Backup using mobile disk

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Backup using mobile disk

Jo Pattyn

SSC-Dedicated

Points: 32348
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September 1, 2005 at 11:37 am

#168156

Hello,
Does anyone of you have experience with using mobile harddisk as backup device?
The reason I'm asking is because of the following:
Currently our sql server runs on a windows 2003 standard edition.
The machine sometimes becomes fully unresponsive after/during a backup on an USB-attached driver. Oddly no blue-screen appears.
Thanks in advance

Viewing 6 posts - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)

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David A. Long SSCrazy Eights Points: 8421 More actions · Answer 1

My experience is don't use USB, use Firewire instead.

I have a seperate server using Firewire to connect to the external HD, created a share on that server, then use the UNC path for the external HD in the SQL Server backup statement.

When I attempted this with USB, I found too many errors, whether the backup wrote directly to the HD or to the local HD, then XCOPY the backup file, especially when the file is larger than 16GB.

With Firewire and Windows 2003, I see far fewer issues.

Andy

Lowell SSC Guru Points: 323518 More actions · Answer 2

FWIW, i've used a variety of firewire and USB devices; any firewire or US device that had an external power supply always worked fine for me, but most backups I did were around a gig in size; not all that big really.

I tried a pair of USB drives that pulled their power from two USB connections alone, with no external power supply; they were flakey and would sometimes appear that they were "unsafely disconnected" during a backup or other large fileshare operation.

with SATA drives being so inexpensive for a 250 gig drive nowadays, you can add a lot of space for a hundred bucks real quick, wether internal or external.

Lowell

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CCrespo SSC Veteran Points: 206 More actions · Answer 3

Try to find with the server manufacturer if there are any issues with that particular system. May be a bios update will solve the problem.

I have found same problems with external USB 2.0 drives and same servers, even Compaq servers. In same cases the drive works, but when i restart the server, it doesn´t boot - and report a hardware failure...

Jo Pattyn SSC-Dedicated Points: 32348 More actions · Answer 4

I'll search for new drivers, biosses.

Thanks for suggestions.

Jo Pattyn SSC-Dedicated Points: 32348 More actions · Answer 5

Turned out of to be a faulty usb driver. Reinstalling the mobile disk with the windows usb driver fixed it.