ghettoVCB and BackupExec 2010 R3

[Confucius]

Hi,

I have ESXi4.1 servers running with ghettoVCB scripts to dump backup images onto a NFS share on a NAS.

A Windows 2003 with external tape drive is used with BackupExec 2010 R3 (after reading about VCB support being removed, upgraded from 12.5).

Everytime a backup is performed, the backup fails with

Final error 0xe0008488 - Access is denied

Final error category: Security Errors

...refer to link V-79-57344-33928

Access denied to file \VCBbackup\W2003SVR\W2003SVR-2011-08-04-01\W2003SVR-flat.vmdk

Access denied to file \VCBbackup\ W2003SVR\W2003SVR-2011-08-04-01\W2003SVR.vmdk

The item \VCBbackup\ W2003SVR\W2003SVR-2011-08-04-01 \W2003SVR -flat.vmdk in use - skipped

The item \VCBbackup\ W2003SVR\W2003SVR-2011-08-04-01 \W2003SVR .vmdk in use - skipped 

Any text files in the VCBbackup NFS share will backup though.

I've tried removing the .vmx file just in case but no change there. I've also backed up no ESX VMs e.g. those from VMware server 2.0 without any problem, so suspect the format of the VMDK files to be a problem. The VM backupimages run OK if copied back onto any ESXi host.

I would have expected BackupExec without VCB support to just backup vmdk files as raw files (even without any agents), but somehow this is not the case.

Any suggestions?

Jung Wan

[pkh]

Am I correct in saying that you are not using an AVVI agent to do your VM backups?

[Colin_Weaver]

Are you still using Pre- and post script to call some kind of VCB activity as the job starts - as 2010 does not need this any longer?

Also if gehtto VCB scripts do some kind of VCB operation and are still being used then this may be causing problems as I don't think we will have done any testing with this product.

[BackupHound]

As Colin says get rid on the pre script that you'd use to vcbmounter the vmdk down from the host, and use BUE to connect directly to the host server, presuming you are using the BUE Virtual Machine Option. ; )

It sounds similar to a problem I had. The vcbmounter script was still running while the backup was trying to access the vmdk. To determine this, open up the Explorer to the location where the vmdk is, and keep hitting the F5 key and see if the vmdk size is increasing. If it is, the vcbmounter script is still running.

[Confucius · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the advice.  However I've nailed it, did a chmod 777 * -R on the NAS (through SSH).. I was a bit surprised why on the NFS share, the backup administrator needed full control (rwx) to the files in the first place (to set the archive flag perhaps).