Forum Discussion

grahwong's avatar
grahwong
Level 3
12 years ago

Backups failing - "Ready; No idle devices are available"

All of a sudden, Backup Exec 2012 is not running most of my jobs.

The job status stays at "Ready; No idle devices are available"

It ran 2 of the backups but I'm not sure why it didn't run the others.

I have 2 drives, but it would only use one at a time. Both initially have a status of 'Online.' When I was able to get one of my backup jobs running, it would load into one drive, that status would change to 'Active.' Then, if I try to run another job, the other drive will change to 'Active' for a moment, then go back to 'Online' and the job status goes to "Ready; No idle devices are available"

These are the things I've tried:

  • Shutting down and restarting the server and the backup device
  • Restarting the Backup Exec services
  • Pausing and unpausing the backup drives

What else can I try?

 

2012
Backing Up
Backup and Recovery
Backup Exec
Basics
Error messages
Managing Backup Devices
Performance
Tip-How to
Troubleshooting
  • Colin_Weaver's avatar
    Colin_Weaver
    Moderator
    12 years ago

    Check what the target device is on the affacted jobs and make sure that devcie still exists in the Storage section of the console.

    If using a pool of devices try changing the jobs to a specific device.

  • lmosla's avatar
    lmosla
    Level 6
    12 years ago

    Check the Home tab to verify there aren't any active alerts that need responding to.

  • grahwong's avatar
    grahwong
    Level 3
    12 years ago

    Yes, the target device is still there.

    I forgot to mention this before, but I am able to inventory the tapes and 'Scratch'  them too.

  • grahwong's avatar
    grahwong
    Level 3
    12 years ago

    The only active alerts are those from the jobs failing, but nothing from before that which would cause them not to run.

  • Moe_Howard's avatar
    Moe_Howard
    Level 4
    12 years ago

    It sounds like BE cannot get a RESERVE on the drive, for whatever reason. Go to the library's LCD console or browser console to see if there is a tape mounted in the drive. If so then manually move it back to an available slot using the tape library's move command.

    If the library claims there is no tape mounted in the drive, try to physically view the drive to see if there is a tape sitting in the throat of the drive. If so, then manually clear that path.

    If there is no tape in the drive, then run tracer.exe before running a job in tape drive1 and getting a second job claiming no devices are available. Save the output to a .bin file by pressing the diskette icon and attach the file to this thread.

    The tracer.exe tool ships with BE and is located in the \Backup Exec folder.

     

     

     

  • pkh's avatar
    pkh
    Moderator
    12 years ago

    You said that you have 2 tape drives in your library.  Did you purchase and install a LEO licence for the second tape drive?