tape engine = 100% cpu

[vulpine]

Has anyone had issues with W2k sp3? I have had ARC 7.0 sp4 running just fine until I applied the latest W2k sp, including the critical updates that address security in the os, I also defragged the disks. All this server does is backups at night.

Symptoms include: tape engine process runs wild taking up 100% of the system's cpu, newly created backup job hangs when trying to connect to tape - even a local tape drive. I am not able to stop the job either, i've had to kill asrunjob, tape engine and then delete the job from the database. Also included are headache, nausea, and anxiety.

Right now I'm running checks on the Very Large Data Base (lol), maybe the defrag mussed up the VLDB? what else is there to do?
Any advice, suggestions or sympathy are greatly appreciated,

Vulpine

 

[Lou0686]

Hey,

Lots and lots of sympathy, lol.

How about reapplying the Arcserve patches. The OS patch may have replaced something. That would be the first thing I'd try.

Lou

 

[vulpine]

Thanks Lou, misery loves company, you know? I went with your suggestion in addition to some other ideas.

Database checks took forever but showed no errors. So I decided to reduce the database by running the prune job (changed my preferred setting of 365 days to 30 days). So now the database should be bouncin' and behavin'. Also threw in a dbdefrag on all databases for good measure.

Reapplied AS 7.0 sp4. Recreated the job, ran it and....
no change. tapeeng is 100% - nothing in the log. Kill, kill, delete.

Device manager shows that everything is okay. I turned on the tape engine logging feature - nothing! It never even logs an attempt to connect.

Am I looking at a total reinstall?

vulpine

 

[vulpine]

After doing everything I could think of, everything besides setting the @#$% thing on fire, I decided to roll back all of the Windows updates up to Service Pack 3. Guess what? Working like a charm. I didn't see anything about this on this forum, or on CA's website. After speaking to Exabyte (the library manufacturer) it turns out that it is happening quite often. W2k SP3 breaks ARCserve 7.0 SP4 - that is a fact.

vulpine

 

[Krauser]

Maybe install patch QO23827 for LOCAL BACKUP JOB HANGS

http://support.ca.com/Download/patches/asitnt/QO23827.html

This patch it's not include in SP4 of Arcserve 2000/7.

Hope it help.

Krauser