Hi All,

Our Sys Admin recently bailed and I am pretty sure our backups are failing by looking at the logs. I am using BrightStor ARCServe r11.5 (Build 3384), which I believe to be a completely unpatched version after reading CA's site, with an Exabyte tape drive. The logs say crap like this:
W3855 07/09/2008 10:00:52 PM 201 Unable to position media. (MEDIA=A-COMPANYNAME-MON- 4/14/08, EC=EARLY WARNING)

and:
Information 07/09/2008 10:06:25 PM 201 Backup Operation Failed.

Any help getting this ironed out would be appreciated, thank you in advance.

My first thoughts are: hardware issues on the Exabyte tape drive, but....you're build no is 3884 (not patched). First upgrade to Service pack 4 for Release 11.5 (to be downloaded from support.ca.com), then see if things improve,

regards  

Thanks for the information that is what I suspected. Currently the Exabyte is locked with a password no one seems to know and it appears our last backup was done months ago. People are about to get pissed I think. Where can I find SP4 for the ArcServe software? I have tried searching the CA site but it is not very intuitive.

To say their support site is not very intuitive is an understatement.

I believe I wound up calling support to get the right link 1-800-225-5224.

the link to Sp4 can be found at:

https://support.ca.com/irj/portal/anonymous/phpdocs?filePath=0/4536/4536_patchindex.html

keep in mind that service packs for r11.5 in fact are full releases. When applying an uninstall/reinstall will be performed in the background. You can also use it for a fresh install.

regards

Thanks so much Cyklops. Does the application get completely scrubbed or does it remember the settings? Also can I apply SP4 if no other patches have ever been applied? It certainly appears to be cumulative based on the size.

all settings will be remembered, job queue, database and logs will be preserved. Sp4 is cumulative.

regards

I have upgraded and still have some errors. However now that we are trying to reconfigure we have come across another oddity. What doe the different icons mean in ArcServe? When I expand a system I see a green box with a white center for everything on the c: and d: drives but a solid green box on "System State." Also what does CA mean by system state? Thanks again.

That means you can select the c and d drives to backup, or individual subdirectories underneath.

System State includes the server boot files, com files, registry files etc. Basically it's a good idea to backup every servers state.

Check the help file for arcserve.