Arcserve 6.5 only restores session 1 on NT

[SunnyByfleet]

Hi, the problem I'm having has been mentioned on this forum before, but I can't find any solutions. Please help if you can!

System: Arcserve 6.5 Enterprise, running on NT Server 4 SP6.
Tape Drive: HP Superstore DAT 40.
Tape: Maxell DDS 4.
Problem:
I perform a backup which consists of numerous sessions. The backup runs with no errors. At the end of the backup the following is displayed in the activity log:

1573 Backup Operation Successful
[CAT] 2/25/02 11:23 PM [IDAAB,SESSION:1] is merged. (files=27954)
[CAT] 2/25/02 11:23 PM [IDAAB,SESSION:2] is merged. (files=20090)
[CAT] 2/25/02 11:23 PM [IDAAB,SESSION:3] is merged. (files=25775)
[CAT] 2/25/02 11:23 PM [IDAAB,SESSION:4] is merged. (files=39300)
[CAT] 2/25/02 11:23 PM [IDAAB,SESSION:5] is merged. (files=50807)
[CAT] 2/25/02 11:23 PM [IDAAB,SESSION:6] is merged. (files=33536)

If I now try and restore something from session 6, the following messages appear:
W3853 Session was truncated. (SESSION=6)
E3801 Invalid session header signature (SIG=00000000)

Basically, I can't restore anything that wasn't on session 1.

So far I've tried the following to resolve the problem:
1. Cleaned the drive a few times. No change.
2. Restored using Restore Wizard, as per a previous thread here. No change.
3. Merged the tape. Tape would not merged.
4. Scanned the tape.
When you scan you get the following:

Run Scan Job Now
Start Scan Operation (QUEUE=1, JOB=6)
Use media 2/25/02 11:23 PM, ID DAAB, sequence #1
Source Session 1 on Media 2/25/02 11:23 PM
379 Directories 27,954 Files (1,276.30 MB) Found on Media.
1,370.31 MB read from media.
Elapsed time: 2m 33s
Average Throughput 537.37 MB/Min
Scan Operation Successful

My questions are this:
How can I restore sessions 2-6?
Assuming I get it all working, will my old tapes still contain valid data?

Thanks in advance.

 

[SunnyByfleet]

Some more information: The build is 620. This is the same as the patch provided on the CA website.

This problem occurs on ALL tapes I have checked so far. :-(

P.S. I have no idea why those cats appeared in my original post.

 

[jgrantca]

We've had the same problem. What we found is that we had to update to build 622 (update device support) for the a certain drive to restore from the 2nd or 3rd session.

Hope this helps.

Jamie Grant

 

[SunnyByfleet]

How do you update to build 622? The latest I've been able to find is build 620.

Thanks for the help! Were the old tapes then restorable, or did it only work for post 622 backups?

 

[SunnyByfleet]

Right, I found the 622 update on the CA site. If anybody else needs it and stumbles across this thread the address is as follows:

http://support.ca.com/as6ntsupp.html

From there you can access all patches and documentation.

Anyway, having applied the 622 patch and LO53442.CAZ (Added Device Support) I can now backup multiple sessions and restore them successfully. This is good.

However....

I still cannot restore from a backup tape that was created using the pre-upgrade (ie 620) Arcserve. I get the same old session not found message.

I tried merging the tape, to no avail. Does anybody have any ideas how I can get the information out? Otherwise, I've got an awful lot of tapes going to waste.....

 

[jgrantca]

Unfortunatly we had to use another backup software package (backupexec) to retrieve the information from the pre 622 version. You can download a trial version from

http://www.veritas.com/.

This software wants SP4+, and it needs to be at least a BDC for the server and netlogon services to be running for it to install. We were able to restore it this way.

I'm glad you found the update as I'm not sure that I'd be able to find it again.

Jamie Grant

 

[NemoOo]

hi jamy ;

i have the same pb to access to session made with a build 620. I upgraded to 622 to resolve the pb . But i need some information inside the tape created with 620.


i m looking for information how you proceed to use backup exec to restore arcserve session .

I make a Win2k fresh install and the latest backup exec demo version. There for i can't mege any media, sessions or tape.

So how you made this miracle ;p

See You

Yann

 

[brettmeek]

This is a problem with ArcServe 6.5, I'm not sure which builds. I went through this with tech support, but they were of no help. After much trial and error, the only method I found of getting a restore to work is the following:
1. Do a restore by Backup Media.
2. Under Restore, Filter, specify the file you need to restore.
3. On the "Source" tab, start from Session 1, and attempt to restore the file. If it does not find the file in this session, change the session number to 2, and so on, until you find the file you are looking for.

There is apparently a cataloging issue with certain builds of ArcServe and certain hardware. I have spoken with ArcServe about this (and you know they know about it)but they haven't fessed up to it.

After going through all of this, I completely uninstalled AS6.5, and updated to AS2000, where this problem does not seem to exist.

The only problem is that any backups you made with 6.5, to restore you will have to go through the same procedure. Just upgrading the ArcServe version does not eliminate the problem on the previously backed up tapes.

Hope this helps

 

[koningbart]

One of our customers encountered the same problem last week.
After several attemps to restore a session on a clean install of arcserve, we installed a demo version of Veritas Backup.exec version 9 on a W2K Workstation. With Veritas we were able to retrieve all the data because it somehow ignores session headers. I know this is dirty but CA tech support wasn't much help either...

 

[GTommy]

Hi

We are using AS7 Workgroup Edition, Build 1086. We get the same errors W3853 and E3801 during restore from session 1. Restoring data from a higher session works. All techtips i've read refer to version 6.5 or 6.6. Does anybody know somthing about version 7.

We've had tried aut every tip(restoring with wizard, clean tapedrive, scan the tape, merge the tape etc) but nothing helps.

P.S.
Restore works fine from a second HP C1537A(using a DDS3) but from a HP C5683A(using a DDS4) restore fails.

Thanks in advance

 

[SunnyByfleet]

Here's a summary of what I found I had to do:

1. Make sure your build is the latest version available.

Once this was the case, all my new backups could be successfully restored.

2. For old backups, get a demo of Veritas. They will post you one in a couple of days. Its a full, time-limited version.