ATI 2020 Bitlocker and differential backups

Mark, when you make any backups from within Windows when BitLocker is unlocked, then as far as Acronis is concerned, BitLocker is not relevant or involved.

The issue here may be more related to timing between when ATI looks for the dependent Full backup file on the NAS and when any response for this query is returned.

Do you have any other PC's without BitLocker doing similar differential backups to your NAS to compare with.

For the logs, these depend on the type of backup being done as to where any meaningful information is found.

There is a new MVP Assistant log viewer tool that has now been made available by Acronis via the Community Tools page.. 

If you have Disks & Partitions backups created on ATI 2020 or later using .tibx files, then look in the Backup Worker logs.

If you have Files & Folders backups using .tib files (or Disk backups from earlier versions using .tib files) then look in the Demon logs.

Other logs are shown by the MVP Assistant under the 'Active Logs' heading of the Log Viewer page of the Assistant.

The log files should be zipped to preserve their original file names if sharing in the forums and would need to be less than 3MB in size, otherwise you would need to share the zip file via a Cloud share service such as OneDrive, Dropbox etc.

Hello Steve - thanks for your response.

Re: "Do you have any other PC's without BitLocker doing similar differential backups to your NAS to compare with?" --- No other PCs; just one PC doing differential backups to the NAS.  

On the older PC that I migrated from (no Bitlocker), I was doing differential backups without issue.  On the new PC, the initial full backup seems to work, but then all the subsequent differentials fail.

I have uploaded a couple of logs in the attached zipped file:

• backup_worker_2021-05-10-21-47-42.0.log --- log of a successful full backup
• backup_worker_2021-05-26-23-47-17.0.log --- log of the latest failed differential associated with the initial full backup
• ti_demon_1CDA09EA-9F65-4568-AE8B-D8A6B5B095B9_458F812C-A9C3-4286-9BD9-E8CE65C4292E_2021-05-26-23-39-18.log --- Demon log of failed differential

Thanks for your help on this!

Mark

Mark, thanks for the logs, I see the issue but not why it is happening!

I have setup a Virtual Machine running Win 10 with BitLocker enabled and ATI 2020 #35830 where I am doing a Differential backup to my own NAS to test your scenario.

It will take a while to run the test as it has to do the Full backup first, so may be a day or so before I know if I am seeing the same issue or not!

Mark, my test scenario backup went faster than expected and both the Full and a subsequent Differential backup from my BitLocker encrypted but unlocked drive to my NAS were both successful!

Hi Steve.  Thank you for running those tests on your machine.  Given that you were successful,  I would suppose your conclusion is that Bitlocker is not inhibiting differential backups. 

To recap: the logs suggest ATI cannot find the archived file, but when I "Open Location" or "Test Connection Settings" ATI has no problem accessing the folders on the NAS.  I might do that checkup at 6pm, then put the PC to sleep and the backups are scheduled for 11:30pm.  

Can you speculate on what might be the issue in my situation?  

Thanks 

Mark

Mark, as I stated early on in this topic, any backups created from within Windows where BitLocker is unlocked will be the same as not having BitLocker involved at all.  The Windows Acronis application won't see any BitLocker activity for this scenario and the destination backup archive will not include BL either so won't be encrypted unless the user elects to apply encryption using the Acronis Advanced option when the backup task is first created.

For my own systems backing up to my own Synology NAS, I never map any Windows drive letters to any of the NAS resources or folders, and have not see this issue for any of my own backups.

I am using SMB 2.0 & 3.0 for both Windows and the NAS in line with the change to deprecate SMB 1.0 in earlier versions of Windows 10 when this was turned off by Microsoft from around 1704.

If your ATI backup task is running by schedule at the same time each time, then it should not make any difference whether it is making a Full or a Differential backup each time.

Steve Smith wrote:

.....

For my own systems backing up to my own Synology NAS, I never map any Windows drive letters to any of the NAS resources or folders, and have not see this issue for any of my own backups.

I am using SMB 2.0 & 3.0 for both Windows and the NAS in line with the change to deprecate SMB 1.0 in earlier versions of Windows 10 when this was turned off by Microsoft from around 1704.

If your ATI backup task is running by schedule at the same time each time, then it should not make any difference whether it is making a Full or a Differential backup each time. 

Like @Steve Smith I do not use drive mapping, I use Device Name - for Synology the default device name is DISKSTATION.

Ian 

Re: Drive mapping

I'm not skilled enough to map the drives manually; I just pick the desired backup folder when I set the backup parameters from within ATI.  In this case, ATI indicates the backup destination is:

\\NEXPOL\X1 Yoga Backups\Acronis - My Backups\ 

...which refers to...

\\<Synology DS918+>\<folder>\<folder>

When I click on the Windows "This PC" folder, I see that the network location \\Nexpol\ is mapped as the Z:drive.  I have re-mapped the network location to not include the drive letter, and have reset the backup destination folder in ATI.  I'll do a backup tonight and see if there are any improvements

Appreciate your help Steve and Ian,

Mark

Attempted ATI backup last night.  Attached is the error message that the ATI app sent me.  Does it hold any clues as to the cause?

Thanks

Mark

Mark, the latest log only confirms what we saw earlier.

Error 0xb042b: The network share is inaccessible.

| error 0x40015: Network disconnected.

| error 0x29b1399: Network operation failed

| error 0xfff0: The network path was not found.

| path: \\?\UNC\NEXPOL\X1 Yoga Backups\Acronis - My Backups\MCK-X1-YOGA-0003.tibx
| code: 0x80070035

Unfortunately it doesn't help tell us why these errors are being given!

Mark Kopytek wrote:

Hi Steve.  Thank you for running those tests on your machine.  Given that you were successful,  I would suppose your conclusion is that Bitlocker is not inhibiting differential backups. 

To recap: the logs suggest ATI cannot find the archived file, but when I "Open Location" or "Test Connection Settings" ATI has no problem accessing the folders on the NAS.  I might do that checkup at 6pm, then put the PC to sleep and the backups are scheduled for 11:30pm.  

Can you speculate on what might be the issue in my situation?  

Thanks 

Mark

 

Is your PC NIC set to allow turn off of the device in Power Settings?  Since your machine is in a sleep state if your NIC is turned off the wake up process may be failing thus causing the issue.

It seems that the problem may be that when the PC goes to sleep, windows turns off the Network Adapter (looks like a known issue).  I have used the group policy editor to enable the following two settings:

• Allow network connectivity during connected-standby (on battery)
• Allow network connectivity during connected-standby (plugged in)

There is a backup scheduled for tonight overnight.  I'll put my PC to sleep as usual at the end of the day, and let's see if the backup is successful.

...Mark

Hello all,

I've been distracted by work for a few days, so I haven't updated my thread.  Here is a summary of the situation:

I recently migrated to a new laptop:

• Win10 Pro 64-bit OS
• SSD (partitioned into C: and D: drives)
• ATI 2020 (deactivated from the old laptop, and activated on the new laptop; the Backup Scheme (differential, scheduled every 2nd night) was copied to the new laptop)
• Backup Destination is a local NAS (Synology DS-918+), connected over home wifi (no other devices doing backups on the NAS/home network)

On my old laptop, the “Entire PC” backup method worked as expected, with a differential every other night (laptop would come out of sleep mode, do the backup, and then sleep again)

On the new laptop, the initial “Entire PC” backup will complete as expected, but subsequent differential backups fail every time, with the error “Network Share is Inaccessible”.  Some observations:

• If I force an immediate backup (by clicking "Back up now") it is successful. 
• The logs suggest ATI cannot find the archived file, but when I "Open Location" or "Test Connection Settings" ATI has no problem accessing the folders on the NAS. 
• It could be that when the PC goes to sleep, windows turns off the Network Adapter (looks like a known issue).  I have used the group policy editor to enable the following two settings:
  • Allow network connectivity during connected-standby (on battery)
  • Allow network connectivity during connected-standby (plugged in)

Still, no luck with getting scheduled differential backups to work (“Network Share is Inaccessible”).

I have downloaded MVPAssistant and found two logs that pertain to the latest failed differential backup (see zip file).

Any suggestions?

Thanks

Mark

Mark, the new logs only confirm what has been seen previously without offering any reason why the network share cannot be accessed at that specific time.

Did you check the Advanced Power options for your Wireless Adapter being used for the backup so that this isn't being suspended when inactive?

Have you tried using a Pre Command to test for the NAS destination before allowing the backup task to continue the task?  I have used the script below in a Pre Command to check for my own NAS being available for times when I was travelling away from home, to prevent a backup task from failing because I was on a different network!

:: File Name = CheckIP.Bat
@echo off
:: ----------------------------------------------------------
:: ----- Set baseIP to the NAS IP address to be checked -----
:: ----------------------------------------------------------

set baseIP=192.168.0.29
set loopcount=20

:: Checking for active baseIP address on local network
:: errorlevel 0 = IP found / 1 = IP not found.

:loop
echo pinging %baseIP% for %loopcount% times
ping -n 1 -l 1 %baseIP% > nul
if %errorlevel%==1 goto next
@echo %baseIP% found active on network!
timeout /t 10
exit /b 0
:next
@echo %baseIP% not found active on network!
set /a loopcount=loopcount-1
if %loopcount%==0 goto exitloop
timeout /t 10
goto loop
:exitloop
if %errorlevel%==1 exit /b 1
exit /b 0
: pause

Another option would be to clone this task and set up the cloned task to backup to an external USB drive to prove that the task will run successfully to a non-network location?  I would expect it to be successful!

Hi Steve - thanks for responding.

Re: Did you check the Advanced Power options for your Wireless Adapter being used for the backup so that this isn't being suspended when inactive?  -- The WIFI Modem (which is hardwired to the NAS) is pretty tightly locked down by the telecom provider; there are very few user-adjustable settings, and specifically not any power options.  One thing to consider is that nothing has changed to physical network in my home since I migrated to the new laptop, and the previous laptop did not have any issues completing the differential backups.

I have added the Pre-Command - and successfully tested it - to the backup routine.  The next scheduled differential is tonight.  I'll report back.

Finally, last night the differential failed again.  I have configured the backup to send me an email with the log on failure.  Attached is the log from last night, in case it might provide any clues. 

Thanks,

Mark

Mark, the Advanced Power Options I was referring to were for the wireless adapter in your laptop not any adapter associated with the NAS.

If you either click on the power/battery icon and select Power Options, or go to the same via the Control Panel, change to plan settings for the active power plan, then open the Advanced settings you should see a panel similar to the one below from my laptop.

Hello Steve - I checked my Power Options and the Wireless Adapter Settings are "max Performance" when plugged in (same as the screenshot you supplied above).  I'll let you know what happens tonight.

Thanks again,

Mark

Hi Steve - last night the backup was completed successfully! 

BUT...it was a "full version", not a "differential version" (I've got it set up to do a full after 10 differentials, and I guess it was time for a full).  I say "BUT..." because as I've noted previously in this discussion, in my case ATI2020 seems to complete the full backups successfully while the differentials fail.  Nonetheless, it feels like progress.  Tonight there'll be a scheduled differential - let's see what happens.

Of note, the CheckIP PreCommand seems to have worked successfully; here's the log ATI sent to me:

I'll report back tomorrow morning with the results of the differential attempt.

Mark

Steve - ATI2020 successfully completed a differential backup last night.  Very exciting - yet somehow unsatisfying: we've done a lot of "diagnosing" over the last couple of weeks, but really made no configuration changes that I can point to which suddenly enable the program to function.  I'll watch it for a week or so before declaring victory.

Thanks,

Mark 

Hey, I will ask here, Is there any way to encrypt my local backup that have not been encrypted during creation?

Sorry Mary but the answer is no as far as encrypting with Acronis is concerned.  Encryption has to be enabled when the task is created and prior to the first run to create the backup.

Hi Steve,

6 days have gone by since I last reported in.  Things were looking positive at first (a successful scheduled full backup, then a successful scheduled differential backup on successive nights)...but since then it's back to the issue described earlier in this thread:

• nightly scheduled differential backups all fail with the message "Network share is inaccessible"
• meanwhile, all manual backups are successful
• the logs are basically duplicates of those provided earlier

Steve - any suggestions for tests/investigations we haven't tried yet?

Thanks

Mark

Mark, I am running short of ideas here as this issue does seem to be specific to your own environment.

You could test with all BitLocker disabled / removed to prove whether this has any bearing at all on the issue - I would assume (based on my own limited testing) that it isn't causing the issue!

Another possible test would be to try scheduling a new backup task for a Files & Folders task using some source files from your NAS to a local destination folder on the laptop, with the task to run say 5 minutes before the problem backup task?  This will establish that the network connection to the NAS is available and the NAS data accessible.

An alternative option to test the same connection would be to set up a Windows Task Scheduler task to copy a few small text files to a target folder on the NAS, again to run just before the problem backup task.

Hi Steve,

I have created a Windows Scheduler Task to copy a file from my PC to the NAS target folder.  I will run 5 minutes before the scheduled backup tonight.  Let's see what happens!

Mark

Hi Steve,

The Task didn't run.  It appears the computer did not awaken to allow the script to run.  I'll have to investigate that.  Might be a power setting.

The backup didn't run either.  One interesting thing I have noticed in the last week or so is that ATI2020 has stopped emailing me the results of backups.  If I send a test email, it works perfectly, and I used to receive an email as per my settings:

Very strange.  Can you speculate on what causes this behaviour?

Mark

Mark, this continues to be a strange problem!  If manual backups or test emails are working then there should be no reason why email notifications from scheduled tasks shouldn't work too, provided the task runs on schedule!

Hi Steve,

Still no resolution to this problem.  I'm going on vacation for a few weeks, so I am giving up on the back-ups issue until later in the summer.  Thanks for all your help and suggestions to date!

Mark