Retrospect not finding Backup Set memer

[mikebk]

I'm having problems with Retrospect 7.7 on Windows 7 Ultimate being unable to perform either a backup or restore as it can't find the Backup set member. I get the "please select the backup set member" dialog. When I navigate to the drive and folders, it never finds the member.

 

I created the backup set inside a Retrospect folder at the root of a USB drive. In that folder there's a "Dantz." file and a folder with the backup set name. Inside the later is a folder 1-backup set which contains many .rdb files.

 

The strangest thing is that I used the backup set to restore some files on the weekend.

 

Any Ideas? I can see in Google that this isn't a new problem, people seem to have been seeing it for 1-2 years. I hope someone else has already solved the problem. I noted that one person reported they just had to click OK instead of Open in the dialog. I don't see an OK buttons.

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[Cygnis]

Try clicking the "Choices" button, then "Browse". You will be asked for a specific RDB file, which you should be able to find amongst the many RDB files you noticed as being on your drive.

 

Does this work?

[mikebk]

That worked!

 

It's not exactly obvious. I had tried Browse but hadn't tried navigating far enough.

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[mikebk]

Apparently I reported success a little too quickly!

 

I starting a backup writing to the backup set. I was asked to find the member and the Choices button gave me the ability to browse to the .rdb. The status display showed files being written to the drive. At that point, I posted that we'd solved the problem.

 

15 to 30 minutes later, I noticed the Select Backup Set member dialog again. In this one, the browse button isn't in the More Choices dialog. Instead, it offers choices of Missing or Skip. When I look at backup set properties that Retrospect seemed to think the hard drive is full (it shows Used=931, free= 0.) while windows explorer says Total = 973, free = 774. It's also showing the backup being located on another drive letter, one that might have matched the drive letter when I created the back set.

 

I've tried mounting the drive on the same drive letter but that didn't seem to affect the problem.

 

Any further advice please?

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[Cygnis]

Sounds like the new "Select backup member" dialog (the one without the 'Browse' option) is a prompt for a second drive, due to Retrospect thinking the first one is full.

 

I've never had problems like this before, but here is what I would try:

Tools -> Repair Catalog -> Update existing catalog file -> (backup set name)

 

Then if that doesn't help, try:

Tools -> Repair Catalog -> Recreate from disks -> All disks -> (select the disk on which the backup set resides, so it is highlighted) -> OK

 

Note that the second operation could take a while, since it would be rebuilding the catalog file from scratch.

[mikebk]

Yes, It does appear Retrospect thinks the disk is full.

 

I tried Tools -> Repair Catalog -> Update existing catalog file . It ran in a few seconds but didn't affect the problem or update the free space.

 

Next, I tried "Tools -> Repair Catalog -> Recreate from Disks ". That ran fine, taking about 25 minutes. Since then, I've performed a couple of backups with no indication of problems.

 

I'm not going to declare success yet but will let you know once it's run normally for a while.

 

Incidentally, why on earth is Retrospect maintaining its own idea of the amount of free space on the disk with the backup set member? That sounds like information it should obtain from Windows not keep itself. What would happen if you needed to move the backup set members to another drive

 

Thanks again

 

Mike

[Cygnis]

No problem. Glad to hear you've had some success. Hopefully it has continued to work since then.

 

Incidentally, why on earth is Retrospect maintaining its own idea of the amount of free space on the disk with the backup set member? That sounds like information it should obtain from Windows not keep itself.

This is because you can specify a maximum size for each backup set (a very handy feature, particularly if you need the disk to contain more than just the Retrospect backup set). Therefore, the backup set member's available space could be quite a lot less than the overall disk's available space.

 

You can change this setting here:

Configure -> Backup Sets -> (backup set name) -> Properties -> Members -> (select member) -> Properties -> (change the "use at most" setting)

 

If I recall correctly, it is not recommended to allow a backup set to use 100% of the disk on which it resides, since Retrospect likes to have some free space available for temporary use during its operations. I can't remember what the exact numbers are, but I generally use 90-97% (if I am devoting the disk entirely to a single Retrospect backup set) and have not encountered problems so far.

 

What would happen if you needed to move the backup set members to another drive

 

You can move them around by changing the properties in the "Members" section of the backup set (accessed as described above). I was going to suggest this as something to try for your original problem, but suggested the Catalog repair/rebuild instead because it sounded like the previous catalog file had problems (e.g. it thinking the backup set was full).

[mikebk]

So far, so good.

 

I had wondered about editing the Member properties but the amount of free storage on the drive in the Properties window is grey and can't be edited (at least without some magic). I can certainly see value in being able to set a maximum size for a member and/or not adding to a member when there isn't space on the drive. In my case I had a 973 MB drive with 763 GB free.

 

Thanks again for your help.

 

Mike