Backup and Recovery Community Blog

Facing any issues with your tape device? Try this....

Kiran Bandi | 18 Mar 2011 | 2 comments

Most common issues with tape devices:

1) Tape drive asks for cleaning more frequently.

2) Media will be marked as full after writing very less amount of data to it. (Will happen with all the media in the library)

3) Media requested by BE may not be inserted properly into the drive.

The first two indicates that there is a problem with tape drive. Investigation has to be done with tools provided by the vendor. Like HPLTT tools for HP drives, IBM ITDT tool for IBM make etc... Perform a write test also along with the general investigations. And some times the drive temperature also create problems. (Drive fan assembly may be having issues). If any problems reported during the testing by using vendor tools, contact the vendor and ask for a replacement.

The third indicates there may be a problem with robot. In this case you can see something like "Stow operation failed at slot XX"...

ERROR in Symantec Technote

Dev T | 08 Mar 2011 | 0 comments

Hello,

I was browsing the below URL:

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH70760

The Technote contains a Microsoft link:

Problem

Unable to attach errors can occur because of options and limitations with restoring Exchange 2000 and Exchange 2003 backups to Exchange 2007 servers

Error

<0xe000848c> - Unable to attach to a resource. Make sure that all selected resources exist and are online, and then try again.

Solution

Current limitations for restoring Exchange 2003 backups to Exchange 2007:

1. Exchange 2003 database backups can not be restored to an Exchange 2007 server

...

The canary in the cave: How multiple jobs help in troubleshooting and trend analysis..

Sir Fang the Green Knight | 17 Feb 2011 | 0 comments

The canary in the cave

I often call Backup Exec The canary in the cave because it can be used to provide insight into the health of your environment. If properly configured, you can see trends in data growth within individual technologies such as Exchange or user shares. You can benchmark one system against the next and, over time, respond if one starts to decline in performance. To do this though you have to give up the pipe dream of one big job and actually run multiple jobs. In fact, one job per server is ideal.

This sounds like a lot of work?

Thankfully the kind and gentle developers at Symantec have provided us with policies. This term may sound unique to Backup Exec but is in truth it is self explanatory. What is your backup policy for your organization? Have you been instructed to do a full backup on the weekend with an incremental each day? Is this the same for all your servers?...

Don’t put the job before the media set.

Sir Fang the Green Knight | 11 Feb 2011 | 0 comments

If you ever find yourself having to delete files off disk to get a job to run, you need to read this article.

Don’t put the job before the media set.

When installing Backup Exec, many first time users go straight for the backup job. Their first goal is to create one big that backs up everything up. This works for about 1-3 weeks depending on disk size and then starts to fail due to lack of disk space. Backup Exec is sophisticated suite of technologies that allows you to reach into almost every aspect of your environment. It is a highly configurable application that requires some initial setup if you want performance in return. The first thing that should be configured is a media set. No! Make that two media sets. The problem is, new user don’t have a concept of what a media set is. Media sets are unique to Backup Exec. A media set helps you keep as much data...

V2iSR.exe Application Error - Cannot Load Ghost

Madstars19 | 11 Feb 2011 | 0 comments

V2iSR.exe Application Error -Could not load Ghost 14.0

I was getting the v2iSR.exe error when trying to load my backup. The error was preventing me from loading my backup image. Out of frustration, I googled this and I found no solution. After some tinkering, I noticed my DATE/TIME was wrong, most likely due to some malware. The fix was simple.

Make sure your DATE/TIME is set to the correct date in your BIOS. This was my fix and I hope it helps somebody out. I can't tell you how frustrated I was at the thought of reformatting and reloading my drive.

vssadmin - Microsoft Exchange Writer is Missing

Dev T | 03 Feb 2011 | 0 comments

I had a server that had the "Microsoft Exchange Writer" missing.

When typing the command vssadmin (C:\>vssadmin list writers) from a command prompt all the VSS (Volume Shadow Copy) writers would come up besides the "Microsoft Exchange Writer".

This is what the Microsoft Exchange Writer looks like should it come up:

If it does not come up in the list... to enable it navigate to the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\...

Not able to configure the Oracle agent on windows

itsmeaffinity | 19 Jan 2011 | 0 comments

1 While configuring the Oracle agent on Windows system using remote agent utility it gives error while adding the username password in Oracle tab & when saving it , It gives error User account doesnot have privilage to log on oracle database

2 In that case please check the V$PWFILE_USERS table you will see that file is empty , In normal cases this file should have default sys account.

3 So ask the Oracle DBA to fix the issue & once done please ask him to check if his able to access SQLPLUS

Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation

Angelique28 | 03 Jan 2011 | 0 comments

For those how would like to try Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation Operation System with Backup Exec Windows licenses, this might be information. :D

Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation is a new server OS from Windows. This is “smaller” (less functionalities) than a Small Business Server.

This Operative System includes a Windows File Server and Active Directory. Customers with this type of servers who would like to have backup copies would need to have a BE for Windows Standard as core license. Small Business Server key will NOT WORK, in Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation.

For customers with the wrong product, they may need to contact their direct reseller to request for exchanging product. However, make sure to check the purchased date. You may return or exchange it within 45 days only. Else, it would be the reseller's choise if they will let you...

How to install patches for RALUS, RMALS and RAMS

pkh | 03 Jan 2011 | 0 comments

After you installed a hotfix or ran LiveUpdate to install hotfixes, you got to check the Agents directory under the BE installation directory to see whether there is a patch for the Remote Agent for Linux or UNIX Servers (RALUS), Remote Media Agent for Linux Servers (RMALS) or Remote Agent for Macintosh Systems (RAMS). This is because when a hotfix fixes a problem with RALUS, RMALS and RAMS, it will place a patch in the Agents directory under the BE installation directory. There is no alert to notify you of this patch.

To install these patches,

Create a directory on the Unix, Linux or Mac machines.
Copy the hotfix into this directory
Unpack the hotfix file, e.g tar -zxvf ralus4164HF138226.tar
Switch to super-user
Run the command ./installraluspatch.sh to install the patch.

If you are using an X-terminal session, you can use Archive Manager to extract the file, in place of Step...

Types of Backups

Dev T | 16 Dec 2010 | 0 comments

To understand the Types/Methods of Backup we must dive into the attributes of a file.

There are 4 basic attributes of a file which are known as DOS attributes:

READ, HIDDEN, SYSTEM and ARCHIVE

Whenever we think of Backups we must only think of the ARCHIVE attribute.

Thumb Rule: Whenever the ARCHIVE attribute is ON (1) the file is ready for backup and whenever the ARCHIVE attribute is OFF (0) the file has been backed up.

There are 5 types of backups:

1. Normal/Full Backup: This backup method will backup the entire selection list irrespective of the ARCHIVE BIT, but after the backup is over it will RESET the ARCHIVE bit to 0 (Change it to 0 : Meaning the file(s) has been backed up)

2. Incremental Backup: This backup method will only backup those...

Links

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