-V host, and started a backup from the SBS over the network to the disk on the 2012 Core. That backup is now 95% complete after running for 5.5 days (~2KB/Sec). For info, fsutil details from the 2012 system below

A backup of the hosted Server 2012 system, thats hosted by the 2012 Core, to the same USB disk shared from the 2012 HV Host ran fairly reasonably.

Any ideas?? KB982018 is already there.

Thanks

Ken

C:\Users\Administrator>fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo d:
NTFS Volume Serial Number :       0x6012418212415de2
NTFS Version   :                  3.1
LFS Version    :                  1.1
Number Sectors :                  0x000000015d4affff
Total Clusters :                  0x000000002ba95fff
Free Clusters  :                  0x000000001edfd538
Total Reserved :                  0x0000000000000000
Bytes Per Sector  :               512
Bytes Per Physical Sector :       4096
Bytes Per Cluster :               4096
Bytes Per FileRecord Segment    : 1024
Clusters Per FileRecord Segment : 0
Mft Valid Data Length :           0x0000000000040000
Mft Start Lcn  :                  0x00000000000c0000
Mft2 Start Lcn :                  0x0000000000000002
Mft Zone Start :                  0x00000000000c0040
Mft Zone End   :                  0x00000000000cc840
Resource Manager Identifier :     EA4FA8CF-A57D-11E5-9CB9-3CD92BF19BDD