Windows 7 Backup does not finish
I'm using Windows 7 Ultimate new installation on a Dell Laptop (~60GB disk). System Backup does not seem to complete.It is backing up "Files in libraries and personal folders for all users and system image". Backup is to large share on a server running Windows Server.Backup starts fine and I can see that a large file is created on the server under a folder named "Backup 2009-11-05 183018".However, backup stops at around 70% and never completes. The backup program stays running for a long time and shows progress at 70%. The program does not hang. I can ask to stop backup and I get a message asking to confirm in which case I would lose all the backup.So it is not a problem of Backup hanging. It just stops around 70% and seem not to progress beyond that.Any Idea?alexmo
November 5th, 2009 10:30pm

Please let us know the model of the Dell laptop. Also, please let us know if it works properly when you back up to a local drive. You may temporary disable or uninstall the anti-virus and run backup again. If the issue persists, please open Event Viewer, locate to Application and Service Logs\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsBackup\ActionCenter, try to find the backup process that cause the hanging issue. Also, please run the following command: vssadmin list writers > %userprofile%\desktop\vsswriters.txt Then open the file vsswriters.txt from Desktop, and try to find which writer has errors. You may either paste the contents in your post.Arthur Xie - MSFT
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
November 6th, 2009 10:18am

Thanks Arthur,The backup eventually completed successfully. What was strange is that it saved about 70% of the data in just a few minutes then it slowed down when it reached 70%. It eventually completed but the time it took from 70% to 100% was unusually long (several hours).I did what you suggested just to verify and found no problems with any of the writers. the event log was clean so was the vssadmin result (no errors).BTW, WINDOWS 7 ROCKS!!!!I'VE NEVER BEEN AS EXCITED ABOUT A NEW RELEASE OF WINDOWS AS MUCH AS WITH THIS VERSION. AND YOUR SUPPORT IS EXCELLENT. KEEP IT UP.alexmo
November 6th, 2009 10:35pm

I had the same problem as alexmo. The one time before that I'd tried to run Microsoft Backup, I thought it hung up. What actually happened was, I had let it "run" for fifteen minutes with nothing detectable happening, and then I aborted. Well, apparently Microsoft's programmers never figured that the first time somebody ran their backup program, they'd abort it; their source code has no contingency. Whereas on my part, I never figured that Microsoft was stopping to create zipped files and that it would take FOUR HOURS to do my first backup. Today I tried again. Two-and-a-half hours after starting, backup was 62 percent complete, and my first DVD-R had 0.7 Mb free. And then...nothing. The hard-drive light was flashing on and off, and Task Manager said that the program was "running" (as opposed to "not responding"), but I kept waiting for something to change. "Please insert Disk 2"? Never happened. I let Windows Backup run TWO MORE HOURS in navel-contemplation mode, then I aborted backup. What p.o.'s me is all the information I was not given, and choices I wasn't given. Frankly, I wish I'd been asked whether I wanted compressed files or not -- uncompressed files would have made the backup go faster, and I would have seen progress. What's a few extra forty-cent DVD-Rs in exchange for peace of mind? I had to do a Google (not Bing) search online to find out that WBU compressed files -- WBU itself didn't tell me this. WBU didn't tell me that the first-backup process would take hours. WBU didn't tell me when my DVD-R was full -- I had to hit the Start button and go to "Computer" to find that out. I've seen DOS programs that were more user-friendly. I was told by an expert, something like "Microsoft stole ideas for Windows Backup from Nero." Maybe so. But Nero lets me know what's what, when I back up my User files. Whereas WBU is a frigging black box. My computer used: a month-old 64-bit Compaq Presario desktop.
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
December 18th, 2009 6:09am

Hi All,Can you please confirm if you are using DVD-R media? There is an issue with some DVD -R media (Sony for e.g.,) that it will stuck after some time. While the DVD team is working on the resolution, we would ask you to retry the backup on DVD RW media and check that the backup succeeds.Regret the inconvenience.Thanks,S.Soudamini.This posting is provided "AS IS" without warranties and confers no rights.
December 18th, 2009 9:21pm

Soudamini -- I used a Memorex DVD+R disk. No, I will not try to run Windows Backup again with any kind of media, just to satisfy your curiosity. If you want to give a computer a 2.5 hour task that might well fail, do it on one of your own computers. And BTW, besides making WBU work on a DVD+R, you might also see about it not taking hours and hours to complete its task, during which you post no messages. Nero's got you beat here.
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
December 18th, 2009 11:48pm

I was having a problem with DVD-R as well, on a Sony Vaio (no Sony specific software has been installed. I switched to DVD-RW and the Image backup worked very well. It also worked very well on an external WD 1 TB hard disk. I see MS is working on the problem og -R versus -RW media.Ted
December 19th, 2009 3:35am

One thing I think you're overlooking here. When I wanted to find out how my burn was going, I clicked on the "Start" button, clicked on "Computer," and it showed me my three drives -- C, D (factory image), and E, with the E drive showing a 99 percent full progress bar and the notation "686 kb free." So this particular Microsoft source code had no problem reading my DVD+R. After I aborted the burn, I right-clicked on the E drive and chose "Close out disk," and this other part of Windows did that, no problem. In short, you already have the source code on file to solve this "Windows Backup with DVD+R" problem -- the source code is just down the hall, is all.
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
December 19th, 2009 2:10pm

I have the same issue with Windows 7 Home Premium edition running on HP Slimline with DVD-R unit. This is the my third attempt at doing back-up. I first thought the issue had to do with the Power save mode. It appear that if I keep the PC busy while doing the back-up is in progress, after quite a while I get the request to insert the next disk. But finally aftermany hours last night I had to go to sleep and when I came back this morning, I had the "Back-up Disk failed error and I did not seem to be able to find a way to get it going again.Also had an issue with CD-R disk. My first disk was by mistake a CD-R. Once it was full I was asked to insert the next volume. But I could not open the disk unit neither using the "Eject" function nor the Open button. I finally got-it going when I noticed the "Close Session" on the menu. Once it ran, I was able to open the Drive and insert the next volume. You would think that IF the Disk session need needed to be Closed, the Back-up function would have taken care of that before asking to insert the next
January 3rd, 2010 9:28pm

What DVD-RWs work, I am having the same problem and am using DVD-R by Sony... can you tell me what dvd-rw make to get?
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
August 13th, 2010 6:40pm

Whatever DVD-RW was on sale. In this case I used Memorex because that brand was on sale. I have since switched my strategies to much better methods. First I purchased a Seagate Go Portable Ext HD (1 TB). I then purchased Acronis True Image Home 2010 (I love this app) with the Plus Pack. Now I reimage whenever any major change is done or once per month as needed to keep my Image up to date. I have had to restore from Image on several occasions and this works wonderfully (I like to play with my OS and various S/W and do fudge up my OS on a regular basis. Acronis has been a Godsend for this purpose. The Ext HD has 6 Images (Original and latest 2 for both my wife's and my laptop) and I have barely used 1/4 the total size. I will not Image to optical media ever again, period.
August 14th, 2010 12:02am

Ted, how many gigabytes in your hard drive, and how long does it take to image it?
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
August 15th, 2010 9:54am

Ted, how many gigabytes in your hard drive, and how long does it take to image it? I am Imaging approx 20 GB on the "C" partition although the entire partition is approx 75 GB. With Acronis True Image Home 2010 it takes about 15 to 20 minutes to create the Image including a complete Image verification. To restore from the Image takes less than 10 minutes. If your Image is up to date that's all you need to do. Since the data (everything moveable is moved) is on the Data Partition ("D" drive in my case) it is all secure and nothing has to be done with it. I just did an Image restore last night. It took a few minutes longer because I had to reapply the large MS update from last Tuesday and the Adobe update from the other day, but that's it. Done, back to where I was before the problem started in about 15 minutes. As I said previously I created the Acronis Rescue Disk as is recommended. This need be created only once (My Acronis was downloaded originally and I do not have the CDes so I needed the Rescue Disk). I also state that I use a 1 TB external HD (Seadate Go formatted as NTFS) for my Images. My Data Partition ("D" drive) is backed up to 2 other PC's about every other or third day so if these need to be recovered I can just move the data across my network back into my PC. Any time a create an Image I first clean all the temp junk off my PC. I then defrag the partition I wish to Image, then let Acronis take over to create the Image. Acronis can do incremental back up as well and can restore the entire partition or just a single file. You control this. I created a nice tutorial on Windows Secrets Lounge http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/index.php?showtopic=776527
August 15th, 2010 2:31pm

OK... is there a fix to this or not? I just wasted two DVD-Rs, with Windows Backup just stopping when the DVD-R was full. It shows as having 660Kb free. Not sure what the first one showed before I cancelled it, but it was essentially full too. Is there something I can do to make this work? Thanks, Mike
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
October 16th, 2010 3:36pm

I too have a similar problem, I use both windows 7 32 and 64 bit versions, both are Ultimate. I used 32 bit version and was very happy with backup and restore. then I built a new pc I7 670 cpu and added same data drives to 64 bit version and since I have never had a completed backup. Even with just windows to backup. No matter which criteria I select all fail around 60 to 70%, not just slow down, Backup is to an external hard drive - have even swapped these but to no avail. It will create an image and a recovery set to either dvd or hard drive. It will not even bazckup a large data only Hard Drive. First time I have used 64 bit and it maybe short lived. Regards Kelley.
November 14th, 2010 12:11am

I'm having the same problem. I'm trying to run Windows Back-up on two W7 Professional Dell PCs to a brand new 2TB Seagate GoFlex NAS (NTFS). They both started up without any problems and ran for several hours unitil they got to about 71 and 74%, but one stopped progressing over 9 hours ago, and the other over 14 hours ago. Both PCs keep whirring away, and both still show "backup in progress". The backup has created over 37GB and 8GB of files on the NAS, so it was working OK for at least sometime. I ran your suggested vssadmin list writers program on one PC (please see below), and got no errors, just status 1 and 5, i.e., four writers were "stable", and six writers were ""Waiting for completion. I would appreciate some help, please. Thanks, Anon E. Mouse ssadmin 1.1 - Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool (C) Copyright 2001-2005 Microsoft Corp. Writer name: 'Task Scheduler Writer' Writer Id: {d61d61c8-d73a-4eee-8cdd-f6f9786b7124} Writer Instance Id: {1bddd48e-5052-49db-9b07-b96f96727e6b} State: [1] Stable Last error: No error Writer name: 'VSS Metadata Store Writer' Writer Id: {75dfb225-e2e4-4d39-9ac9-ffaff65ddf06} Writer Instance Id: {088e7a7d-09a8-4cc6-a609-ad90e75ddc93} State: [1] Stable Last error: No error Writer name: 'Performance Counters Writer' Writer Id: {0bada1de-01a9-4625-8278-69e735f39dd2} Writer Instance Id: {f0086dda-9efc-47c5-8eb6-a944c3d09381} State: [1] Stable Last error: No error Writer name: 'System Writer' Writer Id: {e8132975-6f93-4464-a53e-1050253ae220} Writer Instance Id: {2b546ff8-ebe7-4d0c-9aa8-dbee5393bd9b} State: [5] Waiting for completion Last error: No error Writer name: 'ASR Writer' Writer Id: {be000cbe-11fe-4426-9c58-531aa6355fc4} Writer Instance Id: {fda45791-c104-440a-af18-f03152ca23d0} State: [5] Waiting for completion Last error: No error Writer name: 'COM+ REGDB Writer' Writer Id: {542da469-d3e1-473c-9f4f-7847f01fc64f} Writer Instance Id: {51b310c1-0865-4367-9614-fb7e75ae5518} State: [5] Waiting for completion Last error: No error Writer name: 'Shadow Copy Optimization Writer' Writer Id: {4dc3bdd4-ab48-4d07-adb0-3bee2926fd7f} Writer Instance Id: {fdd30bcd-0b4c-4432-ba7d-1e9c1ba5cb64} State: [5] Waiting for completion Last error: No error Writer name: 'Registry Writer' Writer Id: {afbab4a2-367d-4d15-a586-71dbb18f8485} Writer Instance Id: {f31a4104-793f-4b5e-a8d2-307f7e338eb3} State: [5] Waiting for completion Last error: No error Writer name: 'MSSearch Service Writer' Writer Id: {cd3f2362-8bef-46c7-9181-d62844cdc0b2} Writer Instance Id: {c991022e-3c09-4c4d-8852-a67643dc7b29} State: [5] Waiting for completion Last error: No error Writer name: 'BITS Writer' Writer Id: {4969d978-be47-48b0-b100-f328f07ac1e0} Writer Instance Id: {3145c281-7d72-4772-a0b7-d6b6a0560d5e} State: [1] Stable Last error: No error
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
November 16th, 2010 4:23am

I am having the same problem with Home Prem 64 bit. I select User Data and System Image. It gets to 71% and just dies. IT HAS SAT THERE FOR 2 HOURS. I have tried 3x with same result 71% and stops with no error message. I am running on a HP Notebook g7t with i5 2.66 and 4 GB Ram. I am backing up to a WD USB 320 GB Drive. I ran this successfullyfor over a year to the same WD with my Lenovo Home Prem 32Bit. RC
May 9th, 2011 10:21pm

This topic is archived. No further replies will be accepted.

Other recent topics Other recent topics