NTBackup starting over. Needing help with Unmanaged backup on single tbu drive

[Jeff Taylor]

I have played with ntbackup for months and posted an earlier request
for help re: a script to have a backup occur every night on an XP pro
workstation.

I appreciate the replies but I still can't get it to work reliably.

Can someone outline the correct procedure to get ntbackup to work? I
can't believe it has to be this hard. At least all the documentation
i've poured over doesn't work for what I want. I can't figure it out
and my brain hurts. Not getting any younger at this!

Here's what I'm attempting to do:

I have two DDS3 tapes. I want to schedule a selected files backup to
occur every night but I don't want ntbackup to care *which* tape is in
(i.e. whatever label it has). Just overwrite and verify the latest
backup. I also want the job to run under an account other than my user
account in case I change my password, I don't want the job to fail.
Can it run under the SYSTEM account? How?

I think the solution lies somewhere between the jobs scheduler, the
account used to run it, the label on the tapes and the fact its a
stand alone Seagate DDS3 drive ("SEAGATE DAT 04106-XXX SCSI
Sequential Device"). I'ver tried all I know and am hoping somoene is
actually *doing* this.

I've tried MS knowledge articles which told me about a /um switch, not
to use the /n switch blah blah blah but it doesn't work unmanaged.

caveat....the fact that I change out a tape with the other one should
not break this nightly routine.

Over the course of 6 months I've seen the following behaviour:

"please put in tape with label...."
"The requested media failed to load..."
in Task scheduler it has shown "running..." but it isn't.

Looking forward to a solution!

thanks all
Jeff

 

[David Candy]

Use the Schedule wizard to make the task and assign it to an account for that purpose. The wizard writes the command line.

The receptionist stick the tape in and goes home. The backup run overnight.

That's all I've ever done. I don't use any of the tape libraries features so it doesn't care about it.

 

[Kevin Weilbacher]

are you runnng the script from the server or from a workstation?
-kw

 

[Mark Mancini]

Jeff, run NTBACKUP, have it backup everything nightly (on the server). Go
back into the scheduled task and change /rs:no to /rs:yes and end it in /um
and if you are going to change passwords, create an account in the backup
admins group. This is ALL you have to do, it shouldn't be any more
difficult. The /um switch allows it to use any media. If this isn't
working it may be your drive.

 

[Jeff Taylor]

XP Pro Kevin

 

[Jeff Taylor]

I'll try that Mark....more later

 

[Jeff Taylor]

Mark,

Just came in this morning and see that the backup tried to start but
Task Scheduler just shows the task as "running". No events in
eventvwr. No lights on the drive illuminated.

Could it be my tapes? They weren't new when I aquired them from a
client site some years ago. I thought RSM would have written what it
needed to from all the manual backups I have done (remember, the
manual jobs work without a hitch).

The Seagate drive utility also reports the drive as functional (test
writes/reads/compression).

Strange...

 

[David Candy]

I know on non tape drives if it hits bad sectors it hangs. Never had a faulty tape so dunno what it does there.

Why do you keep talking about RSM. If I understood your earlier posts correctly you don't want RSM. You want it to work normal.

 

[Jeff Taylor]

update: Looks like it's a user account issue. I set the account to use
a service account called BACKUP and gave user BACKUP access to just
the folder where the backup.bks file is located.

Should I have given the user BACKUP permission all the way up to the
parent folder of ntbackup.exe?

Here's the path to the bks file. At which point should the user have
access?

C:\Documents and Settings\saxguy\Local Settings\Application
Data\Microsoft\Windows NT\NTBackup\data



Jeff

 

[Jeff Taylor]

I thought RSM was the remote storage engibe that refreshes the tape
and is called during a ntbackup operation.

 

[David Candy]

If you don't use it you just stick the tape in and backup on it which is what you said you wanted. And I said that yesterday which you ignored.

You said "...but I don't want ntbackup to care *which* tape is in ...", so don't use RSM.

I have never used RSM as it's clear it for those with lots of tapes.

 

[David Candy]

I did this on server. I created an admin account just for backup (with a non expiring password). Use the wizard to make the scheduled task. Set the user name/password. The receptionist stuck the tape in as she went home. At midnight the backup ran. I could stick any tape in.

 

[Jeff Taylor]

oh ok thanks David. Yep that's what I wanted.. My head's full of
knowledge base articles and tips form well meaning users out there.

 

[David Candy]

I just hope turning it off is as easy as turning it on.

 

[David Candy]

And I think you have ro login as the user once (to create the profile), not sure.

 

[Jeff Taylor]

First tape worked. When second tape was put in for the next night, the
scheduled time came and went and no backup was performed. No events
either. When I manually started up ntbackup, the prompt "Do you want
to use the media that was inserted for use with ntbackup?" I said yes
and also checked "Do not prompt again" hoping that ntbackup would just
go ahead and "claim" the tape for use in it's available media pool.

At any rate I started another manual backup to write on the second
tape what it needs to write. But I would hope this can be all
unmanaged.

I will see if putting in the first tape will work according to plan.

Here's the new string btw Mark:

C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntbackup.exe backup "@C:\Documents and
Settings\saxguy\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Windows
NT\NTBackup\data\nightlybackup.bks" /n "Media created 12/2/2003 at
10:14 AM" /d "Set created 12/2/2003 at 10:15 AM" /v:no /r:no /rs:yes
/hcn /m normal /j "nightlybackup" /l:s /p "4mm DDS" /um


Hoping the use of the /n switch is ok with using the /um switch.
Microsoft says no but you didn't indicate otherwise.

Jeff

 

[Jeff Taylor]

Works! Thanks Mark. Here's what I learned about ntbackup with your
instructions. Caveats if you will about unmanaged backups:

~Make sure the service accunt has access to at least the \\..\NTBACKUP
folder.
~Make sure the tapes have been written to at least once before
beginning rotation. NTBACKUP will prompt "to use" media one time
unless you check "Never show this prompt again". Then it uses it
without prompting.

Now I can schedule backups for my clients and not worry about them
changing their passwords when I don't see them for weeks.

Thanks again
Jeff

 

[allamiro]

Works! Thanks Mark. Here's what I learned about ntbackup with your
instructions. Caveats if you will about unmanaged backups:

~Make sure the service accunt has access to at least the \\..\NTBACKUP
folder.
~Make sure the tapes have been written to at least once before
beginning rotation. NTBACKUP will prompt "to use" media one time
unless you check "Never show this prompt again". Then it uses it
without prompting.

Now I can schedule backups for my clients and not worry about them
changing their passwords when I don't see them for weeks.

Thanks again
Jeff

On Mon, 1 Dec 2003 21:41:04 -0500, "Mark Mancini"
<[email protected]> wrote:

>Jeff, run NTBACKUP, have it backup everything nightly (on the server). Go
>back into the scheduled task and change /rs:no to /rs:yes and end it in /um
>and if you are going to change passwords, create an account in the backup
>admins group. This is ALL you have to do, it shouldn't be any more
>difficult. The /um switch allows it to use any media. If this isn't
>working it may be your drive.

Greate discussion

I m kinda confised are you using a batch file that scheduled to run automatically or did you use the backup wizard for ntbackup how do you change it to unmanaged using the backup wizard