v12.5: How to set up "Keep only two full backups" on changing destination media

Hi,

I've set up the following backup plan configuration for testing purposes:

• Backup Options->Backup format: 12 (default)
• Scheduling: Always Full, every day (weekly)
• Clean up rules: by number of backups: 2

See below screen shots:

Cleanup rules:

The backup destination was local folder E:\123\

After that I've changed the time on the machine to trigger the backup start - moved the time by 1 day ahead to 13:14:55. Once the backup completed I've emulated the drives swap, by renaming the 123 folder to different name in each iteration, so that each "day" I had E:\123\ + E:\123_1\ or E\123_2\ folder (thus 2 in total). So each day the backup went to different folder.

As the result on 5th day (when the backups in 1st used folder have expired) there was the following list of the backups (after retention rules were applied): 3 .tibx files, where *.tibx + *-0002.tibx files correspond single (1) backup for previous day when this folder was in "play" (e.g. 2 files = 1 backup, where 1 file contains only metadata) + -0003.tibx file which corresponds the current day backup:

The list of recovery points in this archive (Backups->select E:\123 location->check backups in archive) was also correct and showed only 2 recovery points as it should.

Therefore the issue you describe is not reproduced and probably there are some other settings which you've adjusted in the setup and we need to check it. Please confirm how exactly you've setup the cleanup rules and how you perform the drive swapping operation.

Also one suggestion which may do the trick and get the behavior you saw with v11.7: create a backup plan and set the Backup Format to v11 instead of default v12. Then with "Always Full" schedule you should see the same results as you had in 11.7

Thank you.

Hi Vasily,

first of all thanks a lot for your effort in putting the test together, highly appreciated.

Currently it is still not working, i think i will open a support case.

I did the backup plan basically like you did, it's a simple thing i believe. but, the behavior is simply not clear.

e.g. why the heck do i have two backups in one tibx? i want only full backups, no incremental or so.
 

i want one tibx, doubleclick and i have one backup, this is what i would expect

Also i get this here:
What is a unsupported URI?
Translated the erro message is "Activity on "delete backups" or "backup retention"(?) failed, an unsupported URI is specified"

i exported a backup plan into a json file. would this help you to get along?

i believe the retention command is trying to find the dependance of older backups, can not find them in folder and then the error gets shown. the client has absolutely no automatic backup. is this really a 12.5 behaviour or what#s the thing here? i do exactly the same backup plan in 12.0 and i have no problemsat all.

The basic thing again is, i really need to write backups to different media. acronis shall check "is there another tibx file? yes? is my current backup succesful? yes? delete older tibx. no dependance of backups, just one backup each night to different RDX media. thank you

Hi,

On your first screen shot there are 2 recovery points for 14th and 17th of July, which should be correct, since the clean up rules are set to keep 2 backups in the location. If you want to have a single backup on each of each of your external RDX drives then the proper way would be as follows: Set up a pre-command in Backup options to delete the .tibx files from the location before backup. Retention rules are not the best way to solve the scenario which involves manipulations with the backup location (such as disks swapping). Here's how I've set it up to confirm that it works (E:\123\ is the actual backup location) - the clean up rules are simply disabled in my plan, as they are not needed for this scenario:

The activity warning shown on the screen shot is a known issue (internal ID: ABR-130967), where clean up activity fails when the backup is located on external drives (including RDX ones) AND backup format is set to v12. This issue is fixed in the upcoming Update 1 which we plan to publish really soon (likely next week, unless something goes wrong).

Thank you.

well, no i want to have two full backup sets on each destination :-) so del something is not the way to go.

ok i'm totally lost now. currently in 12.5 the scenario on having all the time only two full backups in tibx format on swapping destination (drives) is not possible but will be fixed with update 1. did i get this right? (talking about using build in acronis tools, not using batch files to aid)

thanks

Looks like I'm lost too ;) In your previous comment you mentioned that you don't want 2 backups and want a single backup on each of the drives and on the 1st screen shot there are 2 backups shown, for 14th and 17th of July which I therefore assumed is not what you wanted, which is why I suggested the method which relies on batch files.

Having 2 recovery points (which may be presented by 3 files, and which is normal since the size will still be the same as for 2 full backups) on swapping drive is not possible until Update 1, where the clean up rules will work properly for external drives - this statement is correct, yes.

Thank you.

haha ok thanks for clearing that up. i am confused in clicking onto a tibx file and "inside" there are two backups shown. i expect only one backup in one tibx. (that's why i dont like a.tibx a-0001.tbx a-0002.tibx)

to work with batchfiles can not be the way for a professional software, but is a workaround.

and than i'll wait for update 1 to check if it will work out smoothly. thanks for now sir