des.cpp-270 assertion failure

[aandi]

Since upgrading to Retrospect 7.5, there have been several assertion failures (followed by Retrospect shutting down until manually restarted).

 

Here is the start of one:

OS: Windows XP version 5.1 (build 2600), Service Pack 2, (32 bit)

Application: D:\Program Files\Retrospect\Retrospect 7.5\Retrospect.exe, version 7.5.387

Driver Update and Hot Fix version 7.5.13.100

Exception occurred on 13/10/2007 at 22:29:17

Error info: Assertion failure at "des.cpp-270"

Exception code: e0000000 ASSERTION

Fault address: 7c812a5b 0001:00011a5b (null)

 

The backups are to file backup sets on an external FW800 disk; DES encryption is indeed used.

 

I have not been able to isolate this to a particular backup or backup set; all backup scripts and backup sets have been used multiple times without the assertion being raised either.

 

This may or may not be related to an issue where verifies are frequently (and apparently spuriously) failing; I intend to post a separate message about that.

 

What do I do next?

[Mayoff]

If this does happen to a single backup set, I would do a catalog rebuild.

 

If this happens to multiple backup sets, try with a new set of preferences be removing the documents and settings/all users/application data/Retrospect folder

 

I have not seen this error before.

[aandi]

Setting everything up again runs the possibility of introducing errors, as well as being time consuming. Is there no possibility of a more systematic approach? An assertion failure, after all, is not a random crash. It's a decision made by a programmer to say "this situation is impossible, so it is better to crash the application than continue", and which can be taken direct to the source code.

 

(As a programmer myself, I would really want the situation not to change in the hope of understanding the problem better).