Anyone with experience diagnosing VSS issues (eg using VSS Debug / Trace)???

[MrPete]

I have a very  painful issue. Since June, some key backups always fail due to windows VSS errors.

It's impossible to tell if the "real" problem is RS or Win10. NO error ever if RS is not running. 100% dead with RS, yet the error doesn't point to RS.

I discovered VSS has Debug and Trace capabilities, but
* I find no documentation beyond a few registry settings
* I can't actually get it to trace or log

Does anyone have experience with this, success OR failure?

Thanks

Pete

[DavidHertzberg]

MrPete,

Being a Mac user, I have no experience with VSS—but will this help?

[MrPete]

Nope. However, I just solved it, with the help of this freeware: http://backupchain.com/en/vssdiag/

Not at ALL what I expected:

I was getting VSS errors indicating slowness while doing backup. Duuuh. That should not be a surprise.

The actual issue:

• A separate partition (D:) is NOT part of the VSS shadowing at all.
• On this computer, that partition is used for a lot of active data storage, including continual security cam file saving
• There was a latent filesystem error (in Windows: chkdsk /f solves it)
• Fixing that (on D:) made VSS work properly on the C drive and all other drives.

Edited September 6, 2020 by MrPete
Added solution.

[MrPete]

Argh. I spoke MUCH too soon. Only had ONE good backup before the same issue returned.

I have spent wayyyy too much time diagnosing this... but may have discovered at least a new "reason"... again not what I expected.

This time:

* Opened RS Volumes list

* The C drive on this (backup) computer is listed TWICE!

* One entry is gray, and properties have an extra line that says "Location: Local drive C is offline"

* All of my backups of course point to the grayed out drive.

* Changed so they point to the new good one, and all is well

 

I CANNOT explain how this happened. Nor do I have any idea how to get rid of the now-spare "Gray" copy???!!!