Problem with Backup Exec 2010 and Vsphere 4 snapshot processing

[Roob]

Hello, I have a problem with backing up some Windows server VMs in Vsphere 4. When I try to back up some VMs i get an error: Completed status: Failed Final error: 0xe0009574 - Unable to create a snapshot of the virtual machine. The virtual machine may be too busy to quiesce to take the snapshot. Final error category: Resource Errors For additional information regarding this error refer to link V-79-57344-38260 This link says only that I have to delete all snapshots for this VM, but in my case I do not have any pre made snapshots. I can see in Vsphere client that Backup Exec starts creating snapshot of VM, but after 8-9 minutes it gives up and I get an error above. If I look into Vsphere client, snapshot process is still not finished, and it sits on 95%. After few more minutes snapshot process finishes and snapshot is made, but it is too late because Backup Exec already fails with above error. It looks like there is some kind of time out somewhere, but I cannot find any solution all over the net. I am using agent installed on VMs. It is strange that this happens only on heavy load machines (like SQL with a lot of DBs), and other not heavy loaded machines do not have this problem and I can back them up without any problem. Let me say that I can create manual snapshot without any problem, so I do not think that problem is in Vsphere. Does anybody have same problem or any solution? Please help me I am desperate :(

[enablenj]

I added more RAM to the physical machine that hosts the virtual machines that threw the errors.  The box that was giving me the trouble was running at close to 90%.  VMWare handles memory pretty well for most things, but that little bit of headroom was apparently not enough to take a snapshot of a terminal server that sees a good bit of use.  I had this exact issue on and off from the time that I allocated the last VM that put me up at 90% until the time that I added the additional memory.  So if you're rolling out VMs and adding RAM and you want to use BackupExec 2010 to back them up with the granular recovery option, add the RAM first and then roll out the VMs.

I was a little surprised to see this caused a problem, since the processor (5506) and the VMWare had handled everything else I threw at it without even a hiccup.  But these errors disappeared entirely immediately after the memory upgrade and have not been back since, now going on 20 backups run.

[un_baiat]

After months of failed backups:

http://www.lo0.ro/2011/backup-exec-v-79-57344-38260-unable-to-create-a-snapshot-of-the-virtual-machi...

[teiva-boy]

Fantastic!  Microsoft issue, blame Symantec.  

Glad you figured it out in the end.

[ourkidpauluk]

Hi,

I believe I have a resolution i found after some digging into this problem.

As you can see above users got things working by removing the Backup Exec client which stops the Backup Exec process from trying to do a GRT backup.   This means it only needs the VMware VSS provider (VSS is the service that 'sleeps'/quiesces the operating system whilst a snapshot takes place) to do the snapshot.

To ensure GRT backups work,  your initial problem may be you installed VMware Tools AFTER you installed the Backup Exec agent.   This means both companies' VSS providers co-exist on the server, which makes them conflict and timeout.

If you installed Backup Exec after VMware tools, it automatically removes the Vmware VSS provider.

To fix the issue, remove VMware tools, remove the Backup Exec agent,  reinstall VMware tools in custom mode, and deselect VSS Provider and then install Backup Exec agent (this method stops a reboot from being necessary).

Happy Days!

[Colin_Weaver]

Depending on the version of ESX (and possibly teh upgrade history) in the environment it is possible for both the VMWars VSS Support and the lgto_sync driver to be installed (visible in MSINFO32 reports) . Either of tese present inside a VM can cause the quiesce error in conflict with what the Backup Exec RAWS installed VMware VSS support is trying ot so.

As such when uninstalling VMware tools make sure that both are removed (you might need to reveiw VMware's own KB articles for how to do this)

[Jomy]

Hello,

Try to use Backupexec 2010 R2

since for me it is working fine. still there is a same error then - the reason for the snap shot error is the conflict b/w windows VSS and vmware vss.

disable - microsoft software shadow copy provider  service from windows services.

Regards.

[davet1]

The information posted here was very helpful. First, I found I could not perform a snapshot via vCenter. Something was messed up with VMware Tools and I just reinstalled the Tools. That took care of the web servers but the database server still got the error. For that server I tried the suggestion of moving it to a datastore with a 4MB block size. After doing that the backup worked perfectly.

Thanks for all of the ideas.