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Can't backup a partition - insufficient space for VSS snapshot

MikeInPoulsbo
Level 4

I ran my first full disk backup today using Veritas SR 16 and the software did not backup the WINRETOOLS partition.  The error was  "Incremental recovery points are disabled because the *:\WINRETOOLS volume does not have sufficient storage space to perform a VSS snapshot"

I did not run into this problem with SR 2103 R2.

The error message suggested to create free storage space on the *:\(WINRETOOLS) volume.

Does this mean I have to grow the partition?

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

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I received information on TenForums that resolved all my issues.  Thanks for the help here.

 

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criley
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VSS requires a certain amount of free space otherwise it will fail.

NOTE: Another possible cause is that the volume does not have enough free space to create a VSS snapshot. As per Microsoft, if the volume is less than 500MB in size, VSS requires 32MB of free space. If the volume is 500MB or greater, VSS requires 320MB of free space.

Taken from http://www.veritas.com/docs/000017563

I understand there is not enough room.  Where is this "room"?  In the partition itself?  How do I fix it?

Markus_Koestler
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on the partition where the VSS storage is located.

criley
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@MikeInPoulsbo

Yes, on the partition itself.

Go to \Program Files\Veritas\Veritas System Recovery\Utility and run SmeDump.exe. This will create debug.txt

Attach the file here and I will take a look for you.

 

criley
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@MikeInPoulsbo

Thanks for the file. It shows that the WINRETOOLS partition is 500MB and 282MB is in use - this means only 218MB is free (VSS needs at least 320MB, as per this: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd364809(v=ws.10).aspx).

You are going to need to free up some space on that partition.

I resized the c: drive partition to create a gap between it and WINRETOOLS which I increased to fill the space.  I'm now able to create a backup that includes WINRETOOLS.  I'm a little concerned now that Disk Management no longer labels WINRETOOLS as a recovery partition.  Should I worry?

It appears that the partition utility I used (EaseUS) cleared the attribute bits.  They should be 0x8000000000000001.  Now I have to figure out how to set them.

 

Got the attrubute bits set the way they were (diskpart gpt command).  It still is not coming up as a recovery partition.

criley
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Sorry, I've never used that software before.

So if you run DISKPART, SELECT DISK #, LIST PARTITION - it no longer lists that partition type as 'Recovery'?

It lists it as "Primary"

criley
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You can probably use DiskPart to change the partition type but you may want to consult Microsoft Support for this.

We are now going away from the scope of support regarding System Recovery since this change was made by a 3rd party tool.

I received information on TenForums that resolved all my issues.  Thanks for the help here.