Backup error on Outlook
Using TI_2011 build 6597 update 1 on a machine running Windows XP SP3, the auto check for update is on and TI tells me I'm using the latest version. I set up a file backup which looks at some folders on the C: drive and backs them incrementally to a set of TIB files on a Netgear network attached storage (total 31GB on a weekly cycle). I've unsuccessfully tried three times to get the email backup to work. I click the "More features > E-mail backup" link and follow the steps ending with "Back up now". It starts doing the first backup but gives up after several hours later. One previous attempt had a write error, but today the TI home page says "The last backup has failed" and the log just shows when I started the backup this morning. Although it doesn't seem to show any error it doesn't say "Operation has succeeded". Oddly the log says it is backing up to MyBackup.tib but the file on the NAS is MyBackup1.tib and shows the time of modification as the time the backup was commenced (eight hours ago).
The Outlook setup is a main personal folder mailbox (file called Outlook.pst with size 7GB) with five other named archive PST folders totalling 23GB more. I know this is huge but this is the reason I bought Acronis in the first place.
Other relevant info: Kaspersky 2011 is running happily. The NAS has plenty of space and is on the same domain as the PC being backed up.
I have exported the Backup settings into a 24KB ZIP file and I can attach it to a post if it helps.
Basically... help!
Thanks Pat L
You gave interesting and useful points.
I've looked at the log and the files backup says "sucessful" but the email is still bad. It says:
1.Operation started...
2.Analyzing partition...
3.Analyzing partition...
4.Priority changed to low
5.Locking partition C:... create incremental backup from My Application Settings
6.To file...
7.Failed to backup file or folder
8.Error occurred while creating the file (0x4000A)
Tag-0xD11B4F5EC453B921
9.Operation has completed with errors
Items 1 to 6 take 9 seconds
Item 7 is after 2 hours 17 mins
Item 8 is 10 minutes later
Item 9 is 40 minutes after that.
I looked in the backup location on the NAS and there are no files with the file name I gave. Only the incremental files backup. I think something has gone badly wrong.
What can I try next?
Thanks, again.
Steve
When you select the destination (the NAS) for your email backup, do you enter the full network path (\\server\folder\...) or do you select a mapped network drive?
The full path is better. Check the credentials are working in the test window thing.
If you use a mapped network drive, it might work at set up and fail later.
I doubt this is the reason because your file backups are working fine and probably with the same settings. But check anyway.
Is outlook running when you run the backup?
When I set up the backup I "Browsed" to the NAS so I'll look for the path and paste that in instead.
Outlook is not running when I do the backup. Each night, Kaspersky is scheduled to do a complete scan at 1:00am and Acronis does the file backup at 3:00am and the email backup at 4:00am. I was thinking that the files size might be the problem but the first file backup of the week is over 9GB with the rest of the week being smaller backup files (because it is incremental). If the email backup was to make one backup file it would be 30GB, so it could still be an issue. Would it be sensible to do separate email backups for each of the email folders so that each is more manageable in size?
Steve,
Can you do a regular file backup of the .PST files?
Contrary to the email backup, this won't backup your account settings, but this might not be a big issue.
After the first backup restore one of this files and make sure Outlook can open them.
I've just set up a new file backup with a few of the PST files selected which total 11GB, in other words bigger than the failed backups have managed in the past. When I set up the destination of the backup I drop down the destination box and unless I select one of the offered suggested locations I have to browse to the NAS. There is no opportunity to paste the descriptive text for the destination. When I've selected it, though, the destination panel shows as \\NAS\Backup\FolderName\ so I hope this is as good as your suggestion.
After an hour the file backup succeeded and the success is confimed in the Help > Log file.
I could use the file backup for all the PST files but I presume it would backup the entire PST file each day which would be 30GB total each day. I can't see how the software could make an incremental backup out of such huge files.
Now I'm back to wondering why the email backup failed.
Any further ideas?
Try to restore a backed up file and open it with Outlook.
I don't know why this fails. I know other users have had issues when Outlook was not completely shutdown, or when they have changed the default location of the PST file, but the backup should work anyway.
I was using other software program to backup Outlook files, that doesn't require to backup the entire PST whenever a new email come in (Genie Timeline. They have a free edition).
Now I don't use Outlook on my home computer.