Backup Exec 2010 removable USB Drive Problem

[jnelson2000]

Could be me, but this makes no sense. According to http://seer.entsupport.symantec.com/docs/276904.htm, if I assign 4 different windows drive letters to 4 external Removable USB drives, when the job starts it should detect media not plugged in?

I have 4 USB Drives (E-H) labeled as week 1, week 2, etc. Last week I unplugged week 2 and plugged in week 3 yesterday. Whaen the backup job starts It tries to write to week 2 which is disconnected. I have to pause all the disconnected drives to make it work. If I don't it keeps asking me for a media overwrite to a disconnected drive.

These jobs are duplicate jobs and are set to use a removable drive pool created.

I thought this would work? Any suggestions?

[jgus_2]

I have the same set up and also get the same results.  I thought that was the purpose of having a Removable- Backup-to- Disk folder so that we could target a device pool of multiple device and have it correctly select the ONE which is online.  Are we missing a setting or something or what?

[Colin_Weaver]

With removable B2D devices, the last job before you unplug the USB disk should end with an eject of the media. (which is a setting in the Job Properties - Device and Media section )

I am also slightly surprised that the document you reference does not suggest putting the removable B2D devices into a drive pool so that you can then target the drive pool for a recurring job and swap the disks for different days.

[Colin_Weaver]

Hmm Moe's answer makes interesting reading as I don't think Tech Support has ever denied support for USB disk used as Removable B2D - and in fact if you configure them as standard B2D and then unplug them you will get problems with offline devices too

However because of this I have asked some internal questions about the supportability of these devices for R-B2D

[Tekpro]

We appear to be having the same problem with Removable B2D and the job was already set to "eject" after each backup (not just the last backup before the drive is removed.)  The jobs run fine until the drives are swapped, then the job stalls waiting for the removed media and won't fall over to the connected media until the removed media is manually paused.

Any other thoughts on this?

[Moe_Howard]

According to Backup Exec, a USB attached disk drive is NOT a removable B2D device...it is a B2D device.  Removable disk devices have an eject mechanism and cartridge which usually houses an HDD and Backup Exec treats them differently.  The application understands a removable-B2D device's media could eventually "disappear".  Reasons include but not limited to, a span from one cartridge the next would eject the media, or a user manually ejected the media, etc...

Your workaround will do to get around this but you're using a feature with a device that was not intended for.

Here's a link to Symantec's HCL for BE 2010, I suggest looking at the removable B2D device section to see what is supported:
ftp://exftpp.symantec.com/pub/support/products/Backup_Exec_for_WindowsNT/329256.pdf

The supported removable devices are the RDX, GoVault, and Rev devices.

You could use a USB HDD with a RB2D as long as the OS will assign the same drive letter when the USB HDD is removed and a new one is added.  I don’t think the OS always assigns the same drive letter when it discovers a new USB device. Have you tried adding different manufactures of USB devices to a system to see if it assigns the same drive letter?
 
I think when using a USB HDD it is safer to use it as a B2D device.

[Moe_Howard]

Tekpro,

Are you using a device such as anRDX, or GoVault, or REV drive?  Or are you using an HDD too?