Client computer backups folder in Drivepool

[lionelhutz]

I have recently had problems with Windows Server Essentials R2 client backup, and my best guess is that it is something to do with having the "Client Computer Backup" folder in a Drivepool.

 

This is new: I have been running the server for about 18 months with client backups going to "Client Computer Backup" folder in a Drivepool and everything was fine until the last month or so. The backup service kept stopping itself and if I manually restarted it, it would stop again almost immediately. The logs showed regular WriteFile and EOF errors. I scanned all my drives with StableBit Scanner but found no errors.  

 

I reinstalled the server OS (again with the "Client Computer Backup" folder in a Drivepool) to no avail; the same errors kept happening. 

 

Then I got the bright idea to move the "Client Computer Backup" folder to my system drive (temporarily) and the errors stopped. I then moved it to a separate drive outside the Drivepool to give it a bit more room and it still appears to work fine. So I can only conclude it is a problem with Drivepool, or at least with how backup deals with Drivepool.

 

Searching on old posts, I see quite a few reports of similar issues from around 2012. Is this still an ongoing issue? Or is there a way to get my "Client Computer Backup" folder back to the Drivepool? 

 

 

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Unfortunately, in a lot of cases, the problem was actually with the underlying disks. 

 

The write and EOF errors indicates that it is a disk issue, though. 

 

 

If you would, enable file system logging on the pool and reproduce.

http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_2.x_Log_Collection

 

 

Additionally, it may be worth running a burst test on each of the disks in the pool (open up StableBit Scanner, and right click on the disk). 

 

Additionally, check the Event Viewer log (run "eventvwr.msc") and check the "System" log for "disk", "ntfs" or controller ("ahci", "iaStor", etc) errors.  if you're seeing a lot of these, it may indicate a problem with the disk that may not be picked up by StableBit Scanner (eg, not enough to cause problems with the surface scan or generate SMART errors), but enough to cause issues with the heavy IO that the backup database generates. 

[lionelhutz]

I have resolved this problem so I thought I would post the resolution.

 

It wasn't a disk issue, it was a folder permissions issue. At some point, all my Shared Folders' permissions got totally messed up. Not sure of the original cause. Possibly my attempts to fix things made it worse, permissions are really complicated.

 

I fixed it by removing each drive from the drivepool, copying any remaining data off the drive, reformatting, then adding the clean drive to a new pool. Then I created new Shared Folders in the new pool and gradually copied all my data into them, checking permissions as I went. I suspect this is a lesson for any new Windows Server installation: create new shared folders and then copy data into them. Don't try and point straight at your old shared folders.

 

The fix took ages because I had more data than space on any one drive, so I had to keep shifting data around. Permissions were so messed up there was some data I simply couldn't move off a drive, luckily nothing important. I suspect there could have been file system level problems, because I wasn't able to reformat the drives until I deleted the old partition using disk management. 

 

Since the fix I have moved my Client Computer Backups shared folder back to the drivepool and it seems to be working fine. So I don't think there is any inherent problem with having that folder in a drivepool. 

[Christopher (Drashna)]

The Client Computer Backup service runs in the "SYSTEM" profile, so if that account doesn't have full control over the folder and files in it... it could ABSOLUTELY cause issues here. 

 

And if you messed with the permissions, you could have accidently left them in a half changed state (or "just wrong") and that would definitely have caused issues.

 

 

Though, point of reference, "SYSTEM" should always have full control over everything. A majority of system services (including StableBit DrivePool) run under this system profile, so it not being set can cause all sorts of issues, all over the place. 

 

 

And yeah, there should be no issues with hosting the database on the pool. If there really was an issue, we would definitely see more reports of it.