BE 2014 one backup keeps failing with communications failure

[Noah_Adams]

Hi All,

I just migrated from 2010 R3 to 2014, specifically to get Server 2012 support. I did a fresh install on a new server and rebuilt my backup jobs from scratch. A majority of the servers are upgraded to the latest RAWS, but some are still on 2010 R3.

I have a problem with the backup jobs for one specific server. The job will run and back up a random amount of data, before failing with a communications failure. The details point to a backup failure of :

V-79-57344-65072 - The connection to target system has been lost. Backup set canceled.,

And a verify failure of: 

Unexpected end of backup set encountered on Quantum LTO5.

V-79-57344-34004 - End of data set was unexpectedly encountered.

The server in question is a file server running Server 2003. I upgraded the RAWS to 2014 and restarted the server. This is happening with both Full and Differential backups. At one point, I was able to get a full backup by running the job immediately after restarting the BE server, however I just tried that for my differential and it still failed.

I had not previously had issues with backups of this server on my old 2010 R3 environment, and all the other jobs in the new 2014 server are working without problems. Seems to be just tied to this one server (which, unfortunately, is one of the more important ones)

Any help would be appreciated.

[pkh]

At the remote server, check that the BE remote agent service is running. Also, check the Eventlog for error messages pertaining to the failure of this service

[VJware]

Is the media server and the remote agent fully updated with HF 218257 ?

[Noah_Adams]

I don't see any event log entries regarding the Remote Agent service. When the backup job starts, I see that the Volume Shadow Copy as well as the microsoft Software Shadow Copy Provider services both start, and after the job fails, they both stop. BERemote is running, and like I said, I don't see any event log entries to indicate a problem.

[Noah_Adams]

Yes, the media server shows 218257 installed, and the remote agent install says that there are no updates to apply on the problem server.

The failed backups all have some data, but it seems to be a random amount... for example, the last 4 failed jobs were 8.95gb, 5.55gb, 5.74gb, and 9.80gb

[VJware]

Any AV on the remote server ? If yes, are exclusions added for beremote.exe ?

Are you able to get a successful backup using the native Windows backup utility ?

Lastly, are you able to successfully backup this machine to disk ?

[BernardJL]

I am having this problem on a number of servers since upgrading to Backup Exec 2014.  We spent a whole day working with one server to determine what can be causing this.  Here are some of the tests we ran.

The system to be backed up is a simple physical machine running Window 7 Enterprise.  It has Microsoft Office and that is about it.  All updates, service packs, have been applied both to the client and the server.  All the updates to Backup Exec 2014 are applied and the current Backup Exec Client is on the machine in question.

1.  Removed Symantec End Point Protection - per the information from Symantec, it seems perhaps Backup Exec is getting cross ways with the End Point Protection product.

• No change.  V-79-57344-65072 - The connection to target system has been lost. Backup set canceled.

2.  Turned off the Windows Firewall - again perhaps causing the issue. 

• No change

3.  Turned off Advance File backup and tried to backup just one file. 

• No change

4.  Reviewed the link given by Symantec but nothing is helpful there.  All the item sare related to configuration items that are either set or not relevant in this situation.

5.  Reviewed all error/event logs with nothing reported.  Checked the disk on the machine being backup up, nothing there.  Removed all restore points--some item from Symantec suggested this may be an issue.

6.  Un-installed the Backup Exec agent on the client and reinstalled, re-established trust.

Observations:  Watching with the Backup Exec Agent display up on the client and the Backup Exec server we can see they do "Snap Shot" processing, the server shows "mount media" and then in a few seconds the backup fails. 

While we are discussing this one machine, We have five (5) others behaving the same way.  At the same time about 10 other machines are backup up just fine. 

The error information provided by Backup Exec 2014 is of no use.  It is so general and the article that it refers too is likewise a very general document.

Is there any tool or something that can check the communications betweeen the Backup Exec Server process and the Backup Exec Client to determine what is going on here? 

Information in the forums seem to be related to some very specific configurations and there appears to be no answers listed on this.

Any help is appreciated. 

Thanks in advance.