BackUp Exec 11d Crashed server and support made the system inaccessible

[Jeff_Brittain]

I am not sure if I can get any support from Symantec. So I thought I would try a moderated forum. (I thought CA was bad). My admin was upgrading to 11d because that is what was sent to him when we purchased it. It brought down our NAS server running Microsoft Server Power (NAS Version).
It blue screened with a stop error.At the time I still can get into safe mode (Last known good, not working). He called your support with case number 29050673. The tech had him change registry entries and now it is sunk (no safe mode = no recovery console). Granted he should have not just listened to the guy on the other end of the phone telling him to change registry settings, however, he is naive. I spent all night setting up a new server from a backup. What is my recourse for getting at least a call back which was promised. After being flagged as "needs further research" and "re-install the os" is not acceptable. Yes that is what was told to us. It is now been 48 hours since i have been home and I am not going to hold my breath for a call tomorrow.

[Joshua_Small]

Had you installed Service Pack 1 for Windows 2003 prior to installing BE?

There are lots of issues with storport.sys prior to this, which can cause anything using the SCSI channel in a certain way to BSOD. I've seen it regularly.

Do you have any info on what STOP error you were actually getting on bootup prior to the rebuild?

I have also seen several situations in which a server would BSOD if the BE services were set to "automatic", as they loaded before some unknown prerequisite.
If you set them to "manual", and started the yourself several minutes after you rebooted the server (or made an "at logon" scheduled task) the issue appeared resolved. Perhaps this is what you experienced?

If you at least understood enough of their English to understand that they want you to change registry settings, you've done better than I ever did.

[Russ_Perry]

No recovery console?? That doesn't sound like something a registry change would do. What was actually changed in the registry?

Russ

[Jeff_Brittain]

This is quoted from my Admin - "The technical support rep told me to change two registry values on the original pv725n server.
Export existing registry and save it to the desktop (on pv725n).
Edit the following registry values:

HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\Services\VSP\Start (REG_DWORD) � Changed value from 0 to 3

HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\VSP\Start (REG_DWORD) � Changed value from 0 to 3

After editing the two registry keys, he asked me to reboot the server. This is when we reached the point when we could not log into windows period (via safe mode, safe mode w/ networking, etc.) Before we edited the registry, I was at least able to enter the OS with safe mode and/or with networking. The tech support rep then suggested we do a �repair� of the windows OS or just a fresh install and flagged the case as �needs further research�."

Which then left us with a complete night of redoing our server. Recovery console does not work since it is Windows 2000 Power (NAS). This is a software RAID device and does not have any SCSI drivers.

-jeff

[Gary_Karasik]

Those registry entries change the startup option of the VSP service entry in Current Control Set and CCS002. That alone would not cause an inability to start the recovery console, which starts before the OS. You can still boot to recovery console off an Operating System CD later than NT3 (Windows 2000 or XP, maybe the server OS #1 install disk too, I can't remember).

Assuming you can get on the Internet, google "Recovery Console" and you'll get to a place where you can find all the RC commands.

It may be that you'll have to do a parallel install of the OS to get at your data.

I too have had techs trash my system, including once a Microsoft tech, and THAT'S annoying when you've paid $245 for a support call. You have my sympathies.