Shadow Protect "Failure"

[Bigaldoc]

A question for my fellow Shadow Protect users. My weekly full image backup failed to run last evening. Here's the story.

I normally run a full image on Saturday with incrementals the other six days. The only change I make each week is to the alternate external USB drive. I keep three weeks on each of two drives. Two weeks ago I returned home about 4 pm on Saturday and had not done my usual pre-backup housekeeping (chkdsk, temp files, browser cache, recycle bin, etc.) So I jumped in to SP and changed the backup time to 8 pm instead of 5 pm so I would have time to get my work done.

The full backup and incrementals ran just fine for these past two weeks.

I was otherwise occupied last night and didn't check the computer to see if the full image was running. This morning when I checked the drive neither the full from last night or this morning's incremental (3 am) had run. No power failure that I could tell; checked Event Viewer and no entries anywhere later than 5 pm yesterday.

I was going to check the SP logs and when I ran the app, the full image suddenly started. It has completed now and is schedule for incremental at 3 am tomorrow morning. The SP log has nothing from last evening - no event, no failure, nada! The last entry in the log is the incremental on April 29.

Has anything like this ever happened to anyone else and wondering what the cause could have been?

[PaulB]

That's very strange, Al. My 'fulls' failed last night too, but that was because my external backup disk (an eSATA device) mysteriously disappeared from my list of mounted devices. I was able to re-run the 'fulls' this afternoon. The absence of any explanation of the cause of your problem is troubling.

Do you have both backup disks mounted and running all the time (two drive letters), or do you physically swap one for the other every week (single drive letter)?

[Bigaldoc]

Thanks for writing, Paul. My two 500 gig USBs are connected as separate drives all the time. Each week, before the full, I edit the job and change the destination drive letter. It's worked fine ever since I've used SP.

Hmmm, I've never been quite sure how much "phoning home" SP does to make sure you're registered and active but I have to wonder after you and I having this problem: do you suppose that their server was "off the air" last night? Considering that there's no failure messages in my log or Event Viewer, I wonder if my SP just couldn't see its server and so, did nothing.

Well, I'm not gonna grieve over it since I don't need the fingers of one hand to count the number of problems I've had with it all these years. AND, my backups are up to date and mountable.

[viking33]

I don't understand why an Imaging program would have to "phone home" or have anything to do with their servers being busy or off line? I would think that the imaging would run independently and on it's own, even without an Internet connection.
Or is this unique to SP? True Image certainly doesn't require an on line connection?

[Bigaldoc]

Careful, Bob! That's speculation on my part in light of the fact that Paul and I BOTH had problems last night.

I have no idea whether SP phones home or not...

[viking33]

Careful, Bob! That's speculation on my part in light of the fact that Paul and I BOTH had problems last night.

I have no idea whether SP phones home or not...

More curiosity on my part. Don't know what I'd have to be careful about, Ole buddy!

[PaulB]

In my case, SP indicated it failed because it could not find the target (G) drive. Sure 'nuff, Windows Explorer could not see the drive either. Can't explain what happened.

[Bigaldoc]

Well, Shadow Protect has done it again! On 30 April the full image job failed to start and when I opened SP the next morning, the full image backup started.

Last Saturday, it ran OK but I can't remember if I already had the GUI open waiting and watching or not.

TODAY, I did not have the GUI running and, although I happened to be sitting here at my desk doing other things and not using the computer, I did open the SP GUI at 5:05 PM and the job scheduled to start at 5 pm had NOT started. I forced it to start by clicking Execute and it is running as I type.

I don't know what could be causing the full image backup not to "fire" on Saturday when it's scheduled. All six nightly incrementals for the past week ran OK as scheduled and the GUI wasn't running.

I really could use some advice or suggestions on this one. I can't help but wonder after all this time of successful operation, whether some Windows update has put a crimp in SP's ability to fire up. I guess I'll go now and start looking in the forum to see if I can spot anything. All suggestions welcome!

[PaulB]

Sorry to see you are still experiencing problems with your SP backups. My 'fulls' are scheduled to run at 2:30 AM tonight. I'll keep a sharp eye on the results given your issue, and will post back tomorrow.

BTW, what OS partition do you use to run SP? Have you considered changing to another?

[Bigaldoc]

Since XP is still my "main squeeze" that is where I have SP installed. I really don't want to go through the trouble of removing it and re-installing in Win7 since I still don't use Win7 that much yet.

I just posted my question in the SP forum so I'll have to see if anyone comments there as well as here.

[Bigaldoc]

I guess you'd have to call me "antsy" because I couldn't stand not knowing.

Earlier in the evening, I was thinking that something in THAT job must be corrupt although I can't imagine what. I've been through all the screens several times and don't see anything amiss. Besides which, the incrementals have been running fine all along.

Anyhoo, I said to heck with this, deleted the job and created a new one to start the full image at 11 pm tonite and the six incrementals as usual, at 3 am.

I just got back up from bed and the job IS running as I write and SP was NOT open when I went to bed. So, for now it looks like a corrupt job file, but ... one never know, do one?

[PaulB]

So, for now it looks like a corrupt job file, but ... one never know, do one?

Let's hope that's all it is!

[PaulB]

My full images ran as scheduled at 2:30 AM this morning. All appears to be OK. The data disk image was considerably smaller than last week's but I remembered that I had reduced the size of the System Restore file.

Have you heard anything back from the SP forums? I'm drawing a blank here. I think we are running the same version (4.1.0.8605). The only difference I can see is that I run it under Win 7.

[Bigaldoc]

No, I haven't heard anything from the SP forum and didn't think I would. That's what caused me to get antsy. It usually takes some time over there to get any answers or comments.

As I mentioned, the new job I created ran just fine and on time. And, the small incremental did take place at 3 am as scheduled.

I don't think I'll ever know the answer to what happened to that job file when I made the slight change to it three weeks ago. All I did was change the time of the full image from Saturday at 5 pm to 8 pm and it didn't run until I opened SP the next morning.

Keeping my fingers crossed. Next Saturday morning I'm gonna delete the current job that's running now 'cause I don't want the Saturday full image running at 11 pm. I'm gonna create yet another new job for 5 pm so I can BE PRESENT to make sure it starts as I was this Saturday.

[BobL]

Hi Al,
Morale of the whole story might be: if you want to change anything on the full image settings - just delete the original scheduled job and enter as a new job.
Just trying to summarize the whole shebang.

[Bigaldoc]

My conclusion exactly, Bob. Just a shame I had to come to this conclusion because of a glitch in performance!

If I ever hear anything from the SP forum, I add more details to what I said there so mebbe the SP honchos might look to see what could have caused it all. If there is an "Edit" button in a job, that's what one should be able to do without possible corruption.

Mind you, I'm not disenchanted with SP. It HAS saved me a lot over time...

[BobL]

Mind you, I'm not disenchanted with SP. It HAS saved me a lot over time...

My sentiments exactly. SP has saved my bacon several times (or more precisely saved me several days of reconfiguring my system - happens when you are like me and like to play/try/beta/trial all sorts of software.
Best to you.

[PaulB]

I wouldn't be too hasty to fault the Edit function. I edit the backup job once per week to alternate between destination drives. One week I point to the F: drive, the next to the G: drive. I sometimes also edit the job to change the time it is run. It seems that most of my problems are associated with the destination drives: they may not be turned on/plugged in or, as in a recent case, they vanished from the list of mounted drives.

One thing I do after editing the job is to finish by clicking File>Exit instead of clicking the 'X'. This way I don't have the SP icon in the system tray. Don't know if this makes any difference but I'm a creature of habit.

I too am not about to give up on SP!

[Bigaldoc]

You're 100% on the money, Paul! I too edit my backup job every Friday, after the last incremental is done. I change the destination, like you, from F: to G: or vice versa, since I also alternate USB drives.

I suppose it could've just been some typical "computer gremlin" that caused some damage, somewhere in the job, because I will continue to have to modify the destination each week. And, again like you, I choose EXIT to fully close the app.

My only "insurance" for the future is to put the job back at an earlier time in the afternoon so I can be present to be sure that it runs. That's what I've been doing for ages and ages.

Looks like those of us who use SP are loyal to "our product!"

[Bigaldoc]

He's baaack! I just wanted to let my Shadow Protect friends know that my malady happened again yesterday.

After the problem of a month ago, I re-created my backup job from scratch and for the past two weeks, all has been well. I have my full image scheduled for 5 pm on Saturdays (when I'm present to be sure it starts!) and the incrementals each night at 3 am for six nights. It has been working as it should. The "only" thing I have to do each week is to EDIT the job to change the destination from one USB drive to the other. I do this usually on Friday afternoon or Saturday morning.

Yesterday afternoon at 5 pm the backup job did not start. I had done my usual housekeeping well before 5 pm (emptying cache, temporary files, recycle bin, chkdsk, etc.)

At 5 pm I looked over at the USB drives and there were NO flashing lights indicating that SP was running. So, I opened Shadow Protect to see if there had been an error of any kind. Before I could do anything, at about 5:06 pm the job suddenly started running and I have no idea whether it started because I executed SP or it was just "running a tad late."

The full image of my three partitions completed successfully and this morning's 3 am incrementals ran as scheduled without the SP app being active. I don't know what's going on and don't even know quite the words to use if I were to make a post in the SP forum. I'm stumped on this one.