Unable to locate consolidated backup file

Be sure to look at your Windows 7 system to see if by any chance the consolidated file resides on your system in a different location than where you expect it. (You could open "Computer" and do a search for "System.Filename:~>".tib", this locates all files ending in .tib on your computer)

A little testing with the consolidation feature in 2013, with the consolidated file being redirected to a new location (I didn't even know that it could be done,until this post), showed a small problem when selecting the location of the consolidated file. When I selected the location for the consolidated file, I selected a different USB connected drive (with a different volume drive letter) to store the file. After browsing to the drive, in the filename box, I deleted the suggested name of the consolidated file and typed in a different file name without the leading drive letter, colon, and blackslash (ie g:\). The resulting file ended up on my desktop, not where I was thinking it was going. I then did a second test, to the same destination, but this time, after deleting the suggested file name, and typing in a new file name, I then clicked on the drive letter, and the file name box was then updated with the drive letter, colon, and backslash preceeding the file name. When the consolidation completed, I had the consolidated file in the location I had requested.

I know that you are using a different version of True Image, but you may find the same issue present in 2011.
Take a good look at the destination file name, and be sure the file name box contains the full path to the drive/folder, and the file name, not just the file name itself, and try the consolidation again.

James,
Thanks for the rapid response. I have used windows explorer to search every drive (including c:) for .tib files. None of the ones found were the two consolidation backups. On the ATIH screen I can see the backup names and their locations (including the 2 that I can't find). I can right click on a good backup and select "Open backup location" and a windows explorer window opens to the correct drive and highlights the most recent file containing the backup, reguardless of the drive. When I do this with either of the missing backups, the correct drive and directory open but there is no corresponding file with any variant of the correct consolidated backup name. It appears that the consolidated backups simply aren't there. There are no errors in the log files and I can successfully validate the consolidated backups. One can't help but wonder what validate really does. Next step will be to try and delete the consolidated backups from within ATIH and trying again: but I don't have much hope that this will work since nothing has changed.

thanks again for the ideas.

John,

Let's first verify that the consolidation process works OK without changing the destination. Create a chain of backups, and consolidate the first slice into the full backup. At the end of this process, you should see a new chain with one less slice.

Thanks, everyone, for the suggestions. I did delete one of the two consolidation backups and recreated it successfuly. It still does not appear within window explorer, but it does have the correct number of slices. Also, new information, if I use ATIH to "browse for backup" both consolidated backups are found in their correct locations on the network drive. It appears now, that my problem is with the settings on the GOFLEX drive. I feel fairly comfortable that the consolidations exist and it is a problem between windows explorer and the GOFLEX drive.

The consolidated files are several gigabytes and take hours to build. Before I delete the originals, I plan is to make a small backup with a second slice, consolidate it to the GOFLEX drive, delete the original and then use ATIH to move the consolidated file back to the original location and confirm the process works.

Thanks again for the suggestions.