USB Drive not overwritten. Auto catalog?

[dotnetcrash]

So I have a client with backup exec 2012 which is on the latest service pack 4.

I am having a situation where the backups are saying that there are no backup sets on the disk, however when i run an inventory catalog manually, it does find a whole bunch.

I do not want to have to log into the client and click "inventory and catalog" every day (especially because they will not pay me for this). I think I can set up a schedule for doing this? So that it will inventory and catalog the disk contents after it is inserted. The problem is that the client will swap backup drives at a random point in the day. 

Do I have to create a schedule for every disk (aprox 20)? Why doesnt backup exec catalog the drive BEFORE running any backup? I just dont get why backup exec works this way. It seems to like being blind to things.

So I guess my final question is, is there any way to force backup exec to take a catalog of the disk before every backup? this would hopefully prevent BE thinking that the disk is full, but not realizing that there are sets on there which have expired already which it would hopefully and ideally overwrite. Is there a more recomended way to get backup exec to erase expired backup sets before doing a new one?

[pkh]

The disk storage on the USB drive is managed by DLM and it grooms the disk on a 4 hour cycle. When the USB drive is offline, DLM is unable to delete the expired backup sets. You would have to to make sure that the drive is left online long enough for the grooming to take place

[VJware]

As the USB disks are swapped on a regular basis, an inventory is required for BE to detect the disk is back online. However a Catalog operation is NOT required.

Is there a more recomended way to get backup exec to erase expired backup sets before doing a new one?

If the disk is online and the DLM process runs, when it finds expired backup sets, it will delete them. It will not wait till a backup set is created. (There is an exception though to this rule. Check Cause # 2 of this KB - http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH187957)

Why doesnt backup exec catalog the drive BEFORE running any backup?

A catalog is not required, but an inventory is required. You can schedule a windows task to restart all BE services prior to the backup job. Or you could use the following BEMCLI command as a scheduled windows task to mark the disks online prior to the backup.

CD\

powershell.exe -command "&{import-module bemcli;Get-BEDiskStorageDevice | Set-BEDiskStorageDevice -Disabled $false}"

[pkh]

If the USB drives are connected to the media server, then BE will automatically detect the online/offline status of the USB drives as they are connected/disconnected to the media server.  There is no need to inventory the disk to bring them onlin.