NTBackup error from XP to network hard drive

[Reverse first and last names]

I am trying to back up my computers to a network hard drive that is a
Maxtor hard drive in a CompUSA network drive box. The hard drive if
formatted with FAT32.

I am using the NTBackup program from WinXP Home. I keep getting the
following error:

Drive 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.

The error message tells me to look at the Event logs, but the event
logs just say that NTBackup reported an error, but doesn't give an
error number.

On another computer I got a "Delayed Write" error inconjunction with
the above error.

I have review MS reports 817688, 828402 and 240392, but none of them
appear to be the same as my situation.

I have scanned the hard drive with the network box's software and
found no errors.

Any ideas or suggestions?

Thanks,
Jay

 

[Reverse first and last names]

Forgot to mention, I am aware of the 4Gig limit on a FAT32 disk, but
sometimes the program dies on the 4th file.

Thanks,
Jay

 

[Kerry Brown]

I am trying to back up my computers to a network hard drive that is a
Maxtor hard drive in a CompUSA network drive box. The hard drive if
formatted with FAT32.

I am using the NTBackup program from WinXP Home. I keep getting the
following error:

Drive 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.

The error message tells me to look at the Event logs, but the event
logs just say that NTBackup reported an error, but doesn't give an
error number.

On another computer I got a "Delayed Write" error inconjunction with
the above error.

I have review MS reports 817688, 828402 and 240392, but none of them
appear to be the same as my situation.

I have scanned the hard drive with the network box's software and
found no errors.

Any ideas or suggestions?

Thanks,
Jay

Are you backing up more than one computer at the same time? It sounds like
you are overloading either the network or the network drive.

 

[Reverse first and last names]

I am only backing up one computer at a time.

I'm starting to wonder if this 4th file is a gigantic file that is
killing the FAT32 system. If it is the cache file, then that can be
quite large.

Thanks,
Jay

 

[Glen]

I doubt it is a windows file. 4GB is quite big for windows system files.
Even for pagefile or hibernate. It might be a media file. Why don't you get
a decent program like Norton Ghost or Acronis True Image as these can do an
incremental backup of the whole partition\drive.

What is the speed of the network card in both computers? Normally they are
set up with autodetect. Try changing the speed to 10 or 100 or if gigabit
ethernet make sure they are both 1000 and if you still get problems reduce
the speed so they are both 100 then test and then reduce both to 10 and see
if the problem goes away. That would show you if its a network\timing issue.

There are a lot of people who get the same error with external drives which
seem to be problems with caching or controller errors. Whether your network
error is related or not I have no idea but you might want to google for the
error and read other peoples problems and any fixes. You might get lucky.

Is the computer your connected to running XP as well.

 

[Kerry Brown]

It could be. Try a backup only selecting a few files that you know are less
than 4 GB. When I tried backing up to a similar cheap network drive I also
had problems when the backup started to approach 3 GB or more. The drive was
using an version of Linux with Samba and FAT32. The drive also had a USB
interface. I switched to USB, plugged it into a server, formatted it with
NTFS and the problem was solved. I also got much better speed this way.

 

[Reverse first and last names]

I tried Ghost and it kept crashing or disconnecting the computer from
the network. I haven't tried Ghost yet to the network drive.

I'm not going from one computer to another. Tried that and the system
disconnected. Now I am going from a computer to a standalone drive box
which has a "server" built in. It is CompUSA's server drive enclosure
with a Maxtor hard drive in it. Both handle 100 Mb.

I've tried searching for the error on the Internet and most of the
comparable hits are slightly different.

I'm getting to the point where I might remove the drive from the
enclosure and dedicate a PC with NTFS. That might be easiest.

Thanks for your response.
Jay

 

[Reverse first and last names]

Thanks. That is the approach I think I will have to take.

Jay

 

[NoStop]

I tried Ghost and it kept crashing or disconnecting the computer from
the network. I haven't tried Ghost yet to the network drive.

I'm not going from one computer to another. Tried that and the system
disconnected. Now I am going from a computer to a standalone drive box
which has a "server" built in. It is CompUSA's server drive enclosure
with a Maxtor hard drive in it. Both handle 100 Mb.

I've tried searching for the error on the Internet and most of the
comparable hits are slightly different.

I'm getting to the point where I might remove the drive from the
enclosure and dedicate a PC with NTFS. That might be easiest.

Thanks for your response.
Jay

Does the NAS server keep any log files on its own that would give you an
idea about the problem you're experiencing? How are you hooked up to the
server? Through a hub or a switch?


--
The ULTIMATE Windoze Fanboy:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2370205018226686613

View Some Common Linux Desktops ...
http://linclips.crocusplains.com/index.php

 

[Reverse first and last names]

Finally got something to work. I used Ghost and went into the advanced
options and set it to limit backup file size to 3 Gigs. It created
about 10 3Gig files for the backup. Apparently the problem was the
4Gig limit on FAT32. It seems that NTBACKUP must pre-allocate space
for the backup file. Even though it appeared the program had only
backed up 2K, it was trying to allocate a 40G backup file.

Now I just have to go find all my legit copies of Ghost that have been
taking up shelf space for a couple of years <g>.

Thanks,
Jay