"Failed to open data stream" error .....again!!

Does the tib file shown in your graphic validate OK?

I just started getting the same error during the validation phase of a disk image incremental backup. The backup has been running faithfully for several weeks until last night. I am using Acronis True Image Home 2011 Update 3 build 6492. There have been numerous reports of failures just like this from many customers in both the 2011 and 2012 versions with no clear solution from Acronis support.

I am going to take a wild guess that ATI 2011/2012 has not been thoroughly tested throughout all its feature set. It is a shame that the quality of Acronis software has regressed since version 2010.

The simple explanation is that ATI loses track of the backup sets when it is configured to delete older backup images once a certain size threshold has been reached. Therefore it fails upon validation. It manages to corrupt itself quite nicely.

I must say that I am really disappointed and will be looking for another software solution to replace Acronis.

John,

Try having the validation as a separate task rather than part of the imaging one.

Thanks for the reply Colin.
I tried running validation on the same backup .tib this morning and it failed.
It appears that the incremental backup was created properly, as it was about 1GB from a disk image root backup of 40GB.

I will create a separate validation task and see if the backup itself runs to completion tonight. I prefer immediate validation so that I know all my backups are recoverable...but if that's not working then I will have to set it for weekly validation.

I'm quite disappointed that no Acronis staff member comments here. There seem to be wide spread issues with "open data stream failed".
I only recognized the failure now that the 30 days support has elapsed by a few days.
By the way, 30 days support is NOT industry standard as proclaimed in another thread by an Acronis staff member. It is just a joke.

I was using ATIH since version 10. I would have upgraded every year if I did not hear so many complaints with every new version. Now ATIH10 did work well and I recommended it to many of my customers. But only ATIH10 (which was long available through some internet stores), never a newer version since I would not spoil my reputation.
Now with Win7 64bit I tried ATIH2012 and at a first glance it seemed to work well. At least the basic functions. Just the GUI seemed annoying since you do not easily find the things you are looking for (e.g. validation, searching archives etc.).
Now there come up so many serious problems (looking at other threads in the forum). Now it seems I need to find another tool that I can use and recommend to customers as well.

Back to the problem at hand in this thread:
I'm essentially backing up my complete thunderbird e-mail folders every day onto a 2nd hardisk.
Since I updated to 6131 I get an error message that the backup could not finish. There was no obvious error message before. That's why I only discouvered it so late.
Since my language settings are german I try to translate the messages I see but it might not be the message as it really would appear in english. Sorry for that.

Looking into the log I see that the backup itself should have been correct. Most of the conducted actions have a green tick.
It goes as far as "Backup-Archive validate" (green ok), "Backup-Archive consolidate" (green ok) but then, next line "open data stream failed" (not ok, red cross). Then, "update of the backup data base done..." (ok) and last "action ended with errors" (not ok, red cross).

Strange thing is when I look back into the logs there was a period of about a week back in october when no errors resulted. I started with the trial version in september and I now recognize the same errors at the beginning, then about a week when it was ok and from then on errors again.
I'm running Win7 64bit.

Any suggestions?

I just tried a seperate validation. This could not be run with the messages
1) "Warning: specify the storage place of Version 6"... / / /
2) Opening of element I:\Mail-Backups\Michi-Mails(3)6.tib failed

Does this say anything to anybody?

Regrads,
Michael

Michael,

Have you had Thunderbird open and running before you attempted a backup? If so, what happens if you try a backup before opening Thunderbird?

Same problem, but only attempting to back up my documents folders to an external USB hard drive. Appears to have completed the backup, but the problem happens in the consolidation phase. Since Acronis won't support its customers and won't give understandable error messages and won't refer to hard drives by letter so we know what the program's failures are, I have no idea what might have caused this error. Wasn't happening with this exact same setup in the past . . . here's the error message:

16 Information 12/12/2011 3:00:33 AM Backing up to file: "G:\Documents Backup\DGW_Document_Backup(1)2.tib"
17 Information 12/12/2011 3:01:01 AM Consolidate Backup Archive Location: "G:\Documents Backup\DGW_Document_Backup(1)2.tib" Destination: "G:\Documents Backup\DGW_Document_Backup(1)2_A044F0D6-C520-4F27-B4EA-66936A19DDA7.tib"
18 Error 12/12/2011 3:01:01 AM Failed to open data stream.
21 Error 12/12/2011 3:01:01 AM Operation has completed with errors.

Dave,

Apart from the temporary working tib file (the one with the ID numbers) being left on your system, does it appear the consolidation has actually taken place?

It might be that the error message is a sort of false positive, you are being told it hasn't removed the 'working' file. It is annoying that Acronis error messages are not more verbose, not helped by the fact a number of errors are trapped by the same error code.

If consolidation hasn't taken place and the error is caused by a file being locked, it might be down to a file that gets frequently written to or one that locks itself. The biggest candidate would be Outlook, Windows Mail or a database.

I purchased ATIH2012 to back up my PC, not to fight reoccuring problems. Every few weeks I get the 'Failed to open data stream' problem and have to resort to deleting the 'task' and associated backups and starting all over. All because ATIH gets confused. One day I am sitting with three weeks of full and incremental backups, the next day I have to delete them all and start over. This is BS.

I have stopped running validation right after the Disk Image backup that occurs nightly. The disk cleanup performs properly when the Maximum size of the backup is used as the determining factor when a cleanup is to take place. I have no idea if the disk backup is even serviceable.

Fred,

You don't have to lose your existing TIB files. You can simply stop using the task, and create a new task in another directory. Alternatively, you can move your existing TIB files to another directory on the same disk, then delete the task and set up a new task.

John,

John Kotuby wrote:

. I have no idea if the disk backup is even serviceable.

You can use your Acronis recovery CD to validate your backup, or simply, and faster, restore a couple of files from the backup. If you can restore, you are in good shape.

Pat,
Thanks for the reply. I will test the backup as you have suggested.