Backing up 2 servers to one tape

[Tactical-N8]

I recently installed Backup Exec 2012 and I am trying to configure it to backup 2 servers to one tape.  I want to do full backups.  I can successfully backup each server individually but I'm missing something when I try to back both up to the same tape.  So here is how I have things set up:

I have a media set named "Full Backup" with overwrite protection set to 1 hour and append set to infinte-allow append.

I have 5 tapes associated with this set.

I setup a backup job for "Server1" to run 1st and overwrite media.

I then have a job for "Server2" set to run later and append to media.

Both jobs are configured to use the "Full Backup" media set.

The 1st job runs fine.  However, when the 2nd job begins, it ejects the tape and says "remove media and respond ok."

Do I have something setup incorrectly with the overwrite or append settings?  What am I missing?

Thanks in advance.

[Kiran_Bandi]

However, when the 2nd job begins, it ejects the tape and says "remove media and respond ok."

Might be because of 1 Hour OPP.. What is the difference between First job End time and Second job Start time? If it is more than one hour, media used by first job wil become Overwritable by the time second job starts and the second job is configured to Append. Increase OPP and see if that helps.

Finalize OPP for Fullmediaset considering your media rotation requirement.

[Tactical-N8]

Thanks for the response Kiran. However, I tried making the OPP 1 week and it still did the same thing.

[Kiran_Bandi]

Standalone tape drive?

What if you insert the same media again into the drive or an inventory on the same tape before the starting of second job?

[Tactical-N8]

It is an internal SCSI LTO-3 drive. I am backing up the server that has this drive and also another server using a remote agent. The strange thing is that I can backup the remote server fine. I am having trouble with the local server the backup exec is installed on. Also, i just received this error message on the local server the last time that I tried to run this: The job failed with the following error: The resource could not be backed up because an error occurred while connecting to the Agent for Windows. The correct version of the Agent for Windows must be running on the target computer.

[pkh]

Read my article below on some common reasons why your job is not appending to your tape, particularyly note the part about overlapping jobs.

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/articles/why-my-job-not-appending-data-my-tapes

[psj_symhelp]

hi check the option " Eject Tape after backup completed " in first backup job properties. If you set second backup job in append mode then it will definatly append to the media. Verify media set is associated with both server backup.

[pkh]

If you set second backup job in append mode then it will definatly append to the media.

This is not true.  There can be a variety of reasons why the subsequent jobs do not append to the tape.  If want you say is true, the OP would not be starting this discussion.

[Tactical-N8]

Thanks for the link pkh.  There was some good info in there but I still couldn't come up with what might be the problem.  Overlapping the jobs is not the problem.  I am trying to run the 2 jobs to tape manually before I schedule them to run on a daily basis.

[Tactical-N8]

I did verify that the "eject tape after backup complete" is not checked on either job. Still the same problem. 

[Tactical-N8]

As I mentioned earlier, I think that there may be something going on with the agent on the server.  I can backup the remote server fine, but when I try to manually backup th elocal server (that houses BE2012) I get the following:

The job failed with the following error: The resource could not be backed up because an error occurred while connecting to the Agent for Windows. The correct version of the Agent for Windows must be running on the target computer.

I tried restarting the backup exec services as well as the entire server but no luck.

[Tactical-N8]

This is frustrating because I just switched from Backup Exec 11d which was working perfectly. I know it was old, but it worked pretty much maintenance free. There must be something simple that I'm overlooking. I'll have to play with it some more when I get back into the office tomorrow. Happy New Year everyone!

[Tactical-N8 · Accepted solution]

Okay, so I finally got the backup working properly today.  There must have been something wrong with the job that I was trying to append.  It would not backup no matter what.  So I deleted the job and recreated it with the exact same settings and now it works.  Don't ask me why or how, but it works!

After recreating the append job I am now able to run a full backup of my remote server by overwriting the media, and I am also then  able to run the append job so that both servers are backed up to a single LTO-3 tape.  I can now rest easy.

Thanks everyone for all of your help and input.