Backup Exec Archives - The Silicon Underground

Why you need to guard your Backup Exec servers

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 04 Mar 2014 11:00:45 +0000

If you have a Windows domain, there’s a fairly good chance you have Backup Exec servers, because you probably want to take backups. Because you need them. (As a security guy, I no longer care how you get backups; just

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Microsoft getting into the backup business?

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 23:03:13 +0000

I take issue with this Register story, which says Veritas has a better name in the storage arena than Microsoft.

Enron has a better name in the storage arena than Veritas. Ditto BALCO and FEMA and Michael Jackson and Martha Stewart.

So Microsoft wants to get into the backup business? Good.

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Fixing Backup Exec with Hisecweb installed

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 03 Apr 2005 03:50:28 +0000

If you run your web servers on Windows under IIS, you'd better install the Hisecweb security template unless you want to find yourself hosting a warez site.

But Hisecweb breaks Backup Exec. So what do you do when upgrading to Apache and Linux isn't a solution?

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Moral Dilemma

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 22 Mar 2005 00:37:42 +0000

I saw the following in one of my Backup Exec failure logs (directory names changed slightly to protect the client's name, and me):

Directory F:\ITWEB\Flash Stuff\Welcome Page Animations was not found, or could not be accessed.
None of the files or subdirectories contained within will be backed up.

Hmm. Flash animations.

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I’ve been messing around with Backup Exec 10

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 29 Jan 2005 19:10:29 +0000

Veritas is trying mightily to unseat Microsoft as my least-favorite software company. I do believe Backup Exec to be the worst piece of software of any kind on the market. In fact, babysitting Backup Exec is the reason I haven't been around much.

I'm looking to version 10 for some relief (and the much-needed 1.0 quality that Microsoft usually delivers around version 3--when Veritas will deliver it probably is an interesting Calculus problem).

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Wake up your Backup Exec remote agent

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 12 Nov 2004 22:05:06 +0000

Usually when a Backup Exec remote agent refuses to respond and stopping and starting the service does no good (verifiable by creating a new job and attempting to connect to the remote server, only to find the drive selection boxes greyed out), the solution is to reboot.

There's a last-resort method more appropriate for production servers.

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Resolving an issue with slow Windows XP network printing

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 20 Oct 2004 23:13:25 +0000

There is a little-known issue with Windows XP and network printing that does not seem to have been completely resolved. It's a bit elusive and hard to track down. Here are my notes and suggestions, after chasing the problem for a couple of weeks.

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Undocumented Backup Exec error

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 09 Oct 2004 03:00:05 +0000

I got an odd Backup Exec error message on Thursday night that I wasn't able to find in Veritas' knowledge base.

The error code is 0x3a18 - 0x 3a18 (14872). Since it seems otherwise undocumented, I might as well document what I know about it.

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Backup Exec misadventures

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 07 Oct 2004 00:36:45 +0000

(Subtitle: My coworkers' favorite new Dave Farquhar quote)

If your product isn't suitable for use on production servers, then why didn't you tell us that up front and save us all a lot of wasted time?

(To a Veritas Backup Exec support engineer when he insisted that I reboot four production web servers to see if that cleared up a backup problem.)

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Maintaining a healthy distance

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 02 Apr 2003 00:42:04 +0000

Yesterday we managed to back up our 40 or so NT servers without incident for the first time in years. OK, months. It seemed like years. It wasn't that long ago that I nearly woke up my neighbors after receiving my fourth 2-am backup failure phone call that week. As I walked through the hallway to fire up the laptop and log in, I pounded the wall in frustration and screamed, "Just once, let me sleep through the night without bothering me. Just once!"

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