We recently upgraded to 3.1.0.3 (Server Edition) and now our C drive backup is failing with the pagefile.sys error (refer excerpt of log below). I note that one of the changes in 3.1 was that pagefile.sys errors will now cause the job to fail - so it's possible this condition may have existed for sometime.

I'm guessing that you'll suggest there's a corruption with the pageFile.sys - in which case do you have any recommendation for resolving this problem. My first thought would be to zero out the virtual memory, and then recreate the paging file - would you concur with this approach?

Thanks,

Craig

It turns out that this is a bug in sbrun.exe which occurs if your pagefile or hiberfile is highly fragmented.

The solution is to replace your existing sbrun.exe with the attached 1.0.0.204 version.  Rename the existing Program Files\StorageCraft\ShadowProtect\sbrun.exe to sbrun.exe.installed and then extract the attached sbrun.exe to the same directory and your problem is solved.  I'm sorry about that, by the way.

The irony is that sometimes the pagefile is indeed corrupt, and that by adding code to notify users of corrupt pagefiles we exposed a bug where we failed to exclude highly fragmented pagefiles.  In older builds, this failure to exclude highly-fragmented pagefile/hiberfile was ignored and the backup continued on (including the sectors for the pagefile or hiberfile).

NOTE: THE ATTACHED FIX FOR SBRUN.EXE IS ONLY INTENDED FOR CURRENT USERS OF SHADOWPROTECT DESKTOP/SERVER EDITION 3.1.0.3
 

Many thanks for the prompt response Nate. I can confirm that that resolved the problem.

Outstanding!  Thanks for the confirmation.

Nate: Is this sbrun.exe also usable in IT edition? Or more general, does IT edition have the same bug?

Yes and No.  IT Edition has the older sbrun.exe, which may fail to read the run list for the pagefile/hiberfile in order to exclude them, which is a very rare condition as it only occurs with a highly fragmented pagefile/hiberfile.  However, if it fails to read the run list, IT Edition will *still* make the backup (it just won't exclude the pagefile and/or hiberfile).  That's the difference.  The installed 3.1.0.3 product will NOT perform the scheduled backup (but will perform a Backup Now backup) if it fails to exclude the pagefile/hiberfile because in most cases a failure to read these files' runlist is caused by disk corruption and we found that it's best to let the user know immediately if their volume is corrupted rather than just ignore it.

I don't know if my problem is related to this "pagefile" posting, but I arrived at it by following a link from answers to questions regarding the inability to perform any backup at all of my C: drive with ShadowProtect Desktop. I tried the fix you suggested above, and replaced "sbrun.exe" with the newer version (1.0.0.204)--but this did not resolve my problem. I installed ShadowProtect a few days ago, and have been unable to use if for anything so far. Based on a very positive review, I purchased the program without trying it first--probably not a good idea at all. The problem I am having is similar to the problems described in the "unable to backup C drive" section. Specifically, I get the following error messages:

These 3 warnings:

03-Mar-2008 19:25:10 service 302 Cannot take snapshot. Error: Volume not supported by provider. Method:  VSS API by STC provider. Volumes count: 1.

03-Mar-2008 19:25:10 service 301 Try snapshot without writers

03-Mar-2008 19:25:10 service 302 Cannot take snapshot. Error: Volume not supported by provider. Method:  VSS API by STC provider. Volumes count: 1.

And then these fatal error messages:

03-Mar-2008 19:27:32 sbvol 503 Fatal I/O error on \\?\GLOBALROOT\Device\HarddiskVolumeShadowCopy1 offset bdee4400 on read (-31 A device attached to the system is not functioning.)

03-Mar-2008 19:27:32 sbcrypt 500 Unexpected end of the image file

03-Mar-2008 19:27:32 (loader) 504 Final error (-31 A device attached to the system is not functioning.)

03-Mar-2008 19:27:32 sptask 516 sbrun.exe started successfully but failed to complete the task

I submitted a request to Technical Support on 3/2/08, but I haven't received a response--other than the automatic response acknowledgeing receipt of my request. The case # for my problem is: 00001255.

I haven't had much luck with the program, and I am worried that ShadowProtect might require a higher level of expertise than I possess. I am just a fairly knowledgeable home user, and I couldn't find anything in the Support Knowledge base that seemed to address my problem (or that I could fully understand). I am also concerned that the program might perhaps be incompatible with the brand new external hard I added to my system, specifically for backups. I installed a Cavalry CAXM 37500 USB and eSata 500GB hard drive. Cavalry provided the means to easily add an eSata port to my PC (Dell Dimension). I obtained the latest driver for the Sata/AHCI (?) controller from Intel, after verifying that everything was compatible with my processor and chipset.

Any help would be appreciated, as I have spent nearly $100 on software that I apparently am unable to use. I guess I learned about the importance of a trial installation prior to purchase,

Thanks for your time.

KevinSF:

03-Mar-2008 19:27:32 sbvol 503 Fatal I/O error on \\?\GLOBALROOT\Device\HarddiskVolumeShadowCopy1 offset bdee4400 on read (-31 A device attached to the system is not functioning.)

This error usually means that for some reasons the snapshot was destroyed during backup process. Since this snapshot was taken using Microsoft default provider you should check the Application Event Log for VSS errors.

Are you sure you rebooted after installing ShadowProtect?  If so, try running the installer again and select the repair option.  It doesn't look like the StorageCraft VSS provider is working properly which is why the Microsoft provider was used.

How come the trial-version is still delivered with the 1.0.0.202 version of sbrun, as of today?

If I bought this software, how can I be sure to get the latest (most likely to be bug-free) version?

An unreliable backup software is pretty worthless...

I apologize that you have encountered this error.  We will be updating the trial and released versions very shortly.  The truth is that this is a very rare issue and the patch is very straight forward that we thought we could get by without updating, maybe we were wrong and I'm sorry. 

STC

Where is the fixed executable attached? 

The second post in this thread.  Just under the title.

 Where is the fixed executable for Desktop Edition 3.1.0.3 attached?  Or am I just missing something obvious?

http://forum.storagecraft.com/Community/forums/p/232/821.aspx#821

It's called sbrun.zip.  Just follow the instructions in that post.  The zip file is just below the title.