NAS Backup issues! Pretty urgent...

[Little-Miss]

Right im using a 1TB NAS (Raid1), DLink DNS-323 i think, using NTBackup.

 

A backup will start, get so far and fail with...

 

Error: The device reported an error on a request to write data to media.

Error reported: Unknown error.

There may be a hardware or media problem.

Please check the system event log for relevant failures.

The operation was ended.

 

Error: X: is not a valid drive, or you do not have access.

 

I've tried so many things that ive just lost track. I've got a few geeks mulling it over as well, but just wanted to throw it out there.

 

Its pretty urgent as i dont have a decent backup

 

Right, off you go....

[kmount]

Is drive X present / accessible if you try and copy stuff to it?

[Little-Miss]

I've just saved a text file to it ok. It does seem to be having a hissy fit every so often when i try to open the drive from my computer saying that it is not accesible but this passes quickly.

[DMcCoy]

Try backing up to a UNC path instead, drive letters are not available when running as a different user, which it may be doing for the system state backup etc.

[sparkeh]

I had a similar problem when I tried using a mapped drive as the backup target. It was hit and miss but ntbackup seemed to have issues with accessing mapped drives (which I assume from the error is how you are doing it?)

Solution for me was to unmap the drive and use UNC path instead.

[Little-Miss]

I have tried UNC and IP but will try it again.

[timzim]

Check your NAS OS has not got any power saving set to run on it, including screensavers. Also, are there any errors recorded in the NAS log which coincide with the time of the backup error/s?

[Hightower]

If you have problems opening it every so often in my computer then that would lead me to think it was a problem with the NAS or even the connection between the server/NAS. I think Timzim is heading down the right lines.

 

How old is the NAS? When did it start doing this, and has it been okay until it started doing this?

[DMcCoy]

Will it create a backup on the local drive? Try with just backing up a single folder as that will show if it's VSS thats broken or not. I assume you are backing up to a file, with the overwrite as the setting?

[Little-Miss]

grr now im being told its not a valid drive when trying to do a backup.

 

I've turned off all power managment. Using its UNC.

 

It's not a year old yet. When i first got it it worked but it hasnt worked for a couple of weeks now. Hence my panic!!

[Hightower]

grr now im being told its not a valid drive when trying to do a backup.

 

I've turned off all power managment. Using its UNC.

 

It's not a year old yet. When i first got it it worked but it hasnt worked for a couple of weeks now. Hence my panic!!

 

Really sounds to me like a problem with the NAS. Maybe log a fault with it under warranty if it's not a year yet. If there's nothing on it and you know the settings to enter, try resetting the NAS to factory default and setting it up again.

[bossman]

@Little-Miss:

 

Its not one of those dreaded buffalo NAS boxes is it?

 

Get it back under the warranty if it is quick sharpish and then look at maybe building your own NAS box using freeNas which will be a damn site more reliable.

[CraigM]

We had a DLink Nas last year, the DNS 313 model or something like that, and it was a terrible piece of equipment. Copying over the network was stupendously slow, but when attached as USB drive it was ok. Of course, attached as a USB drive defeats the point. The device was stolen earlier this year, we haven't bothered to replace it. A homebuilt NAS using FreeNAS is working much better.

 

I guess the problem is that these little NAS boxes have no processing power to really speak of.

[soapyfish]

I had terrible problems that I never got round reliabley with NT backup via mapped drives, in the end I just used MS xcopy and scheduled the task to run nightly. I was careful to use some of the data verification options and continue if errors were located options, to make sure I always had some level of backup what ever happened.

 

There is a list of switches here

 

Command Line Switches for the XCOPY Command

 

Another thought if you have symantec backup exec on another server that has capacity, you could purchase the remote agent part of the software so that the NAS box could backup to that Server

 

Just an idea!

Edited June 4, 2010 by soapyfish

[waldronm2000]

I don't know if it's of any help, but I used to have to distribute large amounts of data to multiple desktops overnight. I had written scripts to do this using XCOPY to mapped drives, but found the scripts fell over when there was a single file bigger than 2Gb if I recall correctly. I would come in the next morning to find loads of messages to the effect that the device was no longer available but for some unspecified reason. Yet if I did a drag&drop of the same file to the share in Windows Explorer, it worked fine. I guessed it might be down to SMB using 32bit addressing within files, but unfortunately I never got to the bottom of it.

 

However, I'm guessing your backup creates a single very large file. If it is possible to create the backup file on a local drive, it might be interesting to see whether this can be xcopy'd or drag&dropped to the NAS.

[EduTech]

Jesus! is this still going on littlemiss - i'll have another think kind of lost for idea's now to be honest.. hmm...

[Little-Miss]

Nooooo! I didn't revive it!

[azrael78]

Are these the same problems that we spoke of some time ago regarding your NAS backup - or is this something else entirely?

I recall a problem previously about backups not working with NTBackup - but nothing about the NAS being unavailable...

 

Could be I'm confused - throw me a PM and I'll see what I can do

 

Az

[glennda]

i know this sounds really stupid but have you tried a ping -t and seen if it drops pings? as it could be a fault with either the cabling to the nas or the network card on the nas.

 

I have a buffalo that occasionaly desides it doesnt want to play ball but it only stores my rubbish so its nothing major when it does!

[ricki]

Hi

 

I have had this for several reasons some of which are listed below.

 

Hard drive failing on raided nas drive. Please note that green lights in nas drive dont always mean they are working correctly.

User does not have permission to write to nas drive where I have entered local nas user credentials with read into a computer and the computer has remembered this instead of a read write account.

Where the nas drive is joined to the domain the time on the server is not correct and so kerberos does not work and so the computer does not have correct rights.

I have also had this if i have had power fluctuations and nas of switched acting up.

I have had this if nas over heating because its in a hot room and fans in nas are not enough to cope.

 

Richard