Running Server 2012 Essentials R2. current on updates.

Using a 3TB Western Digital USB3 external drive for the backup.

I have assigned the drive letter to the external WD drive to drive B:

I used the server move folder wizard to move the client computer backups folder to the B: drive. At this point all the client PCs on the network are able to do backups without errors. At this point I can browse the backup (B: ) drive from the server or the clients if I need to.

The problem happens after I configure the server backup

If I run the customize backup for the server and select the external drive it removes the drive letter. The server will successfully back up to the external but the Dashboard will have errors about the missing client computers backup folder that was on drive B: but no longer found.

I can get around the problem, if I go into Disk manager and re-assign the drive letter back to the external. The client computers will resume backing up the external and the server will backup to the external drive. If I reconfigure the backup on the server it will again disable the drive letter and cause problem until I go back in and assign the drive letter.

Out of the 4 R2 essentials servers I have setup I am only having the issue on one.

Why does the server backup wizard disable Drive letters?

How can I prevent the backup wizard from disabling the drive letter?

I want the client and the server to store backups on the exte

Hi...

External drives can be targets for pc backups or server backups but not both.  The best solution is to add mirrored drives to the server as the targets for pc backups and use a USB drive, hidden drive letter and all, as the target to backup the server.  With or without the volume/folder that contains pc backups depending on the size.

I really do not like the idea of putting the client backups on the usb drive.  If you have both server backup and client backups when the server backs up you will have 2 copies of client backups eating up space.  My vote is to leave the client backups where they are and just do server backups to the USB drive

But you are correct when you run the server backup wizard it will remove the drive letter.  Are all 4 external USB drives the same?

Only one external USB drive is used.

I have assigned the drive letter to the external WD drive to drive B:

I do not include the drive B: in the backup selection. I don't like the idea of backing up the backups either.

Why does the drive letter get disable if it is used for the server backup?