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BackupExec 2012 SP4 problems

HNeumann
Level 4

Hello,

after installing SP4 for BE2012 the server runs poorly. The jobs cannot access the devices properly. Restarting the services work for a short time.  I think we have to open a call. We have the caso options installed... Anyone the same problems?

68 REPLIES 68

Ken_Johnson_II
Level 2
Partner

Well, we went ahead with uninstalling without any guidance. This is what worked in our case.

  1. Uninstall Backup Exec choosing the option to only uninstall Backup Exec Program files.
  2. Reboot
  3. Install Backup Exec 2012 from media or downloaded installation.
  4. Download SP3 from here: http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH205351&profileURL=https%3A%2F%2Fs...file and then install it.
  5. We got a whole bunch of ODBC errors if we tried to do anything in Backup Exec. We found that running this command cleared up those errors: C:\Program Files\Symantec\Backup Exec\catrebuildindex -r (See this as a reference: http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH67271

That was it. No re-creating jobs, no inventory or catalog jobs. We are currently running backups again and the Job Engine is not unresponsive and is not consuming lots of CPU anymore. We intend to stay at SP3 for the time being. It was much more stable for us. Hope this helps.

DaveyMG
Level 4

Hello Ken, I'm going to follow this course of action as well. Did you have to roll back the windows agents on other machines after you went back to SP3?

Ken_Johnson_II
Level 2
Partner

Just to be safe we uninstalled the agents from the servers and then push installed them again from the Backup Exec server after installing Service Pack 3. Most of the servers did not require a reboot for the uninstall, but one older 2003 server did. Your mileage may vary.

FYI: All the backups ran successfully last night for the first time since we installed SP4.

DaveyMG
Level 4

The uninstall/reinstall went OK, also had to do the catalog rebuild. Duplicate tape job started straight away and bengine.exe using up to around 10% cpu. I'm going to let my backlog of dupe to tape jobs clear before doing a couple of test backups as I don't want to have to reinstall the agents if I can avoid it.

marcodoy
Level 2

Symantec? Are you serious with your product and your support?

 

WE NEED TO UNINSTALL everything and go back to SP3. I havecase opened and the support do everything to do not escalate to advanced. This is crazy on things take long time to be fix.

 

There is no resolution for this case. The support close the case and open a different one  06668941

marcodoy
Level 2

Same happened for me.

The initial case was closed and told it it is a Hyper-v issue and they need to open the case with a different team.

I cannot believe how your story is same as mine.

Mark_Stephens
Level 3

Spoke to the BackupExec CORE group who advised doing a repair of the install (add/remove...repair) and that seems to have worked for us.  Scheduler is much improved, jobs ran over weekend and although a couple had issues others that were active completed and those scheduled to kick-off later ran and completed.

With that said, I'm looking forward to taking a look at 2014 (released today) and seeing how that does.

Mark

Wes_Stewart
Level 4

Off-shore support had me install SP4 for another issue I was having, which was not being able to restore within random VM backups.  That issue was not solved by SP4, but by rebuilding the catalogs.

Since the install of SP4 I have spent hours upon hours dealing with the issues. On-shore support has been working with me, and we thought we had it licked last week after a repair, with two solid days of complete backups.  But this past weekend it came back with a vengeance. 

My first entry on my support ticket after the SP4 install says it all: “The installation of service pack 4 has create utter havoc. I have failures all over the place. Jobs running over each other and essentially very little being backed up. I don't have time to think of the original issue of restoring from VMs now because I am having a tough time getting complete backups to run."

I now have an open support ticket for 2 months on the issues of SP4.  Major issue is jobs hanging at queued, or verifying.

My tech support rep calls almost every day, but I really have run out of time to work on this, and I feel we have hit a brick wall.

BTW twice at the request of support I have run sgmon overnight to capture logging information.  It would suck up all of the RAM from the BE server which would cause all of the jobs to fail.

Is BE 2014 the fix or another whole set of headaches?

 

DaveyMG
Level 4

The solution seems to be to uninstall/reinstall BE2012, install SP3 and stay there. It worked for me and a few others judging by other comments on this thread.

I'm considering waiting for BE2014 SP1 before going there.

Wes_Stewart
Level 4

If I have to uninstall and reinstall, what do I have to lose by trying 2014? I am under maintenance so it is no additional software cost to me.  If it is a mess I go back to step 1.  I'm downloading the 2+gb trial right now.

 

DaveyMG
Level 4

I guess you have the uncertainty of not knowing whether 2014 will fix your current set of problems or become "another headache" and, if it doesn't fix your problems, the anxiety of an ever increasing window of failed backups while you do yet another uninstall reinstall to go back to 2012 (providing you can go back as 2014 may change the catalog database structure).

Mike55
Level 3

For what it’s worth, SP4 seems to be working since I dropped deduplication completely.  So that’s with backup to disk and duplication to a tape library only now.  I’ve had no more queuing issues since running tapeinst.exe and dropping deduplication.  This server was a SP4 media install.  I have older posts here.

I may start testing soon on my abandoned server that was upgraded to SP4.

annettelloyd
Not applicable
Employee Accredited

I have getting cases with the same issue.  I know this is frustrating, believe me, I understand.  I would just like to let you know as long as you save out (to desktop, or documents) the data and catalogs folder from the 2012 install, you can always roll back safely by simply removing 2014 and putting 2012 back in, confirm it's functionality, then stop the sql instance service and be services, drop those folders back in on top of the newly created ones (make copies of these too just in case), you should be able to restart the services and have 2012 back to prior to the upgrade.

jan_villeres
Level 4
Partner Accredited Certified

There is a recent hotfix 217347 for Backup Exec 2012 Revision 1798 SP4.
http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH217347

Has anyone tried installing this and resolved the deduplication issue?

Mike55
Level 3

Sorry, I’m done with Symantec deduplication.

Let me put it this way though:
SP4 was released 2014-03-13
Hotfix 217347 was released 2014-05-27, 75 days later

Even if this does fix the queuing problems, if it’s cool at your company to have your backup system crippled for 75 days, please post.  I want to know what business you’re in.

HNeumann
Level 4

75 days :) better than 365 days :) no its cool Symantec is the best company a very big global player for Backup ;)

SkipStPierre
Level 3
Employee

This should no longer be of an issue for our Backup Exec 2012 customers.  However; for anyone that might be experiencing any of the symptoms from above, we invite you to upgrade to Backup Exec 2014

In Backup Exec 2014 we have made many improvements and you should no longer experience this issue. 

You are welcome to PM me directly if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Skip St. Pierre

Product Management

Backup and Recovery Team!

jan_villeres
Level 4
Partner Accredited Certified

We have an environment with Backup Exec 3600 R2 appliances configured as MMS. Is the new Backup Exec 2014 compatible with our existing applances?

Thank you.

DSAI
Level 4

Hi,

 

Can someone confirm the problems associated with SP4 have been resolved.

 

thank you

R2D2_C3PO
Level 2

FWIW for anyone else going through this, ahem, inconvenience - this solution worked word-for-word.

I installed SP4 and the Hotfix that came thereafter.

Our primary job workflow is a primary backup to a NAS that duplicates the backup set to a secondary external drive once the primary is made.

Primaries to the NAS were unaffected. The duplication backup job - or usually, the verify portion of the duplication backup job - would get stuck. As a result BE would come to a screeching halt with all jobs held up until intervention. The only resolve was to reboot. It would work again for a while but absolutely no jobs would complete on the duplication task after the primary backup.

The exact above steps worked for me. The only thing I had to do was reconfigure the visuals of BE; no lost jobs, no lost data, etc. Even down to the point of the ODBC errors ... ran that command line and that resolved that.

Everything is back to a way more significantly stable BE with all jobs completing. Will NOT be updating 2012 anymore ... will stay status quo until jumping up to 2014.

Thanks, Ken Johnson, for the write up!