DLM and BE2014-SP1

[Marcel_CH]

Dear all,

we are running Windows 2012-R2 and BE2014-SP1.

There seems to be a critical bug where DLM is marking medias as "expired" an then moving them to "retired media" as acknowledged here:

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH225365

That is all fine but to me it seems there is more behind it.

I already posted in the thread here,

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/forums/tapes-randomly-disappear-slots-backup-exec-2014

but it seems to me that not all of the tragedy behind DLM gets it's deserved attention.

On Friday I put 8 tapes. I manually scratch them all. The Full Backup runs, and on monday some tapes of that full backup set, again, have dissapeared. If I scan the Slots, where I know I put tapes, they re-appear but blue, overwritable, scratch. Only if I go then and check the Full-Backup log, those tapes have been in use for this Full-Backup.

And it happens to us, that DLM will "expire" medias of Backups that are on the bank. Meaning we cannot get to our data, unless we re-catalog the whole set.

So we can't browse through backup-sets to see if we have the Data backed up, which set to get from the bank in order to restore data for a user.

 Luckily this weekend for example, it didn't happen. DLM messed up the tapes before the Full-Backup ran, so I only hat to intervene and scan the tapes in the "lost slots". But it could be, that in one week DLM will take medias used for this weekends Full-backup and "expire" them.

So my word of caution would be;

always check the media used against the audit log to make sure that there will not be valuable data overwritten once you scan slots where "lost medias" are located.

Keep an eye on your Backup-Sets by checking your Full-Backups through a simple browse through an restore job to check if all of the backups are still present and calculate an catalog in case you need data.

To me, this seems a serious bug.

It affects our Backups:

- lost data because of "expired" medias that are re-used even if they contained data

- restores turn into an painful experience because all of the sudden, medias in the Set dissapear because the are being "expired"

P.S. I really miss the ability to see in the restore section, which medias has been used for the backup job

[Marcel_CH]

Today we installed an SQL fix on our Backup Server per WebEx Session with Symantec.

Now lets hope for the best.

I would assume if that was the fix for the DLM Problem, that it will be rolled out as a Hotfix without the need to install .NET 3.5 and SQL Management Studio 2008 R2 as we had to.

Regards,

Marcel

[Marcel_CH]

Too early to say "The Bug is solved" but:

Three DLM Cycles (and 109 retired B2D Medias) later:

not one Tape Media has been touched.

Keeping my Fingers crossed.

A good week to all of you.

Marcel

[Min_WPT]

Thanks for the update,  looking forward to when this is finally fixed.   as workaround, I disabled DLM by registry in our environment where there is very little disk based backup,  tape backup is lot more critical to us.

[Marcel_CH · Accepted solution]

Looking good. 

DLM is now also much more consistent with when it runs and retires a lot more B2D Medias.

But only B2D Medias.

320 retired Medias and no Tapes.

I closed my case with Symantec. The last thing I have open with Symantec is a WebEx Session when the official fix is published to make sure the manual adaption will not cause problems.

A word to Symantec:

I understand it must be really hard to test a new feature (DLM) for all the possibilities. That said, it's really scary that a bug that bad (and yes, it is really bad in my eyes) made it to the live version.

Wish you all a very nice Day.

Marcel

[StefanWR]

Hi Marcel, that sounds good. Can you give me/us some details about the fix? I would like to open a case with Symantec as well to get this fixed asap and if you have some sort of fix number I could referr to, it might easy the process.

Thanks a lot.

Stefan

[Marcel_CH]

Hey Stefan

Well, I would assume that they know exactly what SQL Script they used to fix that mess.

What I can tell you, is that this is the header of their Script. Should be enough to ring a bell.

/****** Object:  StoredProcedure [dbo].[DeleteCatMediaByMediaGuid]    Script Date: 10/27/2010 14:37:55 ******/

Other than that, please read all I know about it in the post above where I wrote that we had to install .NET and such.

Hope that helps.

Best,

Marcel

[Min_WPT]

I got notified by Symantec about hotfix release for this issue.

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH227745

[Marcel_CH]

Dear all

We, as well, did install the official Hotfix over our Workaround Solution with a Symantec Tech.

No issues, and now the Hotfix also shows in the "Installed Updates".

Best,

Marcel