SBS 2011 Server Veeam backup fail

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modder man

Active Member
Jan 19, 2015
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I have a veeam endpoint backup doing a full computer backup on an SBS 2011 Box and I get the below error when it trys to complete a backup. If I need to use a different backup all together I can But I would like to do a full machine backup to a synology.

: Error: Failed to create snapshot: Backup job failed.
Cannot create a shadow copy of the volumes containing writer's data.
A VSS critical writer has failed. Writer name: [SqlServerWriter].
Class ID: [{a65faa63-5ea8-4ebc-9dbd-a0c4db26912a}]. Instance ID:
[{5b43b4ef-6f10-4ea6-b1a0-a726730f25b0}]. Writer's state:
[VSS_WS_FAILED_AT_PREPARE_SNAPSHOT]. Error code: [0x800423f0].
 

NetWise

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Jun 29, 2012
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Edmonton, AB, Canada
Could be wrong, but Veeam Endpoint is a free solutions for desktops and laptops. While it states it will install on 2008r2 or higher it makes no effort to suggest it works on servers. It likely has no support for the VSS needed for SQL, which is what it seems to be choking on.

How much space free does your reserved system partition have?
 

TechIsCool

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Feb 8, 2012
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Clinton, WA
techiscool.com
Confirm the VSS writes are actually working using the Windows Backup first. If VSS writes fail on that then you know something internally is broken. Event log is your friend. Veeam is only triggering VSS and if that does not work you get errors.

Code:
vssadmin list writers

Give that a try and see if it throws errors
 

QueBall

New Member
May 28, 2015
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Could be wrong, but Veeam Endpoint is a free solutions for desktops and laptops. While it states it will install on 2008r2 or higher it makes no effort to suggest it works on servers. It likely has no support for the VSS needed for SQL, which is what it seems to be choking on.

How much space free does your reserved system partition have?
I fight with this on a semi-regular basis with a similar backup system that relies on windows VSS. Every now and then the system reserved partition gets full. Usually some temporary file or log file that is created by that particular app has gone and chewed up all the space in this tiny hidden partition. Have to assign a drive letter, give my user full permissions to the disk, stop the vss filter device drivers and then I can delete the file. It gets recreated the next time that backup is run.

Here are instructions given by Dell for their appassure product when this happens. You have to ignore the appassure specific stuff and figure out what file veeam or the VSS writer has left behind that can be safe to delete. Suggest testing it on a cloned virtual machine first.
Agent Unable to Backup with Error, "DoSnapshotSet Failed" (117838)

Make sure to remove drive letter from system reserved partition if you added it. I know for sure leaving the drive letter assigned to that partition screws up most full system snapshot based backup software.
 
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