WSE 2019 - Client and Server Backup has stopped, Service failing

Cayman Dwain 96 Reputation points
2020-10-13T20:58:13.803+00:00

I've come to the dashboard and found 2 critical error relating to backups.

First is The Windows Server Essentials Computer Backup service is not running

The second is This computer was not successfully backed up

I've also found the last couple of server backups have not completed and the last two weekly cleanup tasks for client backups have not completed either.

I've tried restarting the backup service but it either fails overnight (when the server backup runs) or if I manually start a client backup it goes for about 5% then fails and the backup service stops (leading to the two critical errors again).

I've rebooted the server. All update patches are applied.

I'm not sure where try next as this backup services has been running flawlessly for years.

Appreciate so ideas please.

Windows Server Backup
Windows Server Backup
Windows Server: A family of Microsoft server operating systems that support enterprise-level management, data storage, applications, and communications.Backup: A duplicate copy of a program, a disk, or data, made either for archiving purposes or for safeguarding valuable files from loss should the active copy be damaged or destroyed.
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  1. Cayman Dwain 96 Reputation points
    2020-10-17T20:04:28.68+00:00

    I've found the answer. That one bad sector was in the client backup dat file. I ran the repair tool by selecting a client device, then bottom right was Client Tasks, in that dialogue box was a tools tab, and a repair tool.

    Took hours and hours to run, but now the backup service has restarted and client backups are occurring as normal.

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  1. Xiaowei He 9,866 Reputation points
    2020-10-14T05:07:19.92+00:00

    Hi,

    a. Please try to start the "Windows Server Essentials Computer Backup service" manually, check if it can be started manually, if not, what is the error message we get. We may check the "System" and "Application" logs in the Event viewer, check if there's any error about unable to start the service. If we found the Event ID 271 and 267 in the Eventlog Source ServerEssentials, please refer to the following article:

    https://audministrator.wordpress.com/2017/11/06/windows-2016-cannot-start-windows-server-essentials-computer-backup-service/

    (Please note: Information posted in the given link is hosted by a third party. Microsoft does not guarantee the accuracy and effectiveness of information.)

    b. Please check if the disk store backup files have enough free space?

    c. Please open CMD as admin, then enter vss list writers, check if there's any writer with errors.

    Thanks for your time!
    Best Regards,
    Anne

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  2. Cayman Dwain 96 Reputation points
    2020-10-14T23:03:37.367+00:00

    I can restart the services ok but when it runs is stops again. Where specifically should I look in the event viewer?

    The client backup storage has 68gb available, but the other error messages shows the clean up service has not run.

    vss list writers gives an error at a CMD prompt as unrecognised batch file

  3. Cayman Dwain 96 Reputation points
    2020-10-15T14:59:02.243+00:00

    I can see in the Application log that WSSBackup.exe crashed around the same time that the Health Check critical alert. Just before that crash I can see 4 VSS Access Denied errors.

    I don't know a lot about VSS or how to solve any problem with that service.

    I've also seen in the System log an error at the same time of The device, \Device\Harddisk5\DR5, has a bad block.

    Harddisk5 is my client backup target and running CHKDSK /F has identified only 1 bad sector.

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