BESR 2010 and USB disks

[Jao]

Hi

Does the new version of BESR have the abilty to backup to any USB disk that's inserted yet?

I'm asking cos I've asked on each new release.  I simply want to be able to backup to a drive called X: regardless, no ifs, no buts, just straight forward backup everything when asked, to where I want it, without having to prep disks beforehand or amend backup jobs.  Basically I want this to be as admin free as backing up to tape currently is.

Cheers


Mark

[Nups]

Hi Jao,

As long as windows detects and supports the USB disk inserted the new version of BESR shouldnt have any problems backing it up. Nor the previous versions had any issues.

Also as per my knowledge there is no Hardware Compatibility lists for USB drives in BESR.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Nupur

[Jao]

Cheers for the reply, but every version of BESR to 8.5 is renound for having this problem. I've been asking with every release hoping that finally it does. Typing in BESR USB Disk Rotation and you'll see page after page after page of people asking the same question month after month and being told that the product doesn't work like they were sold.  Bare naked BESR has never been able to handle USB rotation without either a) manual intervention, b) third party utils or c) some VBS scripting.  All of which are fine if you have onsite techy people, but not when you have 15 remote offices, where the level of technical skill just about reaches swapping the tapes each night and no more. Some examples:-

http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/besr-targets-drive-letter-not-specific-drive

http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/weekly-drive-rotation-does-not-recognise-new-drive

http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/how-set-besr85-two-drives-get-rotated

http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/how-back-any-disk-specified-drive-letter


I'd like the speed of removable drives, with the simplicity of tape and the advantage of Restore Anyware :)

[Nups]

Ok so you are talking about swapping the drives. I have seen cases where matching the disk signatures of the disks helps in these kind of situations. And you are right. The technote below shall help you in this regards:

http://support.veritas.com/docs/316826

Check out the mbrwiz part from the technote.

Also take a look at http://mbrwizard.com/reference.php#signature

[MIXIT]

I don't mean to be a pessimist but I'm really getting tired of fighting with BESR issues. 

I was testing version 8.5 Desktop Edition and having all sorts of annoying problems whilst using an Iomega REV drive, rotating 5 x 35GB disks monday-friday.  With the kind help of folks ont eh forum, I finally ironed out some of the problems.  I was just about to offiically recommend this product to a customer when I noticed 2010 was out, so instead, i decided to test that. 

I don't know what I did wrong, though I suspect it's not me, but now BESR 2010 thinks drive H: (the REV drive), no matter what disk is in, is a Mounted Recovery Point.  It is not a Mounted Recovery Point, nor have I never chosen an option to mount one.  Rec Point Browser sees no rec points thus gives me no target to Dismount the supposed point.  For the sake of testing, I ran a Format on the rev disk, then manually deleted anything left over (REV puts a little autorun.inf file). 

So I uninstalled BESR 2010, verified the Dismount REcovery Point option was gone from the right-click menu in My Computer (XP), then reinstalled it, and have the same problem.  I've uninstalled Iomega's REV system software prior to that, hoping perhaps it was just a stupid Iomega/BESR 2010 compatibility thing.  So right now, the REV drive is just a USB disk attached, yet BESR won't give up on the Mounted Recovery Point thing. 

So when trying to define a new backup job (none exist at present), and I think it's the 4th screen where you set up the Destination, I browse to H: to select it as my Destination and get an error about the drive being read-only.  Details button shows that it thinks it's a Mounted Recovery Point.  I can manually create files/folders on the disk no problem, so it's fully interactive from a Windows standpoint, just not via BESR. 

By the way, BESR 8.5 would never allow me to eject the disk unless I first stopped the BESR service (this problem existed on multiple systems so I know it's not the computer...).  It seems 2010 has corrected this so that's progress at least. 

So I need help figuring out how to get H: to be just a regular drive from BESR's perspective, none of this "mounted recovery point" nonsense.  


Thank you. 

[ioniancat21]

I saw your question and just wanted to add some input that may help you get closer to your solution. I have done away with all REV drives where I do consulting work for clients, when they are being used for image-based backup storage. The reason for this is because Norton Ghost, another Symantec product doesn't play nice with those REV drives, despite the fact that the software is bundled with them. Some of my clients purchased these drives with the idea that they could have their backups stored on REV media. My customers had problems creating and restoring images and the only fix in these cases would be to create backups to network hard drives or NAS, then copy those images over to the REV drives and vice-versa when restoring, which is very time consuming. Long story short, in all cases I replaced those REV drives with USB Hard drives. While REV offers a nice cartridge format, the price per megabyte is more expensive than the hard drives and the reliability of REV is quite poor. With 1TB hard drives going for under $100 these days, why play around with non-standard technology?

My advice is to ditch the REV device, as it's headed in the direction of ZIP and JAZ.................to the obsolete hardware graveyard. Furthurmore, Maxtor's One-touch technology works intermittantly, making your task of performing backups that much harder. In close, my advice would be to abandon the REV drives and buy a 10-pack of 80GB hard drives, which should cost around $300-400 and rotate them as you would with REV cartridges. Judging by the fact that your using REV, I'd assume this isn't for archival backups to sit on a shelf for 7 years as most I.T. managers will find it costly to throw expensive media like REV on shelves and would turn to DLT tape instead for those tasks. Just to add, I use external hard drives all the time for BESR backups and restores and have never had issues doing anything with those types of devices.

Trust me on this one and good luck,
CAT

[ioniancat21]

I wanted to add a link to some reviews of REV on CNet. While these users may have other issues, the end result is REV is not sunshine and roses all the way!!!

http://reviews.cnet.com/other-removable-media-drives/rev-35gb-90gb-external/4852-6407_7-30804334.htm...

[ioniancat21]

To answer the original question, if you use Computer Management's Disk Management utility to change the drive letter of the multiple hard drives to match, there will be no detection issues and you'll be able to swap drives without reconfiguring your backup jobs. Just to make sure, I tried it right here with 2 different hard drives and it worked perfectly. Just to add, I'm doing full independant backup images and not incremental-based backups so keep note of this, I believe incrementals may not work similarly because they're part of a set, therefore BESR is going to look for the other pieces beforehand. Also, make sure you have the BESR application not running while performing the drive letter change as it may detect you changing the drive letter and prompt you to add the drive into BESR as a device.

[MIXIT]

Hey CAT, just letting you know I sent you an email a few days ago.  No hurry to reply but wanted to let you know here via the Symantec forum notifier in case it got lost in the shuffle. 

Thanks. 

[ioniancat21]

I got your message and have replied, thanks again!!!

[aychekay]

Original Poster, Jao,

I haven't used version 2010 yet but I agree that starting with version 8.0 and continuing through version 8.5, BESR's feature that detects a USB Drive and assigns it an alias actually prevents you from creating one simple backup job that backs up to any USB Drive with a given drive letter.  I asked a long time ago for the option to disable that feature but I don't know if and I doubt that it's been added to version 2010.

Version 7 would let you do exactly that, have any number of USB drives that you assigned the same drive letter and then use one backup job to backup to any of those drives, assuming that you only want to make full images. Of course, this would work well with incremental backups.

The only way you get this functionality with version 8 or 8.5 is to have several hard drives that BESR doesn't "recognize". For a better explanation of this see my blog article here: http://symantec-besr.blogspot.com/2008/12/besrs-alias-feature-doesnt-recognize.html

REV Drives

I want to second all the negative comments about REV drives. Dump them as fast as you can. One of my biggest complaints was their failure rate combined with a one year warranty. It isn't uncommon for the drive to fail at 13 or 14 months and then you're sunk. Another complaint is the way they are designed to be recognized as a CD Drive instead of a true hard drive. This often throws backup software a curve ball that it can't handle.

Check out the RDX Drive (Dell sells it as the RD1000 Drive). These have longer warranties, are recognized as hard drives, and are more of a business/enterprise product in their design and reliability. Be aware that up through version 8.5, making backup jobs with the RDX Drive is still a chore that requires scripts and likely some human intervention. I suspect that version 2010 is the same story. Take a look at a forum post from October 2008 where I outlined a bunch of BESR issues: https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/forums/share-your-feedbacksuggestions

[MIXIT]

Hi CAT, I didn't see your email (not in the Sym Connect inbox nor in my regular email inbox.  Which address did you send to?)


Ok now to my post. 

I still find myself unsure of whether BESR is worth the time or not. 

So bottom line is this: 

1.  Does BESR work reliably with any backup hardware other than a single attached USB hard drive?  Based on what I've heard so far, the answer is no.  By reliable, I mean my user only has to swap the disk (or tape) out each day and doesn't have to do anything else because the backup jobs are automated, old disk images are auto-deleted so there are no out-of-space issues, and NO SCRIPTS are needed.  If the product can't work out of the box or with some patching/updates, then it's a useless product - I shouldn't have to find workarounds for it. 

3.  Or should I just go with a server-oriented solution like a DAT drive and Backup Exec?  But if I did, would it work on XP and would it do image-based backups and simple restores using a hardware independant recovery boot disc?  

The only reason I even keep trying to figure this stuff out is because I have no idea if there are any good alternatives.  ShadowProtect looks very good, but who's to say they don't have all the same problems?  

Anyway, feedback is appreciated from anybody.  CAT, if your email already gives me the answers I'm hoping for then great! :) 

[MIXIT]

Sorry I double-posted. 

[MIXIT]

Hi just wanted to say thanks for all the info in your post.  I wrote my "about to give up" post before writing this reply but wanted to express that I appreciate the info on the RDX but still in my mind if BESR can't interact with this stuff effectively on it's own without custom scripting then the product is useless. 

A person shoudln't have to write their own scripts to make such basic tasks as automated backups and media management work.  If I knew how to script I might just suck it up and make a workaround of some kind but since I don't, I'm strongly of the mind that Symantec should figure out how to make the product work properly in the first place. 

And maybe it does and I'm missing something, but if so what would that be?  

Thanks again. 

[MIXIT]

Please disregard the above posts from me.  I'd edit them out but for what it's worth, they provide good background on where my frustration is at with this. 

Anyway, here's what I"m going to do: 

Forget 2010 and just reocmmend purchasing 8.5 to my customer.  Before even looking at 2010, I had had 8.5 working sufficiently well.  I had it doing Independent Recovery Points via 5 backup jobs to 5 REV disk cartridges, one for each day of the week, and it was both doing the backups as well as removing the older image file so disk management was functional. 

In my mind, there is no viable alternative to the above - any "desktop edition" product from anybody is likely to be a potential problem for a business trying to use an XP box as a server.  And since XP is the 'server' OS of choice for my customer, we don't have any options towards using regular Backup Exec 12.x or BESR Server Edition - the only Symantec product that will work is BESR Desktop Edition.  (PS:  I would never put any Norton product like Ghost into a business environment). 

Also, having just an external USB hard drive attached might work for backups, but not for effective disaster planning.  I need media to go offsite each day and the only convenient way is via small removable media.  If BESR Desktop Edition supported tape drives, I might go that route but since it doesn't (according to the blog post at least), I am stuck with this REV solution. 

So while everything seems to be going in circles, I think I'll just stick with BESR 8.5 and resell that to my client.  As long as they're on XP, there's no need to go with a newer version which seems to add more problems than it solves (in my test at least). 

CAT, I'm still interested in your email but either way i'm going to stick with BESR 8.5 Desktop Edition even if the hardware has to change. 

 

[Andreas_Horlach]

The BESR 8.5 and 2010 software have been tested and will back up to the REV drives, as well as RD1000 and RDX drives. Regarding the REV drive, one issue we have is the device drivers not cooperating, and the device appears in MY COMPUTER as a CD-ROM drive. The device needs to show up as a removable disk or hard disk. If not, follow this link for a solution, or contact Iomega.

https://iomega-eu-en.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/iomega_eu_en.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=15218

Please let me know if this helps.

[MIXIT]

Thanks Andreas.  I took the REV hardware from my customer's site and brought it here for a bit but will be returning it to them soon so I"ll see if there are any quirks to sort out.  I ended up selling them version 8.5 but what I think I might do is buy an NFR copy for the PC I'm writing from here and test that a bit.  It won't be with REV hardware but at least I'll get more familiar with any oddities (if any) from my own perspective using the software day to day for my own backup needs.  

I've found that the OFFSITE copy function works well in 8.5 as well (haven't tried on 2010.  I'm not sure yet if under 8.5 the software auto-managed Independent Recovery Points via OFFSITE copy when using UNC paths on a local subnet (I believe I set the Rec Point count to 1 but I see about 5 backup images there), but either way it's a secondary backup function so I"m not complaining. 

Sorry about the frustration thing, when one is under pressure to find a working backup solution for a customer that hasn't had a backup in weeks it's difficult not having the software "just work" without hassles. 

Anyway, now that the customer has purchased the software if tech support s needed I'll call in and/or post here depending on the urgency. 

I'll check that link out now too, thanks for that.