Backing Up Remote Clients

[treost]

Hi,

 

I have a few clients that telecommute and i need to back up their computers. one user has a 64-bit Vista Ultimate whereas the rest have Windows XP PRO. They all connect to the office network thru VPN.

 

I installed Retrospect Client 7.6.107 on the Vista user and tried to add that machine to the client database thru retrospect server but I got the error -530 (back up client not found)

 

I am not sure what's causing this error. I have yet to try too back up remote XP users. If you've dealt with similar issues, please let me know how you went about fixing it. Thanks for your input!

 

Thanks,

treost

[rhwalker]

Probably that the multicast/unicast client discovery packets aren't making it through the VPN tunnel. You might want to capture some of the packets to see what is happening, and where they are dropped. You might need to add a special rule on your router to pass the packets.

 

Which version of Retrospect (not client) are you using? The solution, if it's not a router issue, will depend on the particular Retrospect version you are using.

 

I suggest that you repost in one of the Retrospect for Windows or Retrospect for Mac forums, as appropriate.

 

Russ

[treost]

thanks for your quick response! i have retrospect 7.6.123

 

thanks,

treost

[rhwalker]

i have retrospect 7.6.123

Ok, then the correct forum would probably be here:

Retrospect for Windows

 

Russ

[emulator]

Russ...

 

I believe that this member is having problems with his Retrospect client not communicating with his Retrospect Server.

 

Since this is the Retrospect Client forum...

 

Treost...

 

How are you trying to add the client? Are you typing in the IP address in the Retrospect server interface?

 

Here's a couple of things you can try:

 

1. From the Retrospect server, can you ping the remote computer to be backed up?

 

2. Have you checked your server and client firewall settings? For example, Retrospect's client installation puts an entry to allow traffic through the Windows firewall, but if you have another third party firewall (Norton, for example), communication between your Retrospect server and your clients may still be blocked.

 

One (off topic) last thing to consider is bandwidth. How much data is going to be backed up? If you are backing up gigabytes of data, then make sure that you have plenty of bandwidth. Otherwise, your backups will take a long time to complete. It might also saturate your internet connection which can have an impact if you are hosting your own websites/mail servers/etc.

 

I hope that this helps.

[rhwalker]

I believe that this member is having problems with his Retrospect client not communicating with his Retrospect Server.

which I understood, but, because the question was about going through a VPN tunnel (which I have done), and because the solution will depend on which version of Retrospect is being used, and also because this particular forum is very rarely used, that's why I made my suggestion.

 

Since this is the Retrospect Client forum...

Perhaps, although this is a sub-forum of "General Discussion - Retrospect", which is why it is so rarely used. The solutions really are platform dependent because the versions have never been in sync.

 

How are you trying to add the client? Are you typing in the IP address in the Retrospect server interface?

Not a solution unless you want to do it over and over. VPN tunnels route to the remote endpoint, and that changes with VPN connections. I didn't understand the original problem statement to refer to site-to-site VPN between static IPs, but instead for client software VPN connections to a central office VPN appliance (or firewall with VPN support).

 

1. From the Retrospect server, can you ping the remote computer to be backed up?

Really won't provide much information. This is a routing problem at the boundary for multicast and port 497. Ping is ICMP protocol, completely different routing rules at the boundary.

 

2. Have you checked your server and client firewall settings?

The original problem statement pretty much eliminates this as the issue.

 

I've been there, done this. Requires capturing packets at the boundary firewall/VPN appliance to see the cause. But it's a routing problem, and special rules have to be written on the appliance to make it work.

 

You are right, though, about the bandwidth issue. Most broadband has pitiful upstream bandwidth, and it would be faster to wait for the client computers to come home for the backup.

 

Russ

[emulator]

For what it's worth, I did the following:

 

1. Installed the Retrospect client on my Mac (offsite from home, running Leo client 10.5.8).

2. Connected to my company's VPN via Mac OS X's built-in VPN client.

3. Remoted into the Retrospect Server and attempted to add my Mac client to the server. I received the "backup client not found" error.

4. I checked my Mac's firewall settings, and found that there was no rule to allow the Retrospect client traffic.

5. I allowed Retrospect traffic through the firewall.

6. I went back into the Retrospect server and attempted to add the Mac client again.

 

Wait for it....wait for it...wait for it...

 

The Mac client was added successfully.

 

If we're worried about the IP addresses of the remote computers changing IPs each time they log in (if his setup is similar to mine), we can simply add static IPs in the DHCP so that the client receives the same address each time.

 

Again, for what it's worth, it worked for me, and I was having similar issues as the user that originally posted this issue.

Edited November 7, 2009 by Guest

[treost]

thanks for all your help! i fixed the problem by allowing port 497 thru windows firewall. now i am getting error -560 invalid public/private key. do you know why? should i uninstall and reinstall it with a public/private key?

 

thanks,

treost

[treost]

i fixed that problem by adding pubkey.dat to C:\Program Files\Retrospect\Retrospect Client folder. now everything is fixed and just added the remote Vista client to the server.

 

thanks,

treost

[rhwalker]

3. Remoted into the Retrospect Server and attempted to add my Mac client to the server.

Yes, but that's a very different problem statement than the original one. I didn't understand that the original poster wanted to provide remote login capability or credentials to his server to those telecommuting people in his company so that they could log on to the server and change settings to supply their current connection's IP to Retrospect, and then have to remember to remove that IP when they closed the tunnel so that someone else couldn't do similar things.

 

If we're worried about the IP addresses of the remote computers changing IPs each time they log in (if his setup is similar to mine), we can simply add static IPs in the DHCP so that the client receives the same address each time.

That's an implementation option that is not always available - depends on the configuration of the VPN tunnel, whether endpoints at the other end of the tunnel get DHCP configuration through the tunnel. Not all VPN setups permit (or can be configured for) that. VPN is a bag of screaming cats.

 

With some VPN technologies and hardware, you can craft a rule to permit Retrospect's multicast discovery packets to pass through the tunnel, eliminating the IP configuration issue. Multicast is not normally routed across network boundaries, and the way to make it happen (if possible, given different vendor solutions) is very platform specific (for the VPN platform).

 

Both your solution, and the solution used by the poster, were platform specific. That's why I made my original suggestion to repost in the appropriate platform's forum.

 

Not all posters are as technically savvy as you are or as this one is to be able to translate Mac platform instructions to another platform.

 

Russ

[emulator]

thanks for all your help! i fixed the problem by allowing port 497 thru windows firewall. now i am getting error -560 invalid public/private key. do you know why? should i uninstall and reinstall it with a public/private key?

 

i fixed that problem by adding pubkey.dat to C:\Program Files\Retrospect\Retrospect Client folder. now everything is fixed and just added the remote Vista client to the server.

 

Wonderful! I'm glad my firewall suggestion worked. Sometimes the simplest solution is the one that ends up working ;-)

Edited November 7, 2009 by Guest

[billski]

thanks for all your help! i fixed the problem by allowing port 497 thru windows firewall. now i am getting error -560 invalid public/private key. do you know why? should i uninstall and reinstall it with a public/private key?

 

i fixed that problem by adding pubkey.dat to C:\Program Files\Retrospect\Retrospect Client folder. now everything is fixed and just added the remote Vista client to the server.

 

Wonderful! I'm glad my firewall suggestion worked. Sometimes the simplest solution is the one that ends up working ;-)

 

FWIW, I have an XP notebook Retrospect client that stopped being "seen" by the backup master, after two years of retrospect backups. I had upgraded Norton Internet security on the client machine.

 

while I spent my time diddling with Norton firewall settings on the client, it turns out that somehow Windows Firewall was enabled on the client. Two firewalls running at the same time. I opened the port on windows firewall and, voila! it worked.

 

I just disabled the windows firewall and left the firewall work to Norton. Don't need the extra overhead.

 

Hope this helps someone.

 

 

 

Edited September 11, 2010 by Guest