Hi all,
this has been a long journey. From the day when this problem surfaced (June 2003) until it "accidentally" worked (beginning of November 2003).
The problem was our backup of Microsoft Exchange Information Store (Exchange Server 2000) and Brick Level backup. We are using ARCserve 9 with SP1 and Patch 3.
The backup of our information store seemed to be doing right. The job log would always containt this error message:[tt]
E8524
Received unrecognized command from the client agent. (COMMAND=-69)
E8604
Failed to start backup. (DBNAME=First Storage Group, EC=)
[/tt]
At the end of the backup session however it would say that no errors occured. I took this for granted and did not bother to check, as the size backed up made sense. Then for some strange reason, i did check and much to my surprise saw that the information store totaled some 24GB and I had a bunch of transaction files from way back. This did not correspond with the 17GB backed up "successfully".
In addition to this, as if that wasn't enough, brick level would do ok one day, then the next day only back up a few mailboxes, lastly not backing up any mailboxes. The job log would look like this:
[tt]
[11/15/2003-17:02:24 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\XXX
[11/15/2003-17:18:42 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\YYY
[11/15/2003-17:18:45 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] E8604
[11/15/2003-17:18:45 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] Failed to start backup. (DBNAME=\Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ, EC=EXCH Exchange Agent -- (2529) \"Fail to Open Information Store\".)
[11/15/2003-17:18:45 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ
[11/15/2003-17:18:49 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] E8604
[11/15/2003-17:18:49 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] Failed to start backup. (DBNAME=\Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ1, EC=EXCH Exchange Agent -- (2529) \"Fail to Open Information Store\".)
[11/15/2003-17:18:49 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ1
[/tt]
Now, we have another location where we are using ARCserve 9 to backup up IS and brick level too. The major difference is, their information store is considerabley smaller then ours, only some 4GB. We experienced the same kind of error messages in the job log, but in this case IS was backed up successfully and transaction logs were all deleted thereafter. Brick Level caused same problems there as with us.
After numerous attempts, trying to solve this problem on my own and with help of Tek-Tips community, which led to nothing unfortunately, I finally called ARCserve Support.
To make a long story short: German ARCserve Support sucks![[evil]](/data/assets/smilies/evil.gif "[evil] [evil]")
. A month o' wasted time. I got pissed off at some point, wrote an angry e-mail which i addressed to some important people, and things happend. At the end I ended up with ARCserve support in USA.
The solution to Information Store Problem: When creating a backup job it is important that you select Named Pipes as remote protocol and that backup is done through Network Neighbourhood. Expand the computer, right click Microsoft Information Store you want to back up, select Remote Protocol and from the two possiblities select Named Pipes instead of TCP/IP.
The solution to Brick Level Problem: CA claims Exchange Server instability to be the reason why. They have provided us with a fix which deals with this scenario. It's a Exchange Agent DLL-File (Dbaxchg2.dll) that needs to be replaced. The fix is numbered T367075.
My backups are running error free for now. I sincerely hope it stays this way
Especially, I would like to thank mohamdr who really tried his best. I also hope this information will help other from falling into the same pit.
Cheers
Knutern
this has been a long journey. From the day when this problem surfaced (June 2003) until it "accidentally" worked (beginning of November 2003).
The problem was our backup of Microsoft Exchange Information Store (Exchange Server 2000) and Brick Level backup. We are using ARCserve 9 with SP1 and Patch 3.
The backup of our information store seemed to be doing right. The job log would always containt this error message:[tt]
E8524
Received unrecognized command from the client agent. (COMMAND=-69)
E8604
Failed to start backup. (DBNAME=First Storage Group, EC=)
[/tt]
At the end of the backup session however it would say that no errors occured. I took this for granted and did not bother to check, as the size backed up made sense. Then for some strange reason, i did check and much to my surprise saw that the information store totaled some 24GB and I had a bunch of transaction files from way back. This did not correspond with the 17GB backed up "successfully".
In addition to this, as if that wasn't enough, brick level would do ok one day, then the next day only back up a few mailboxes, lastly not backing up any mailboxes. The job log would look like this:
[tt]
[11/15/2003-17:02:24 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\XXX
[11/15/2003-17:18:42 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\YYY
[11/15/2003-17:18:45 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] E8604
[11/15/2003-17:18:45 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] Failed to start backup. (DBNAME=\Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ, EC=EXCH Exchange Agent -- (2529) \"Fail to Open Information Store\".)
[11/15/2003-17:18:45 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ
[11/15/2003-17:18:49 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] E8604
[11/15/2003-17:18:49 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] Failed to start backup. (DBNAME=\Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ1, EC=EXCH Exchange Agent -- (2529) \"Fail to Open Information Store\".)
[11/15/2003-17:18:49 ,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0] \Individual Mailboxes\ZZZ1
[/tt]
Now, we have another location where we are using ARCserve 9 to backup up IS and brick level too. The major difference is, their information store is considerabley smaller then ours, only some 4GB. We experienced the same kind of error messages in the job log, but in this case IS was backed up successfully and transaction logs were all deleted thereafter. Brick Level caused same problems there as with us.
After numerous attempts, trying to solve this problem on my own and with help of Tek-Tips community, which led to nothing unfortunately, I finally called ARCserve Support.
To make a long story short: German ARCserve Support sucks
. A month o' wasted time. I got pissed off at some point, wrote an angry e-mail which i addressed to some important people, and things happend. At the end I ended up with ARCserve support in USA.The solution to Information Store Problem: When creating a backup job it is important that you select Named Pipes as remote protocol and that backup is done through Network Neighbourhood. Expand the computer, right click Microsoft Information Store you want to back up, select Remote Protocol and from the two possiblities select Named Pipes instead of TCP/IP.
The solution to Brick Level Problem: CA claims Exchange Server instability to be the reason why. They have provided us with a fix which deals with this scenario. It's a Exchange Agent DLL-File (Dbaxchg2.dll) that needs to be replaced. The fix is numbered T367075.
My backups are running error free for now. I sincerely hope it stays this way
Especially, I would like to thank mohamdr who really tried his best. I also hope this information will help other from falling into the same pit.
Cheers
Knutern
