Backup Plan for Network Share Fails with "Access is Denied"

I don't think the save network credentials feature implemented in B&R is working correctly. It doesn't save credentials for myself either.

I have a strange problem with the scheduler as well, but it looks like it's credentials in one direction.

Using the management console via AMS connect to the agent on the machine and create a backup plan there. That appears to work. If I create a central backup plan and then deploy it to a machine, it deploys but never runs. In your case you're getting access denied. Hmmmmm

What if you switch to advanced view and explicitly specify all credentials?

I have the same, the backup seems to forget the credentials? I have also done this in Advanced view. Once done I can force a backup and schedule a backup but it seems after 24 hours it stops? ....hmmmmm. Back into the plan again and its asking for credentials... ahhhhhh

Advanced view makes no difference. I'm using the Management Console to connect to the server in question. It does feel like Acronis BR is just forgetting the network credentials.

Backing up a UNC path should be a fairly fundamental requirement of an enterprise backup system.

Any Acronis developers out there that can lend us a hand?

I think I'm having this problem too. I'm backing up to an SMB share. I noticed that last night Acronis didn't back-up my machine and when I went to view the back-up plan Acronis acted like it didn't remember the user/password for the SMB share.

This is my second attempt at using Acronis Backup and Recovery. With my first attempt in April I ran into problems backing up to a Linux-based NAS. I got a refund on my purchase, but I just rebought it after I noticed they fixed the problem in the recent update. But now this... Will it be another 6 months before we get a fix on this? With backups to SMB shares ever work correctly?

I've contacted Acronis support about this. I'll updated the post with any useful information they may give me, that is if they don't take the initiative to update this post directly (*hint*).

Small observation. This is what is recorded in the events logs of the server when the backup agent tries to run it's nightly task. Not sure if this is related directly to the problem or the symptom of something else.

Ok, it looks as if the first part of my query is easily explained. When you're editing a backup plan you must re-enter the network credentials.

http://kb.acronis.com/content/8418

Still doesn't explain why my backup isn't running.

The kb article also claims you don't need to enter the credentials to edit a task. It tells you if you simply hit save it will work.

That doesn't work for me. The save button is grayed out until I re-enter my credentials.

Shoot. I just started another thread on pretty much the exact same issue. Let me repost it and I'll start monitoring this thread:

If you aren't using "Remote" vaults this topic isn't for you :) My specfic "Remote" vault is a external USB hard drive on another file server. I waited very patiently for well over a year to even think about trying BR10. The file naming convention was a show stopper. With the release of build 12457 you now have the option to use "Echo" naming convention so I decided to give it a try. Problems right off the bat.

Fresh install of Server 2008. Fresh install of BR10. The problem in a nut shell is that the backup plans will not consistantly back up the the remote vault. It will forget the credentials, hang, stop, you name it. An array of different issues. When I check on the plan in the morning it is still running at 0%. The lock file is present on the remote drive but the backup is hung.

Here is the "odd" part. I have three servers backing up to that remote vault. Two Echo Servers and one BR10. The Echo servers have not missed in years. I then put that external USB hard drive on the BR10 server and the two Echo servers back up to it no problem. As long as the USB hard drive is physically attached to the BR10 server it works fine.

Today I did a BR10 Workstation to a remote vault. Same issues. Something about BR10 does not like vaults that are not physcially attached to the server BR10 is running on.

I spent days on the phone with support. Same run around as always. I gave up real quick. Until BR10 is "set it and forget it" I refuse to purchase or use it. After well over a year it obviously isn't there yet.

Anyone else have problems backing up to "Remote" vaults?

Anton or any of the other Acronis guys, do you have anything to say? Is there something I can do to troubleshoot this? I really don't want to have to babysit my B&R Workstation install to make sure that it didn't decide to stop backing things up.

hi,

there are few issues with hidden share. please try without $ and with full control ntfs right.

regards,

Antoine.

There is no doubt Acronis has a problem here. My symptoms were absolutely identical to the ones listed above. My external USB drive is not an admin share (no $) and the credentials supplied have full access to that "share". As stated I simply moved the backup drive to the BR10 server and made the drive "local" to the BR10 server as opposed to "remote". The Echo servers still back up to it flawlessly even though it is now "remote" to the Echo servers.

I too was using a UNC to the backup media. I was going to play around with mapping a drive letter instead of a UNC and decided against it. I have so much time in debugging this software it makes me sick. I am done. It needs to work as advertised, period, and it obviously hasn't since the day it came out.

One last observation... has anyone noticed that the backup jobs (when they run) start out at 50% complete and go from there? Acronis admitted it was a cosmetic flaw with build 12457. This might be the overall problem with BR10. I can see missing something deep in the OS but this cosmetic flaw is just sitting there staring you in the face if.. you simple watch the backup. All you have to do is look. What kind of debug and beta testing could they have done with such and obvious, in your face, flaw?
I have had this impress since BR10 came out. No design. No beta testing. Nothing. Like throwing something against the wall and hope it sticks...

Is anyone making any headway with Acronis support? I just got a reply from them asking for a wireshark packet capture. That makes no sense. How would I get a wireshark capture of this? I can't predict when Acronis will suddenly decide to stop working. I don' t think the tech support person that got my case actually read my description of the problem.

Has anyone heard anything yet? My backups continue to fail, but they're failing silently. The only thing in the event log says:

Scheduled license checking has completed.
Additional info:
--------------------
Error code: 2
Module: 202
LineInfo: 599e50188dc69fce
Fields: $module : C:\Program Files\Acronis\BackupAndRecovery\mms.exe
Message: Scheduled license checking has completed.
--------------------

I am also experiencing issues with failing scheduled backups and have the same error as you have listed, this happened this afternoon. I have scheduled backups to run every 3hrs:-

Log Entry Details
Type: Information
Date and time: 11/10/2010 15:55:59
Backup plan: [None]
Task: [None]
Managed entity type: [None]
Managed entity: [None]
Machine: hryfs01.hospitalradioyare.com
Code: 13,238,274(0xCA0002)
Module: 202
Owner:
Message:

Scheduled license checking has completed.
Additional info:
--------------------
Error code: 2
Module: 202
LineInfo: 599e50188dc69fce
Fields:
Message: Scheduled license checking has completed.

I have been asked to run debugging on the client machine for the scheduler to create a log file. Might be worth doing the same if you haven't allready. I have also updated the scheduler to the lastest version.

http://kb.acronis.com/content/1518

Many thanks
Shane

Also might be worth looking at this error to do with share names:-

http://kb.acronis.com/content/6672

Thanks Shane. Installing the update to the Scheduler caused Acronis to immediately start a backup. We'll see if it keeps it up after a few days.

Well... one of the first things support had me do was install the latest scheduler. At that point the scheduled backups actually started but... had problems accessing the network share. I don't know if it makes anyone feel any better but the same problems exist with BR10. Rather then backing up to a UNC share I mapped a drive letter to the share and it backed up fine. Not nearly an acceptable method (as mentioned above) but it worked. I didn't try that approach on the server because 1) it was not an acceptable solution and 2) I am no longer debugging Acronis's problems :)

Well, my problems started back up again. It seems as though Acronis only runs for 2-3 days before it decides it will no longer run backup plans at their scheduled times. I discovered that manually restarting the Acronis Scheduler service in the Services control panel will cause Acronis to wake up and start any missed backups, but I'm not going to do that manually.

The only potential good side in this is that the bug appears to be in the Acronis Scheduler application, not in Backup and Recovery. Acronis seems to be really bad about releasing hotfixes for problems with Backup and Recovery, but they do seem to be willing to regularly update the Scheduler application.

But they better fix it fast. I only have a bit more than a week left until my 30 days are up. If they can't fix it before then I'm going to ask for a refund.... again (I ran into a different bug when I first tried ABR in April, and had to get a refund). This time I'm not going to give Acronis another chance.

This looks like it is yet another problem that is falling of deaf ears...

I've been exchanging emails with Acronis support for the last couple weeks, so they are listening. They had me install the new build of Acronis Backup and Recovery, which is just a week old. I didn't realize there was even a new build. I thought they would have announced it in the forum, but I guess not. We'll see if that fixes it.

So far I haven't been terribly pleased with the first level of Acronis support. I've been going back and forth between 2 reps, and they both seem to be having a problem understanding that my problem is with the backup plan not running. They keep thinking I've having a problem with Acronis continuously asking for the credentials to my NAS. I don't know why they keep thinking that, except perhaps because I had opened a ticket with them over that issue back in April. So, its been pretty frustrating to have to re-explain my problem over and over again.

They told me that they would escalate my case to the second tier of support, but so far it doesn't seem like they've done that, since I keep getting emails from the same two people.

Hello all,

Thank you very much for all your posts and feedback. Please accept my apologies for not replying earlier and I will do my best to assist you.

The error message - Access to file is denied could mean that the credentials used for the backup plan creation and backup location are not the same. However, it is hard to say at the moment what exactly causes this issue, we do not have any known problems similar to this.

I would recommend to contact our Support team so that we can investigate and resolve these issues. A quick remote session I am confident will get this fixed. If you would like to contact our Support team by e-mail, please include the following reports:

1. AcronisInfo.

2. Backup plan creation wizard screenshots.

3. Process monitor logs so that we can see what our software is trying to access.

Andrew,

I am very sorry about your experience with our Support team. I will escalate it to our Management team so that such incidents do not occur again.

If you need additional help, please let me know.

Thank you.

I am having similar problems backing up my NAS (and also problems with other software) after upgrading my Synology NAS firmware. Based on my own investigation and comments in the Synology forums, I belive the problem is a combination of the SMBD component on Linux being really slow and Acronis timing out too quickly on attempts to access the network share on the NAS. Other programs just slowed down, but Acronis flat out dies trying to run a backup.

Synology has a patch that other users say has fixed their problems. I'm waiting for the patch.

I'm in the process of switching my backup software (and that of my clients) anyway, but I'm not ready to change my SBS backup yet. I'm fed up with the monthly and sometimes daily problems with Acronis. I'm just posting this here for the benefit of other folks who are having similar problems.

...Jim Hansen
Canyon Country Consulting

Well I got the update from Synology. It made things better. At least I could authenticate from the Acronis edit backup plan window, but the backups still failed. I updated my Acronis SBS server software to 12497 and that seems to have fixed the problem. (At least with a test of 2 backups.)

I am still having trouble with slow file openings that I think is related to authentication issues with XP/Server 2003 accessing the Synology box. I did not have these problems until this summer. I'm wondering if MS updated something to do with domain authentication in XP/2003 systems that slows down access through the SMBD Linux module. I don't have these problems with my only Vista system and I don't have these problems accessing Windows file shares from XP/2003.

...Jim Hansen
Canyon Country Consulting

I am having the same problem. It is as if the backup system does not save or ignores credentials for the NAS login. The files are recognized in the edit window under "what to back up", but then when the backup is actually performed the credentials are ignored and I get a "Access to file is denied" error. So, Anton, it appears that you have at least a few users who have a completely useless Acronis product. I wouldn't call this an unknown problem. If the software could use the mounted NAS server mapped to a local drive then it wouldn't have a failure to remember/use credentials, but it appears that Acronis is unable to backup a network mounted drive in SBS. Has there been any consistent solution to this problem?

I am having the same problem. I put in the authentication credentials for my network share and it works in identifying files to backup. Then when I save the plan and run it later I get an access to file denied. Such a basic feature so poorly implemented.

I had same problem with Acronis B&R 11 using Synology NAS station as storage.

Solution: Deleted network share from nas, created iSCSI disk, mapped to Acronis Storage Node server and created managed valut. Now everything works (slowly) but reliable.