telenaut Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 Over the last few weeks, a client with an Intel iMac from April 06 had problems with their Retrospect backup set on a brand new 600GB La Cie drive. The following log entries go backwards in time. At the end are TODAY's log entries. Is there any solution to backup sets that have "Bad Backup Set Headers"? What causes this? Do we need to start a new backup yet again? My client's comment and question: "Anyways ... This program is wearing me down. Is there any other way to back up a Mac?" ... A recent comment from my client, followed by a Retrospect backup session log: ... "After 2 hours, I force quit Retrospect. It didn't respond; took 3 attempts to do so. The drive kept running. I tried to shut down, the computer froze. After some time I forced a shut down by holding the button down "Booted the computer, ejected both drives, then turned off the backup drive (button). Shut down the computer and started again. Tried to run Retrospect; got this message: Retrospect version 6.1.126 automatically launched at 10/29/2006 7:00 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/29/2006 7:00 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 Big - 10/29/2006 7:00:35 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/29/2006 9:07 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/29/2006 9:08 PM Can't access catalog for backup set My Bkup 10-06 Big, general error. 10/29/2006 9:08:01 PM: Execution incomplete. Quit at 10/29/2006 9:08 PM .... Another session: .... Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/27/2006 6:48 AM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 Quit at 10/27/2006 6:54 AM Retrospect version 6.1.126 automatically launched at 10/27/2006 7:00 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/27/2006 7:00 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 10/27/2006 7:00:25 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ Catalog out of sync with backup set ³My Bkup 10-06 Big². Select Tools>Repair>Update Existing from the Directory. 10/27/2006 7:20:54 PM: Execution incomplete. Remaining: 2179 files, 565.8 MB Completed: 0 files, zero KB Performance: 0.0 MB/minute Duration: 00:20:29 (00:15:44 idle/loading/preparing) 10/27/2006 7:20:55 PM: Execution incomplete. Total duration: 00:20:29 (00:15:44 idle/loading/preparing) Quit at 10/27/2006 7:22 PM Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/27/2006 7:22 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 *************************************************** Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/27/2006 7:23 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/27/2006 7:23 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 10/27/2006 7:23:49 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ Catalog out of sync with backup set ³My Bkup 10-06 Big². Select Tools>Repair>Update Existing from the Directory. 10/27/2006 7:40:26 PM: Execution incomplete. Remaining: 2181 files, 565.8 MB Completed: 0 files, zero KB Performance: 0.0 MB/minute Duration: 00:16:37 (00:16:13 idle/loading/preparing) 10/27/2006 7:40:26 PM: Execution incomplete. Total duration: 00:16:37 (00:16:13 idle/loading/preparing) Quit at 10/27/2006 7:41 PM Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/27/2006 7:47 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 ... From another session: ... We noticed this morning that Retrospect had frozen. Here's the latest info from the log: Retrospect version 6.1.126 automatically launched at 10/26/2006 7:00 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/26/2006 7:00 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 10/26/2006 7:00:38 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/27/2006 6:48 AM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 ... From another session: ... Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 10/24/2006 8:18 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 Quit at 10/24/2006 8:50 PM Retrospect version 6.1.126 automatically launched at 10/25/2006 7:00 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/25/2006 7:00 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 10/25/2006 7:00:42 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ 10/25/2006 7:20:20 PM: Comparing Macintosh HDŠ Bad backup set header found (0x8cbc46e3 at 292,954,428). File ³Database²: miscompare at data offset 232,191,687, path: ³Macintosh HD/Users/me/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2004 Identities/Main Identity/Database². 10/25/2006 7:21:30 PM: 2 execution errors. Remaining: 1 files, 301.3 MB Completed: 303 files, 240.9 MB, with 6% compression Performance: 147.7 MB/minute (131.1 copy, 206.4 compare) Duration: 00:20:48 (00:15:30 idle/loading/preparing) - 10/25/2006 7:21:46 PM: Copying Music FilesŠ 10/25/2006 7:34:13 PM: Comparing Music FilesŠ 10/25/2006 7:34:44 PM: Execution completed successfully. Completed: 94 files, 416.7 MB, with 0% compression Performance: 251.2 MB/minute (148.7 copy, 806.3 compare) Duration: 00:12:58 (00:09:39 idle/loading/preparing) 10/25/2006 7:34:45 PM: 2 execution errors. Total performance: 181.9 MB/minute with 47% compression Total duration: 00:34:02 (00:25:09 idle/loading/preparing) Quit at 10/25/2006 7:35 PM ... Another session ... Retrospect version 6.1.126 automatically launched at 10/24/2006 7:00 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 10/24/2006 7:00 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 10/24/2006 7:00:33 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ Trouble writing: ³My Bkup 10-06 Big² (2506833408), error 206 (drive reported a failure: dirty heads, bad media, etc.). 10/24/2006 7:23:13 PM: Execution incomplete. Remaining: 778 files, 426.6 MB Completed: 139 files, 145.6 MB, with 27% compression Performance: 21.7 MB/minute Duration: 00:22:40 (00:15:58 idle/loading/preparing) 10/24/2006 7:23:14 PM: Execution incomplete. Total duration: 00:22:40 (00:15:58 idle/loading/preparing) Quit at 10/24/2006 7:37 PM ... TODAY's log ... Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 11/5/2006 6:02 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Executing Recatalog at 11/5/2006 6:15 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ Bad backup set header found (0x10001042 at 291,283,075). Bad backup set header found (0xfffffff8 at 291,800,450). Bad backup set header found (0xbc719230 at 291,814,912). Bad backup set header found (0x81a20530 at 291,849,193). Bad backup set header found (0xc1398bae at 291,849,865). Bad backup set header found (0x6928831c at 291,855,060). Bad backup set header found (0x8cbc46e3 at 292,954,428). 11/5/2006 11:25:14 PM: 7 execution errors. Completed: 512383 files, 280.4 GB Performance: 926.3 MB/minute Duration: 05:09:55 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 11/5/2006 11:25 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 11/5/2006 11:25:39 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ 11/5/2006 11:47:42 PM: Comparing Macintosh HDŠ 11/5/2006 11:50:36 PM: Execution completed successfully. Completed: 3330 files, 713.7 MB, with 6% compression Performance: 164.6 MB/minute (123.7 copy, 246.0 compare) Duration: 00:24:57 (00:16:17 idle/loading/preparing) - 11/5/2006 11:50:52 PM: Copying Music FilesŠ 11/6/2006 12:10:22 AM: Comparing Music FilesŠ 11/6/2006 12:17:11 AM: Execution completed successfully. Completed: 1092 files, 3.8 GB, with 0% compression Performance: 472.6 MB/minute (410.8 copy, 556.4 compare) Duration: 00:26:19 (00:10:16 idle/loading/preparing) 11/6/2006 12:17:13 AM: Execution completed successfully. Total performance: 360.7 MB/minute with 0% compression Total duration: 00:51:32 (00:26:33 idle/loading/preparing) Quit at 11/6/2006 12:17 AM ... from a later session today: ... Normal backup using My Backup Script at 11/6/2006 5:48 AM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 11/6/2006 5:48:06 AM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ 11/6/2006 6:09:13 AM: Comparing Macintosh HDŠ Bad backup set header found (0x4ed700b4 at 298,832,440). File ³Database²: miscompare at data offset 205,628,044, path: ³Macintosh HD/Users/me/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2004 Identities/Main Identity/Database². 11/6/2006 6:09:46 AM: 2 execution errors. Remaining: 1 files, 301.3 MB Completed: 47 files, 18.5 MB, with 0% compression Performance: 79.8 MB/minute (86.7 copy, 33.5 compare) Duration: 00:21:40 (00:17:26 idle/loading/preparing) - 11/6/2006 6:10:01 AM: Copying Music FilesŠ 11/6/2006 6:10:01 AM: No files need to be copied. 11/6/2006 6:20:41 AM: Execution completed successfully. Duration: 00:10:40 (00:10:39 idle/loading/preparing) 11/6/2006 6:20:43 AM: 2 execution errors. Total performance: 75.1 MB/minute with 0% compression Total duration: 00:32:35 (00:28:05 idle/loading/preparing) Quit at 11/6/2006 6:21 AM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
telenaut Posted November 6, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 I've been using Retrospect with good results and absolute picture-perfect restores since 1989 or so, back when it was named Diskfit, and it backed up my Mac SE to floppies. In my opinion, Retrospect is the most reliable and comprehensive backup software available for the Mac -- in spite of these kinds of errors (that usually are recoverable if hardware, hard drive, and OS problems are resolved). Retrospect is the one program that I recommend to all clients, and I'll continue to do so. However, these kinds of intermittent errors are going to lose my client as a Retrospect customer if they continue. I would appreciate advice from EMC Insignia staff or other Retrospect users. Thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 Please see: http://kb.dantz.com/article.asp?article=5410&p=2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
telenaut Posted November 6, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 Thank you. A minor note to the message board administrator - Indents created by mulitple spaces, used for legibility, don't work on this bulletin board software. ITLE: Troubleshooting Bad Backup Set header and other similar errors To resolve the error use the following steps. 1) Try a new tape or disk A LaCie 500GB failed with bad blocks, we bought a new La Cie 600GB 2) Try a different brand of media 3) Try isolating the device when possible. If it is SCSI, try making it the only external SCSI device. It's firewire. We've done that. Same errors. 4) If it is a SCSI device under Mac OS X, make sure it is using a supported SCSI card. It's firewire. 5) Look for updated adapter drivers and firmware: USB, FireWire, SCSI or ATAPI vendors may offer newer firmware or drivers which may make for better device communication. It has the latest LaCie firmware. 6) Try a new cable, especially for a SCSI device. Internal ATAPI cables could become crimped or damaged. Inspect them if necessary. We've used the new cable that came with the new drive. 7) Try making your ATAPI device "primary" rather then a "slave". It's firewire. 8) If you are using USB, try connecting the device directly to the computer rather then to a USB hub. It's firewire. 9) Make sure the files reporting the error are not in use. In rare cases, an open file will generate this error at the same media position number each time. No other programs were running. 10) Try the device on another computer. Good idea. If you do all of the above, and the error follows the drive to another computer, that could be an indication of a problem with the device. Check with the hardware vendor to see if they can offer any additional suggestions. During catalog rebuild If you get these errors during a catalog rebuild, you may also see an error: recync or resynchronizing (slow). 1) If you have an encrypted backup set and fail to give Retrospect the correct password prior to a catalog rebuild, you may get these errors immediately. Provide the correct password before the catalog rebuild. It's not encrypted. 2) If the error happens at the same file positions (see the numbers after the errors in the log) every time you rebuild, that is an indication of bad data on the media. If the data was written incorrectly to begin with, a catalog rebuild will never fix the problem. If you backed up with verification turned off, then you may see these errors during the catalog rebuild. We always use verification. 3) If the file positions change with each rebuild attempt, then follow the troubleshooting steps outlined above and attempt the catalog rebuild again. Good idea. 4) Try the catalog rebuild with the media in a different drive, if the error happens when rebuilding the media in different drives, then you may have a damaged tape. It's a firewire HD. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CallMeDave Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 Quote: My client's comment and question: "Anyways ... This program is wearing me down. Is there any other way to back up a Mac?" From the information provided, it sounds like a hardware problem. - What Type of Backup Set is "My Bkup 10-06 Big"? Is it a File Backup Set or a Removable Backup Set? I would offer that the first different "way" to backup this Mac would be to use Retrospect with non-flaky hardware. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 As another question (once you answer Dave's question as to the type of backup set), how is the disk formatted, and what was used to initialize it? Has any memory been added to this computer? Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
telenaut Posted November 7, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 7, 2006 Hi CallMeDave: It is a File Backup Set on a La Cie HD. I agree that it would be optimal "to use Retrospect with non-flaky hardware," as you suggest. I don't believe that Retrospect is necessarily the cause of the problem -- I agree that isolating hardware problems is important. They have a 20" Dual Core Intel iMac, with the most current version of MacOS. Do you consider that to be flaky? Are there subsystems in the iMac, such as Firewire ports, that commonly degrade in ways that affect Retrospect backups? They have a brand new La Cie D2 600GB. Is that considered to be flaky? Is there a drive manufacturer that you would recommend that we use instead of La Cie? ... hi rhwalker: The drive was formatted as MacOS Extended (Journaled) by Disk Utility. They have only 512MB; they are planning to add 2GB in the next week or so. Thank you, Dave and rhwalker. DN Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted November 7, 2006 Report Share Posted November 7, 2006 Ok, you've answered my questions. I don't see anything that you are doing wrong. Because memory hasn't been added, there is a very high probability that the original Apple memory is good. I was just tossing this out in case some marginal memory had been added. And the reason that I was asking about the formatting was to make sure that we didn't have some oddball filesystem in the mix. You've got a good computer. The only known problem with the LaCie drives is that the power supplies are known to go, and the mechanical construction of the firewire socket on the enclosure has been known to be poor (I've seen them break the solder connections internally because of flexing), but you've got a new drive. While we can't dismiss that, lets go on the assumption that it is not the problem. There are some older versions of Macintosh computers (well before the Intel Macs) that had known firewire problems. This is not one of those. However, the drive is on a firewire connection. Is there any other firewire device on that chain? If so, let's try with only the LaCie on the firewire chain. Other than that, I'm stumped. This shouldn't be happening. Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
telenaut Posted November 7, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 7, 2006 Hi Russ: It is the only firewire device on the chain. Thanks. d Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted November 7, 2006 Report Share Posted November 7, 2006 Then I'm stumped. This shouldn't be happening. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CallMeDave Posted November 7, 2006 Report Share Posted November 7, 2006 A 20" Intel iMac with 512Mb or RAM? The Apple Store shows the current 20" Core2Duo ships with 1 Gig; did they actually sell the CoreDuo 20" with only half that much? I'm hard pressed to imagine Retrospect (which needs lots of RAM in the best of situations) running well under Rosetta (which has additional memory requirements) with only 512 Mb. So the first thing I'd suggest is bringing this machine up to real world specs by feeding it 2 Gigs of RAM. Hopefully it will address the backup issue, but it will also make a _huge_ amount of difference to the user's workflow, as there will be much less disk swapping. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twickland Posted November 7, 2006 Report Share Posted November 7, 2006 Quote: - 10/24/2006 7:00:33 PM: Copying Macintosh HD Trouble writing: 'My Bkup 10-06 Big' (2506833408), error 206 (drive reported a failure: dirty heads, bad media, etc.). 10/24/2006 7:23:13 PM: Execution incomplete. In my experience, a 206 error with a HD destination means a hardware failure with the drive. These often start showing up in Retrospect before other problems with the drive become obvious. The bad backup set headers are consistent with drive failure, as are the catalog out of sync errors, since the catalog and data are on the same drive. Did you try the drive on another computer, as you suggested you might? You could also try a test backup to a file backup set on the internal volume to see if you can get it to run successfully. I can't speak of the quality of current LaCie drives, but I had to go through a couple of brand-new LaCie Big Disk FW drives two years ago before I got one that didn't start giving us 206 and bad backup set header errors. Quote: File 'Database': miscompare at data offset 205,628,044, path: 'Macintosh HD/Users/me/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2004 Identities/Main Identity/Database'. This is your Entourage mailbox. A miscompare may be due only to a new e-mail arriving between the time of backup and compare. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
telenaut Posted November 8, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 8, 2006 Thank you, Retrospectors, for your thoughtful help and advice. We'll add more memory next week, and I'll rebuild the catalog yet again. And yes, CallMeDave, the iMac came with only 512MB. (You can call me Dave, too) In the following log excerpt, Retrospect reports: "Can't add to backup set My Bkup 10-06 Big: The catalog is locked." No one at my client site manually locked the catalog; either it happened automatically somehow, or the log is reporting something incorrectly. What causes that? The catalog is continually going "out of sync" and requires rebuilding the catalog. What causes that? . ........................................................................ I received this e-mail from my client last night: ......................................................................... "Here's what happened (it launched on schedule and froze; I shut down, restarted, ejected both drives and shut down again; restarted, and tried to run another backup). Before the first backup I had Entourage open then quit, iTunes open, then quit, knowing the backup would start soon and in hopes it would go smoothly ... :" Retrospect version 6.1.126 automatically launched at 11/7/2006 7:00 PM Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 11/7/2006 7:00 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 11/7/2006 7:00 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 11/7/2006 7:00:55 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 11/7/2006 7:00 PM Can't add to backup set My Bkup 10-06 Big: The catalog is locked. 11/7/2006 7:01:00 PM: Execution incomplete. Quit at 11/7/2006 7:01 PM Retrospect version 6.1.126 launched at 11/7/2006 7:59 PM + Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.1.8.101 + Normal backup using My Backup Script at 11/7/2006 7:59 PM To backup set My Bkup 10-06 BigŠ - 11/7/2006 7:59:19 PM: Copying Macintosh HDŠ Catalog out of sync with backup set ³My Bkup 10-06 Big². Select Tools>Repair>Update Existing from the Directory. 11/7/2006 8:18:06 PM: Execution incomplete. Remaining: 422 files, 548.4 MB Completed: 0 files, zero KB Performance: 0.0 MB/minute Duration: 00:18:47 (00:16:02 idle/loading/preparing) 11/7/2006 8:18:07 PM: Execution incomplete. Total duration: 00:18:47 (00:16:02 idle/loading/preparing) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twickland Posted November 8, 2006 Report Share Posted November 8, 2006 You've got two different problems. For the catalog locked issue, see Two copes of Retrospect running For the catalog out of sync error, I really think your client has a hardware problem with the destination drive that needs to be addressed first, as has been discussed earlier in this thread. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.