11d will not back up server consistantly night after night.

[Liger_Technolog]

Hi

Am pulling my hair out here in frustration!

Have recently installed backup exec 11d onto Small Business Server 2003.  Have setup a standard job to backup the C: D: information store, sql databases, Shadow copy components and system state.  Set the time to go off about 9:00pm.

It works occasionally, it fails lots!

It backs up the C drive and then we beleive it ejects the tape and fails to backup the D drive.  The job just keeps running then waiting for a tape it cannot use.  We had to set the run time flag so that it only ran for 8 hours.  Else it just keeps going like the energiser bunny.

We get the error messages:

Completed status: Failed
Final error: 0xe00084f8 - The network connection to the Backup Exec Remote Agent has been lost. Check for network errors.
Final error category: Resource Errors

For additional information regarding this error refer to link V-79-57344-34040

Backup- D: DataMedia mount failed.
User canceled a Physical Volume Library operation.

On the nights it fails to backup the tapes are marked with the: Not Appendable (End marker unreadable)

We investigated this and thought that the problem may be with the information store, so we removed this from the backup and used NTs backup to backup this.  Again the backup worked one night, but the next night it failed again.

We have cleaned the tape drive a Quantum DLT4-V4 with DLT drives.  We have checked websites and forums, we have rebooted the server, we have updated the software until it can update no more.  The customer is ready to throw the software out of the window and I am going as bald as an egg.

Please help me.

Thanks

Calvin

Liger Support.

[pikes]

Have you made sure that you are on the correct build of backup exec? Even if you have an old build, if you update, it won't update to the latest build. The latest build is 7170. You can find out what build you have by going to help->about in the system console. If you don't have 7170, you will need to download it from symantec's website. If you download the backup exec demo and use your registration keys, it will work fine. If this is the case, also make sure you update the build on the remote agent on the servers you are backing up.

If that doesn't solve your problem, have you checked your servers' event logs for errors? Look at when the job fails and see if you can find anything on the servers' event logs. Post whatever you find here.

[Scott_Straub]

Calvin,  I'm sorry to say this, but I've been using 11d for over 6 months now, and that's just how the software is.  If you are expecting something stable that you don't have to babysit daily, you should really look elsewhere. Maybe it will improve with more time, maybe not.  Based on how the hotfixes tend to break as much as they fix, I'm guessing the latter.  CPS shouldn't even have been released.

Read through this message board.  I know it's normal for people to complain about a product on it's support forum, but Backup Exec is unique in this aspect, because a lot of the complaints you will see here are about known bugs (confirmed by many different users, across a lot of different hardware) that haven't been fixed for over a year or even through a major version update. 

You can try opening a case with Symantec support.  You can read customers experiences with support on this forum too...

[Liger_Technolog]

Checked the event logs.  Have two identical Backup event errors at about 23:55.

Event ID: 33152

Adamm Database Event: Database Connection Lost!
Error = E_PVL_DB_LOST_CONNECTION
Server = "**************"
Active Node = ""
Instance = "BkupExec"
Database = "BEDB"
Connection String = "DRIVER=SQL Server;SERVER=************\BkupExec;DATABASE=BEDB;App=BEWS PVL"

I then seem to be getting a contuus event in my log:

Event id: 2803

Source: MSSQL$BKUPEXEC

SQL Server has encountered 1 occurrence(s) of cachestore flush for the 'Bound Trees' cachestore (part of plan cache) due to some database maintenance or reconfigure operations.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Server also is running Blackberry Manager.  Although I have disabled the information store backup.

Cheers

Calvin

[Stephan_Zerth]

Scott, you really name it.
 I'm dealing with all this builds and bugfixes for over 18 month. After all I can say: This product isn't stable at all. The more features, options, agents you are using the more bugs and problems you'll find. Even the most basic functionality a backup software must be able and expected to perform, can't be guaranteed:

Simply BACKING UP FILES.

It doesn't work reliable.

Practically, there is no support for this product.

So, Calvin: Go. Go as fast as you can. Don't look back and test the next backup solution thoroughly, before payment...

[Liger_Technolog]

OK,

Because I have a bad habit of flogging dead horses, lets try this:

Its still not working correctly, managed to get three days successfulls but then it all fell apart again.  But I got the successfulls after I stopped and started all the SQL Backupexec functions.  I am getting the informational message in the log files:

Event ID: 17055

17052 :
This SQL Server has been optimized for 8 concurrent queries. This limit has been exceeded by 2 queries and performance may be adversely affected.

If SQL is unstable this may be causing my backups to stop working.   Does anyone know how I can stableise SQL with Backup exec?  I am using the standard SQL that was installed with Small Business Server and Backup Exec, would that be MSDE?

Calvin