Do you actually have one or more drives set up as a back up drive? If you do, it/they should show up as one of the backup options in the BDBB console. When you press the backup button, a popup box appears with a drop down to select the target drive for the BDBB backup. The older version defaulted to server storage, but this new version, at least mine does, defaults to my designated backup drive.

Edit: I just realized that you posted this in the old version thread. Have you downloaded the new version here http://www.mediasmartserver.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=4078 ?

Make sure any non-storage pool drives are formatted and show up in "My Computer" on the server with a drive letter.

_________________
Alex Kuretz
Remote Notification: Monitoring and alerting for your Home Server via email, Twitter, text message, RSS, push notifications, and on your Mac desktop
Have you tried our Add-Ins? If so, be sure to Rate them at WeGotServed.

When I rebooted the WHS then I saw the backup drive show up...

This Add-In isn't working for me! I took the msi, opened up a UNC path (via run dialog) to my server, put the file there and and then went to the Console and installed it. It told me that it would disconnect and I should reconnect to configure the add-in. Well now I can't reconnect. I get to the login screen, I put my password in and then I just get a blank blue screen. Going to try a manual reboot of the server by touching the power button and see if I can connect afterwards. I just wanted to make a note of this in case anyone else has had this issue.

EDIT: Okay, the server came back up and I was able to connect after that. Scared the crap out of me, though. My server is brand new. I don't even have backups on it yet. Still playing with it. I guess the installer hung or something, but at least it's up and the add-in shows up under Settings.

This happens from time to time when installing or removing add-ins.

Doing 1 of the following will always fix it.

#1. Wait for 15 to 30 minutes before trying to reconnect
#2. Remote connect to server & log off all users in the task manager.
#3. Remote connect to server & restart it.

_________________
Chris Bickerstaff
HP MSS DataVault X510
Core 2 Quad Core Q9550s
4GB Mushkin Ram
TR4MB eSata Enclosure
TR4UB USB Enclosure
Netgear WNDR3700
UPS APC 1500 XS LCD

Thanks, CBick. I'll give that a shot next time. Though how do you remote connect and log off other users? Handy info!

This happens to me often (blue screen console), when installing/uninstalling addins or sometimes doing nothing. I just RDP into the server and restart it. Console always comes back after restart.

Thanks cavediver. It came back for me after a manual reboot, but I will definitely try just RDPing into it and restarting next time. Stupid me thought I killed it today while I was setting up my router to give it a static lease. I RDP'd into it and then did a release and renew to see if it grabbed the proper IP. Well dumb me didn't realize that releasing the IP would boot my RDP session.

Quick unrelated question, this is built from Server 2003 so should work the same, right? I run a Server 2003 Enterprise Edition Web Server at home. Can I change some things around the same way? Changing the name of the local admin for example, or changing the RDP session settings, things like that.

Does this Add-in backup shared folders too? It backed up only the WHS backups but not the shared folders. Database is 700 gb and most of my backups are in shared folders.

Any idea how to backup "everything" on the D drive to a network drive? , I wouldn't hurt including in Sys drive in the backup too.

System drive is difficult if not impossible.

You can back up the shares by looking under the back up tab & selecting the server.

This add-ins function is only to back up your client PC's backups.

_________________
Chris Bickerstaff
HP MSS DataVault X510
Core 2 Quad Core Q9550s
4GB Mushkin Ram
TR4MB eSata Enclosure
TR4UB USB Enclosure
Netgear WNDR3700
UPS APC 1500 XS LCD

BDBB only backs up the Client Backup database.

For an automated way to backup the client backups AND the shared folders see http://www.mediasmartserver.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=3261

_________________
....JBick

EX475, 2 GB, LE-1640
PC1: Vista-->W7 Ultimate/32, (D-Drive RAID-5 Array)
PC2: Lenovo Laptop, Win XP Home SP3
2xLinksys WRT54G v1.1 and 2xNetGear GS105 Gbit switch

Hello everybody,


First of all: Alex, great job with this tool!

Secondly: I only enable duplication of the backup (2 disks in WHS), in this case the registry keys which associate the clients with the server (and eventually their backups) is not saved. Two questions:

• If my WHS crashes, it will find my duplicated backups, but does it still need the registry keys to associate the client with its correct DB? (And this option is not available in your tool when only using duplication, right?)
• If I would have 3 (or more) disks on my machine, and WHS crashes completely and I have to manually re-install the DB, I assume the backups are scattered among the different disks (and as such, I should re-assemble everything myself)?

Kind regards and hope to hear from you soon !


M.

The problem with enabling duplication for the Backups, is that if the DB gets corrupted you are then duplicating the corrupted DB which leaves the backup useless. The only value in enabling duplication is to protect against drive failure.

If you lose your system drive, then the backup DB should be there since you have it duplicated. I believe there were some changes in PP2 that would allow the backups to be seen even without the reg keys, however I have not tested this very much.

If you've got duplication enabled, it shouldn't matter if the files are scattered across disks as WHS will automatically add those drives to the pool when you run Server Recovery.

I hope this helps.

_________________
Alex Kuretz
Remote Notification: Monitoring and alerting for your Home Server via email, Twitter, text message, RSS, push notifications, and on your Mac desktop
Have you tried our Add-Ins? If so, be sure to Rate them at WeGotServed.

Hello Alex,


Thank you for your quick reply!

If server recovery is not possible (e.g.: the entire disk containing C: & D: crashed), you have to re-add the disks if I'm not mistaken. In that case I should manually re-assemble all the parts of the backup, right?

Concerning the registry key: I must have formulated my question wrong.
Part 1 of question: If you do a complete re-install of the system, not a recovery, (e.g.: a new system or for a reason described above) and I've managed to restore the backup-database (e.g.: manually): how do I re-create the association between a specific client and the server (i.e.: use the same GUID as before the crash) in order for backups to be correctly associated with the client as if no crash ever happened? I assume you should use a registry key for this (which is an option if you use your tool to backup to an external media).

Part 2 of question: If you do a recovery, is this done automatically, or do you still need a registry key to restore the original client association?

Kind regards and hope to hear from you soon!



M.

Server Recovery is possible even if you lose the system drive.



Without the registry keys, the exact tie won't be recreated, you need to make your own backups. The key to backup is documented. And as I said before, I believe PP2 includes some features that expose the backups even if you haven't restored the registry keys, so you will at least be able to see the backups and access them though they may not be tied to the client.

_________________
Alex Kuretz
Remote Notification: Monitoring and alerting for your Home Server via email, Twitter, text message, RSS, push notifications, and on your Mac desktop
Have you tried our Add-Ins? If so, be sure to Rate them at WeGotServed.