Performing backups in Modern/Connected Standby
Hi all,
My first post in this forum although I've been a user of True Image for some 7 years and posted a bit in the earlier Wilders forum.
I'll admit to being somewhat baffled by this. We have had a Dell XPS 13 for a couple of years now. Until I had to uninstall and reinstall TI2019, recreating my backup tasks, for an unrelated issue, True Image it has worked flawlessly creating 2 backups in the middle of the night. Now I cannot get it to wake for backups at all. "wake up the sleeping/hibernating computer" is ticked.
The Dell XPS uses Connected Standby and S3 is officially not supported. Indeed attempts to disable Connected Standby via the registry hack and force S3 cause system instability.
It feels like TI2018 had this working but TI2019 has broken it, although it did work when I upgraded to 2019 and was still using the old backup tasks. But, of course, there are a zillion things that are updated on our devices almost daily without our intervention these days and we also are making changes that, while they might not seems related, could have consequences.
I was amazed that a search for "Acronis" and "Connected Standby" found precisely nothing, like it didn't need to be discussed, although Wake Timers certainly do not work in Connected Standby.
It is frustrating because I can look in the event log and see the laptop doing various random things all night in Connected Standby, but Acronis will not start a backup until someone physically wakes the machine in the morning.
Any thoughts? Anyone? Because I've run out of ideas here!
Thanks Steve,
What's interesting is that TI2019, upgraded from TI2018, actually worked until in response to an unrelated issue with Bitlocker they asked me to uninstall and reinstall TI2019 and recreate my backup tasks. So I do have the new latest and greatest version of TI2019 freshly installed on this system and that appears to be the problem!
I have raised the issue with Acronis in my support ticket for the previous problem (now fixed), but they have yet to respond. I guess they may ask me to raise a separate ticket. We'll see.
Anyway, I thought I'd see what you guys think and thank you for replying. It seems odd there is no mention of InstantGo/Connected Standby/Modern Standby (I wish they would settle on a name!) at all if it is a problem. Hopefully there is a simple solution.
Jon
I believe you already covered this, but just to be sure, is the "allow wake timers enabled"?
https://www.eightforums.com/threads/power-options-add-or-remove-allow-wake-timers.50074/
Even if so, as a test, i'd switch it off, change default power scheme to something else and then back again, plus, then enable wake timers again. This might force ATI to pick up the setting if it's somehow not being used.
I have various backups throughout the day and seems like they do wake up the system as expected in ATI 2019 so it should be possible. But, hard to say why the change in behavior since upgrading on this system.
Wake timers have been mentioned a few times as a culprit though so maybe playing with a change and turning it back on will help.
Just curious, but if you create a Windows scheduled task to run a backup and tell the task to wake the system, does that work?
Hi Jon,
Had not read here any questions on Modern Standby (the official name of the low power state) in this Forum. I should have suspected it was only a matter of time until I did.
Modern Standby replaces S3 and S4 power states on capable/compatible Win 8 and Win 10 systems. If a device is capable of supporting Modern Standby it will use that power mode and will not use S3 or S4.
Interestingly, you cannot disable Modern Standby without a complete uninstall/reinstall of Windows. That fact tells me that things can go wrong with this feature when a user has issue with other hardware components in a PC and replaces such things as a hard drive, network adapter, or cpu. You mentioned that you had some "unrelated" issue. Was this issue hardware related? If yes, what was this hardware and did you replace the hardware with a direct replacement part? By that I mean an identical part?
I think Bobbo offers some good advice in attempting to basically reset things but unfortunately the power mode cannot be turned off or disabled. So I would suggest that you perform a full shutdown of the system and see if that might get things working. To do this simply hold down the Shift key while clicking on Shutdown in the Power Button menu of Windows.
I am including a link to the MS Development site that discusses Modern Standby in much more detail and contains some further troubleshooting steps that may prove useful. Let us know what you find.
Thanks guys,
It's great to see such knowledgeable people helping out here because tech support for all products seems to be a bit hit and miss these days. Acronis seem better than most but they are still not perfect.
Bobbo_3C0X1, when you say you have this working on various systems are these Connected/Modern Standby systems or "normal" S3 systems? Regarding "Wake Timers", this option does not even appear on a Connected/Modern Standby system. however, when I noticed backups weren't running from standby I did the registry edit you mention and set them to "enabled". Acronis' requests to wake the system now appear when I run Powercfg /waketimers, but backups still do not run. I have Wake Timers working with TI on two other systems so I know they can work with TI2019, but my understanding is that they are not supported on Modern Standby (let's just call it that for brevity) systems so, although I tried it, I'm not sure this is the solution!
Windows Task Scheduler is also (amazingly) unable to wake a system from Modern Standby, so this is not a workaround.
Regarding Enchantech's comments about Modern Standby, yes, been there too. I actually forced it OFF in the registry using the "CSEnabled=0" registry hack and magically Acronis wake timers worked! Powercfg /a showed S3 supported again. However, the system was not stable and would often bluescreen entering or leaving standby! After about 30 minutes I reversed that registry hack again!
The "unrelated issue" was a problem backing up the entire Bitlocker protected disc of the same system, which has previously worked for 2 years using TI2017/18/19. Acronis was telling me that I either needed to "unlock the volume or turn off Bitlocker" although the volume was clearly already unlocked:
It turned out the problem was that the space allocated to snapshots had somehow become very small and Acronis was unable to Snapshot the system. The error message was just wrong. Fortunately, that issue is now resolved and the backup works just fine (when not in standby!).
Anyway, having been around the houses I now think I am going to try another clean install of TI2019 and to recreate the backups again with the "Allow Wake Timers" hack OFF. I'm wondering if Acronis trying to use Wake Timers, that are not supported on Modern Standby systems may be preventing it from doing things the right way - it thinks it is on an S3 system not a Modern Standby system. As to why it didn't work when I first reinstalled TI2019 that may be because for speed (:D) I copied the backup settings (for notification settings etc.) from another regular S3 system. I now realise that if Acronis is using a whole alternate way of waking for Modern Standby systems those imported settings, which use Wake Timers, may have again been the cause of the problem!
I have raised this with Acronis Support too, as I mentioned above, so we'll see what they come up with.
All other thoughts are very very welcome!
Jon
This is a new power setting for me - "modern". I'm just learning about it here now :)
Best I can tell, all of my wake timers are 0-4. They range from 0-4, with different combos for different devices, but don't see anything that shows "modern" or 005 or something like that.
C:\WINDOWS\system32>powercfg /query
Possible Setting Index: 000
Possible Setting Friendly Name: Do nothing
Possible Setting Index: 001
Possible Setting Friendly Name: Sleep
Possible Setting Index: 002
Possible Setting Friendly Name: Hibernate
Possible Setting Index: 003
Possible Setting Friendly Name: Shut down
Possible Setting Index: 004
And not sure what Acronis is capable of waking up from, it only shows that a waketimer is set at the time my next scheduled full OS backup is set to run tonight.
C:\WINDOWS\system32>powercfg -waketimers
Timer set by [SERVICE] \Device\HarddiskVolume8\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Acronis\Schedule2\schedul2.exe (AcrSch2Svc) expires at 6:59:00 PM on 5/3/2019.
The bitlocker issue is something I'm dealing with too. Don't want to muddle it in this thread, but I have an ongoing trouble ticket with Acronis support and there are a few threads on it now. Here is mine:
No inputs back for a few weeks now.
Jon,
Given your post I think you have hit the nail on the head here. Now mind you I do not use Modern Standby as none of my systems support it. Having said that from what I have read about it I would say that your registry hack was not the best thing for the system. I would try the complete uninstall of TI 2019. Use the Clean up tool after you run the uninstaller to remove the leftovers then Restart the PC prior to running the installer file again.
If that fails you might be looking at a reinstall of Windows itself to fix this. Not a great prospect.
Hmm,
Not sure I'm going to get this resolved without Acronis support.
I've now done a clean uninstall/reinstall of Acronis with Windows back running in Modern Standby with no registry tweaks.
Unfortunately no scheduled backups run when in Modern Standby.
Without the "Allow Wake Timers" hack the "Wake a sleeping/hibernating computer" option does not appear in Acronis.
I wish I could remember what the backup settings looked like when all worked back on the 28th April, before Acronis was uninstalled and the backups recreated.
I guess I might be able to try restoring the Acronis settings from a backup before that date?? Is there a KB on how to do this? I imagine many of the files are locked as long as Windows is running. Maybe do it in Safe Mode? What folders are needed?
Thanks guys.
Jon, the majority of settings for your Acronis tasks are stored in C:\ProgramData\Acronis folders structure which you could potentially restore from a backup image, but not sure that this would resolve this issue.
The first test should be to create a totally new backup task, even if of only a single folder, then test to see if that will run when the computer is in Modern Standby mode.
The most likely recovery that would help here would be to go back in time to when everything was working correctly and recover your OS partition back to that time, but this will back-level everything else to that point in time too, so make sure you have a current backup of any changed data if going this route, plus be ready to reinstall any applications that may not be present in the old backup etc.
I might try recovering that folder, but I guess I will need to do it in safe mode if that is even possible??
I've tried a new single folder backup. No dice unfortunately. I do not think there is anything wrong with Windows tbh. The only changes I had were two simple one line regedits, since reversed and all else is good apart from this problem with scheduled backups, which actually started before I made either of them - immediately after a complete reinstall of Acronis. Both the regedits were actually an effort to fix this problem.
I'm still not sure if there is anyone here who has backup working from sleep on a Modern Standby system. It would be interesting to find someone that has and whether the "wake sleeping/hibernating computer" option is there in TI, because it doesn't show here (probably because the Wake Timers option is not available in Power Plans for Modern Standby systems).
Jon, if you want to restore the C:\ProgramData\Acronis folders then restore it to another location first such as on a USB stick plus make a copy of the current contents too.
Then when you want to replace the current contents with the restored copy, stop all Acronis Services first, then end all Acronis Processes before attempting to delete the current folders and replace them with the restored copy from your USB stick.
Thanks Steve.
Jon,
Modern Standby is dependent on your network connection being on at all times. If the NIC is set to power off then the functionality of Modern Standby is disabled.
I copied the below from the MS Dev tech site and I suggest that you confirm in your Power Plan settings that the Network is set to NEVER sleep.
Please note that the information in this topic applies to systems with Connected Standby enabled. Connected Standby is enabled by selecting "Never" in the following Power & sleep setting:
When my PC is asleep and on battery power, disconnect from the network:
- Never
- Always
- Managed by Windows
Most systems enable Connected Standby by default.
If you find that your power setting for Network is set as indicated above then possibly your network setting was something different when things were working. True Image is highly integrated into the Windows environment so if it were me I would try option 3 above, Managed by Windows, and see if that might get things working for you.
Hey guys!
Finally I got to the bottom of this and thought you might find it interesting!
I was seeing what appeared to be inconsistent behaviour, where sometimes backups would run in Modern Standby and sometimes they would not. There didn't seem to be any sense it until I had an epiphany!
1. As described here Modern Standby suspends all desktop applications but continues to allow "Session-0 services" to run throttled.
2. Acronis TrueImageHomeService and TrueImageHomeNotify normally run under the "SYSTEM" user and, as such are run in Session 0. So, you may be interested to hear scheduled backups will run (for better or worse) even without "Wake Sleeping/Hibernating Computer" set, as a Modern Standby computer is never truly asleep in the old fashioned way. As this setting is not normally visible in Acronis on a modern Standby system (The "Allow Wake Timers" option does not appear in power plans on such systems, so the option is hidden in True Image) such backups will "just work" but ,unfortunately for some, I don't think you can stop them from running in standby!
3. However, if you set a pre/post command to run True Image asks you for a userID under which to run that command. In this case TrueImageHomeService and TrueImageHomeNotify (not just the pre/post command) run under that UserID (not SYSTEM).
4. If the user is logged on to the computer these tasks run under the users active session, so dialogue boxes like cmd.exe can appear on the user's screen. However, because all desktop apps (basically all non-Session 0 apps) are prevented from running in Modern Standby, backups will not run until the system wakes.
5. However, if the user is not logged on then schedul2.exe creates the TrueImageHomeService and TrueImageHomeNotify using the user's credentials but under Session 0, as there is no regular UI session to connect to!
6. The upshot of all this is:
- A simple task created without pre/post commands will always run in Modern Standby mode (like it or not)
- A task with pre/post commands will only run if the user whose credentials the task uses is NOT logged on!
We always have a pre-command to our backups as they are on a remote server and the pre-command issues a Wake-on-LAN to the server before the backups commence. As a consequence, the backups would run if the admin user on the laptop was not logged in, but would wait until the PC was woken and the admin user signed in, if he was. Very confusing! Especially, as when testing I would normally put the PC to sleep while logged on as admin, but in everyday use that account is not normally logged on.
To fix the issue going forward I have created a new hidden user "Acronis Admin" and all backup tasks are run under those credentials. As this account is never logged into a UI session True Image backs up perfectly.
Probably Acronis' should document this in some way!
Jon
................deleted............... (a duplicate of the post above caused when the original was forwarded for moderation)
Jon,
Very good! Let me get this clear for myself. You are running the backup to a remote device that is awakened by a task pre-command. This task also authenticates to the remote device via user Acronis Admin. Is this admin account created in Windows? If yes are you enabling the System Administrator account and then logging into Windows with that account prior to backup task run time? If yes, have you password protected this account?
Nice work in getting to the bottom of the issue.
Not quite @Enchantech,
- Yes, I am waking the backup server (another server on the same LAN in fact) with an unauthenticated Wake-on-LAN pre-command
- As soon as I want to use a pre-command Acronis insists I enter Windows credentials. It then uses these credentials to run TrueImageHomeService and TrueImageHomeNotify and the pre-task (verified with Process Explorer). It is here I use my new hidden "Acronis Admin" account (administrator account with a complex password) on the Modern Standby system being backed up.
- True Image continues to use my regular remote network login for network credentials (the credentials you input when you browse to a network folder). the remote server does not need an "Acronis Admin" user account.
- The System Administrator account is not enabled or used.
What's really interesting to me is how True Image handles scheduled backups on Modern Standby systems:
- Without any special configuration backups that do not need Windows Credentials to be specified (i.e. backups that do not have a pre/post command) run under the SYSTEM account in Session 0 and will just work - Modern Standby allows services and applications running under Session 0 to run, albeit throttled. The throttling is not noticeable for something like True Image.
- Backups that DO need Windows credentials will NOT run in Modern Standby mode if the user whose credentials you are using is logged on! This is because it will run TrueImageHome under the UI session of the user, which is suspended in Modern Standby mode. However, if the user is logged OFF it WILL run the backups, because then Acronis runs them using that user's credentials but in Session 0.
- There is no need to make any registry edits for this to work. Wake Timers do not need to be enabled and the "Wake the sleeping/hibernating computer" option does not even appear in True Image as a result. The downside of this is there seems to be no way of stopping such backups from running in Modern Standby Mode, unlike with S3.
Lastly, I thought you might also be interested that in doing all of this I also hit the issue you were troubleshooting here and here!
File backup worked perfectly first time, but as @Patrick O'Keefe found when I tried to create a whole disc backup it would fail complaining that it could not open a file with the same backup name but with "V11.tib" ending. Your workaround of waiting for it to timeout and then re-selecting the folder, clearing the password field and re-entering the network credentials password worked perfectly, thanks!! It seems this bug, however caused, is still alive and well in TI2019! It only seems to occur when I use my "Acronis Admin" account as the Windows Credentials. It seems inputting those is causing it to use incorrect network credentials until those are reapplied.
Jon
Seems maybe I spoke to soon about the workaround to the "whole disc" issue. While it works for the backup attempt where you browse and re-enter credentials, it then fails again on the next attempt. It seems True Image is not storing the credentials correctly. So, for full disc backup I cannot run under "Acronis Admin".
As a messy but alternate solution, I created another tiny backup task for a single small file between 2 locations on the laptop, just as a pretext to run the Wake-on-LAN pre-task. Then I set the the full disc backup to run 2 minutes later, without a pre-task and so using the SYSTEM account, as True Image does by default. It works, if it's a bit ugly!
Hopefully, Acronis can fix this "V11.tib" credential problem sometime!
@Jon
Hmmm, So first thing is Acronis True Image uses and runs at the User/admin level. This enables sufficient privileges for the application to perform low level functions on the installed machine.
Second, it sounds like you are backing up to a device (Linux based I suspect) to a guest or non-authenticated SMB share.
Because of backup task failure you are invoking the Windows Administrator acct. to elevate privileges to the System level which is allowing the task to run as expected.
Having said that this workaround is not sufficient to perform a full disk or entire PC backup to run unless you delay the start of the task.
So what I see here is, providing my assumptions are correct, you have run into the situation of Windows not liking the fact that you are connecting to a remote device over an unauthenticated connection. The use of a System level authentication for Windows to allow the task to run is something I believe is unintended from a security perspective and probably will not be allowed by MS to continue to exist. It is for these reasons that I feel your issue is not that of True Image but that of Windows itself.
Have you tried to setup a authenticated user account on the remote device and target that as destination for the backup task? If you are correct in your position that if the user/admin is logged into the computer this prevents True Image and the task to run then, I would think that an S3 or S4 state PC awakened by a pre- command with a scheduled task to run thereafter would also fail for the same reason.
I do not think what I am about to suggest to be good practice but have you tried logging off the Windows session as user/admin then logging back in as Acronis Admin without using a password and see if the task will run. If it does then you can certainly use it as a workaround but your PC is extremely vulnerable to attack in doing so.
Sorry, I'm obviously not making myself clear.
The backup is to another Windows machine not Linux. Connection to it is authenticated in the usual fashion, with a regular administrative user account..
I was not using the "Acronis Admin" account to raise privileges and this is a regular administrator account purely on the laptop. It is not the special and generally unused and hidden Administrator account. It's only advantage is that this is an account which is never logged on to the system.
The issue is that, on Modern Standby systems, any backups which are run using a user's credentials (rather than as SYSTEM) will only run during Modern Standby if the user is not logged on. This leads to apparently inconsistent backup behaviour which depends of the logged-in state and is far from ideal.
Backups without pre/post tasks run using the SYSTEM account, so are unaffected by this issue. But backups with pre/post tasks run under the credentials of a user account so they are affected. If the user is logged on, TrueImageHomeService and TrueImageHomeNotify will be run using the user's active UI session, which is suspended during Modern Standby. As a result the backups will not be allowed to run until the system wakes and the user session becomes active. However, if the user is logged off True Image creates tasks using the same credentials, but using "session 0", which is not suspended during Modern Standby, only throttled, so the backups run.
By creating an "Acronis Admin" user (which I then hide from the login screen to avoid confusing the end user) I can have the task run using an account that is never logged on to the machine, so the backups will always run. This works perfectly for file level backups.
However, I've discovered when I try to create a disc level backup I hit this "v11.tib" bug, where the credentials True Image saves are in some way wrong/corrupt, so the backup cannot run at all - either manually or on a schedule. This is nothing to do with Modern Standby. This can be overcome by your workaround of re-inputting the network credentials after the backup times out, but that only seems to work for that instance of running the backup; The next time the backup runs, manually or on a schedule, it will again fail. So, to work around this bug, I had to abandon my whole "Acronis Admin" method, for disc level backups, instead running a dummy backup 2 minutes before the main backup, which is just a pretext to run the "Wake-on-LAN" pre-task I need and then running the main backup without a pre-task, once the remote server has had a chance to wake. By doing this the main backup does not need to run under user credentials. It instead runs using the SYSTEM account, as by default. This works in Modern Standby so all is good :).
Is this clearer?
What are the suggestions for Acronis' from what we have learnt here? Here are my thoughts for discussion :).
First, and unrelated to Modern Standby. I hope Acronis will focus some effort on crushing these "v11.tib" bugs. Like @Patrick O'Keefe describes here, mine occurs only when trying to create a full disk backup together with a pre-task. The problem seems to relate to the backup's need for 2 sets of credentials - Windows credentials it then uses to run the backup and pre-task, and Network credentials for the remote server. But, why this only affects full disk backups I really do not know.
On Modern Standby, I may be wrong, but Acronis do not seem to have coded for Modern Standby at all or barely. Backups seem to mostly run while in standby by accident of earlier design. Furthermore there is no way to actively stop this from happening as on S3 systems. Acronis need to do some work to make the product consistent with what is possible on S3 systems.
- If True Image realises it is running on a Modern Standby system it should add the "Wake the sleeping/hibernating computer" option to the advanced settings of schedule pane, without reference to the "Wake Timers" setting, as this setting is not shown in Power Options and does not do anything on Modern Standby systems.
- If "Wake the sleeping/hibernating computer" is ticked then schedul2.exe (which is always able to run on Modern Standby systems) should run the backup task according to the schedule.
- If "Wake the sleeping/hibernating computer" is unticked then schedul2.exe should check if the laptop is in Modern Standby mode at the time the task is due to run. If it is, it should not run the task at that time. If "Run missed operations at the system startup" is ticked it should suspend the task until the PC next exits Modern Standby. If "Run missed operations at the system startup" is not ticked then the backup should just be rescheduled for the next scheduled time.
- On Modern Standby systems there should be a 2nd level tick box, below "Wake the sleeping/hibernating computer", to wake "When plugged in" and/or "When using battery". This replaces the feature provided by the "Allow Wake Timers" option in Windows power plan settings on S3 systems, but which True Image must handle for itself on Modern Standby systems.
Getting around the problem of backups that run using user credentials not being able to run in Modern Standby if the user is logged on is trickier to do without adding confusing options to the True Image UI. However, the current situation is not I think satisfactory. If Acronis have a good reason for running TrueImageHomeService and TrueImageHomeNotify using user credentials when pre/post tasks are used, I would:
- Add a "Run backup as a service" option (pre-ticked) to the Windows credentials screen.
- This credentials screen probably needs to be added permanently to the backup's advanced tab so credentials and the "Run backup as a service" option can be changed at any time, without needing to recreate the backup.
- It should have a tool tip that says this box should be ticked "to ensure backups run when the computer is in standby, but should warn that, if ticked, any pre/post tasks will will run silently and will not appear on the user's screen, so such tasks should not require user interaction.
- If the above option is ticked then the backup should always be run using the supplied credentials but under "session 0", so the backup will always run when the computer is in Modern Standby
- If the above option is unticked then the task should run using the session ID of the logged on user, if available, as presently. This will allow the user to see the output of any pre/post task and interact if necessary. However, it will mean the backup will not run if the machine is in Modern Standby and the user is logged on. This seems an inevitable limitation of running a pre/post task that includes a necessary UI on Modern Standby systems.
There is an alternative way of handling the above, but as I do not understand why True image does things presently I am not sure of the consequences. The alternative method is certainly easier for the user!
- Here there would be no need for a "Run backup as a service" option :)
- schedul2.exe would be changed to always run the backup itself (TrueImageHomeNotify and TrueImageHomeService) under the SYSTEM account, even if Windows credentials are asked in order to run a pre/post task. This way the backup will always run, provided any suspended pre-task does not "block" it. So....
- If the system is in Modern standby mode at the time the task is run and if "Wake the sleeping/hibernating computer" is ticked, schedul2.exe should run any pre/post task under "session 0". This will ensure the pre/post task runs. Any UI will not be visible but as the device is in standby this is moot!
- If the system is NOT in modern standby then, as currently, the pre/post task should be run using "Session 0" if the user is not logged on, or the session ID of the logged on user, if he is.
This will enable any logged on user to see and interact with any pre/post task when they are logged on, but will never block the task from running unattended or in standby if the user so desires. This 2nd method seems preferable in all ways unless there is a vital reason why backups with pre/post tasks need to be run using the credentials of a user, as currently.
Jon, if you are able to consistently recreate the .v11 issue, then please open a Support Case with Acronis and document the steps needed to allow their developers to test this for themselves.
For the other comments about how connected standby is managed etc, then I would recommend submitting Feedback using the tool provided in the ATI GUI and provide a pointer to this forum topic (URL) for the full context of the dialogue held here. This would allow Acronis to consider any of your suggestions for the next version of ATI due later this year.
Thanks Steve,
Yes, the v11.tib bug is easy to recreate. I'm already discussing this with Acronis on my existing ticket, but have asked if they want it broken out into a new one, as the bug is now totally unrelated to the previous bitlocker problem!
I have taken up your suggestion to provide feedback using the tool provided.
I guess I thought you MVPs may also be able to use your contacts to point people to take a look and/or maybe refine the suggestion to make it better. They must get a lot of random suggestions from users via the tool. I also know that for a while there seemed to be an Acronis employee who was actively involved in discussions here.
Modern Standby certainly seems to be overlooked in TI2019.
Jon,
Thanks for the additional information, yes, I do have a better understanding of the situation now. I am glad you have decided to advance this to Support as clearly Modern Standby has not been addressed in the current product.
I believe that the V11.tib "bug" as you put it is not really a bug but rather an erroneous error the application offers up when a network destination location is causing or having issues. This seems to reference that the requested backup file(s) are already open by another process so Windows security enforcement has been triggered.
I have done some experimentation with networking and the TI app using the most recent builds of Windows 10 and I have discovered that there are times and circumstances where network response time causes issue with the TI app. This has been reported to Support for further investigation. I am of the opinion that recent changes in Windows networking are behind much of these issues but hopefully they can be worked out in the near future.
Your delay workaround for the full disk backup is a great example of the types of problems I have discovered in my testing and you are right that a purposeful wait in triggering that backup task to run does solve the issue. The question is what exactly is causing this behavior? I believe it to be a combination of things but only time will tell.
Hi Enchantech,
Actually the 2 minute delay from running my pre-task backup is just to give the Wake-on-LAN command in that pre-task 1 minute to fully wake the server. I find if you start the backup too quickly after issuing the Wake-on-LAN the server is still not visible on the network. Also, the pre-task waits a minute before even issuing the WOL, to make sure the laptop has properly re-established it's network connection. Hence a 2 min delay.
The reason the full disc backup works is because by eliminating the pre-task in that backup task it does not need to run under Windows user credentials and the "v11.tib" problem only occurs when the task is running under Windows user credentials, rather than SYSTEM.
I'm not sure I agree about it being a problem with the network destination despite what it says in the log.
- The network credentials it is using are the same in both cases.
- As I say, the full disk backup works if run without the pre-task in the backup task and the pre-task is still running, just in a separate task run 2 mins earlier. The backup actually starts at the same time in both cases, to within maybe a few seconds. We are just separating the pre-task into a separate backup task so the main one does not need to run under user credentials.
- Also, it works even with the pre-task in the backup if it is a file backup instead of a full system/disk backup, even with the same backup name. I can't see how the network destination can be preventing the creation of a backup file when it's a full disc backup but not an identically named file when it's a file level backup. To the remote backup server they are the same thing.
- And then there is the whole "v11.tib" naming issue. That alone is a bug in naming.
Anyway, yeah, let's see if Acronis want to look into it.
ps. Acronis are suggesting a callback to discuss and possibly a remote diagnostic session. Not sure quite when we can do this due to business commitments but sounds interesting.
Jon,
I've read and reread your reply's here and I am pretty sure I fully understand what you are saying.
Might I suggest that you try the backup task with the pre-command in place but that you log off the User session on the PC prior to allowing the machine to enter Standby. If you are correct about the user logged in being an issue when the backup runs then logging the user off should remove that issue and the task should then run as SYSTEM as you suggest.
I would continue to create the delay times in any case as like I say, there are definite minute plus delays in connection establishment now with the latest releases of Windows 10 which I assume are in play here.
I would encourage you to arrange the remote session with Acronis support. I have done this myself and found it very useful in solving issues I have had.
Keep us posted.
Hi Enchantech,
Not that I blame you, because I'm sure I would have got lost trying to get my head around this without all the information right in front of me on the laptop, but you are mixing up two things here.
The need to log off is purely an issue with Modern Standby.
- When using a pre/post task Acronis runs TrueImageHomeService as well as the pre-task under the user's credentials rather than SYSTEM
- if the user is logged on then TrueImageHomeService runs them in the user's interactive session, which a Modern Standby system suspends in Modern Standby Mode. So backups do not run in standby when the user is logged on
- If the user is logged off then TrueImageHomeService runs them in "Session 0", the special session in which services are run and which Modern Standby only throttles, rather than suspends. As a result backups do run in standby when the user is logged off.
- None of this applies when there is no pre/post task. In that situation TrueImageHomeService runs them under SYSTEM credentials, in "Session 0", so backups always run in standby, regardless of anybody's logged in state.
To workaround this, I started running my backups using a local administrator user "Acronis Admin" which is not used for any other purpose and will never be logged onto the system in an interactive session. Consequently, backups run using those credentials will always run in standby.
But, this "v11.tib" issue is completed unrelated to standby or whether users are logged on or not. It arose when I started to use the Windows credentials of an "Acronis Admin" account on the laptop to run my backups, but disk-level backups using these credentials fail whenever they are run - manually or on a schedule, while logged on or on standby. It is a new problem (for me) that has nothing to do with Modern Standby.
I discovered that although file-level backups worked perfectly this way, disk level backups did not work AT ALL, even when run manually.
- Disk level backups work if there are no pre-tasks and SYSTEM credentials are used
- Disk level backups work if there is a pre-task but my normal admin user login credentials are used
- But, disk level backups failed when I tried to use the Acronis Admin credentials
The error is shown here:
Note the reference to "v11.tib" although this is the first attempt to create this backup. This is clearly the wrong filename. But why does a file-level backup work ,even of the entire contents of the same disk, when a disk-level backup fails?? The log is complaining about "credentials for the network share" but both backups were to the same location and are using the same saved SMB credentials!
Anyway...........!
I have spent a few hours with Process Monitor on the laptop and Windows Auditing on the server and finally I have fixed it and it certainly does seem to be a bug in True Image!
So, when I run a file-level backup True Image runs the task on the laptop using the "Acronis Admin" credentials and correctly uses the server's network credentials for access the backup location. But, when I do a disk-level backup this is what we see:
As reported in the log, Acronis has a LOGON FAILURE to the remote server. See this Process Monitor screen capture. You can see it hit the error and even subsequently add it to the Acronis log:
Why is this happening??
Well if we look at what the remote server is seeing:
- Initially Acronis logs onto the server with the correct network credentials and views the destination directory:
- But, when it comes to write the new file it inexplicably switches to using the laptop's local "Acronis Admin" credentials, which unsurprisingly fail!
Once I created an "Acronis Admin" account on the server with the same password and gave it permissions to the backup location all magically works :)!
There is no reason in the world why it should do this.
- "Acronis Admin" is just the Windows account on the laptop that the backup task is running under.
- "Acronis Admin" has never been input as network credentials (does not appear in the connections/smb list)
- It does not happen for file-level backups, where I can see Acronis consistently using the right network credentials
..it's just a simple, if somewhat obscure, bug.
It did occur to me that "Acronis Admin" would not have an SMB list in its HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Acronis\Connections\smb\ as this account was not used to create the task, or any tasks. However, as we know, True Image does not get the credentials from the registry but from the scripts file for the task itself. Also, if this were the problem it would affect file-level backups too. Also, why did it manage to use the right credentials less than a second before? And, finally, if it didn't have the credentials it should ask for them, not just blindly try it's local Windows credentials in wild desperation! :D
Anyway, the good news is all is clear now. I know exactly how to workaround things so they work - make sure "Acronis Admin" is an account with the same password on both machines and "Acronis Admin" has permissions to all necessary folders and files. It is a little obscure. I'm sure most people won't hit it. But, it's likely to be especially common for those using pre/post tasks and backing up to a NAS, where it is very likely the logon credentials for the NAS will be different to their Windows/Microsoft logon!
I think this is very likely to be exactly what happened to @Patrick O'Keefe here. Here he talks about how True Image will only accept his Windows Credentials (because it really does want Windows credentials to enable it to run his pre-task), but that the whole disk backup fails because, in error, it then tries to use those same credentials to authenticate on the NAS!
I have pointed Acronis Support here, so they can see the problem if they care to fix it.
Jon
................deleted............... (a duplicate of the post above caused when the original was forwarded for moderation)
Jon Gardner wrote:But, this "v11.tib" issue is completed unrelated to standby or whether users are logged on or not. It arose when I started to use the Windows credentials of an "Acronis Admin" account on the laptop to run my backups, but disk-level backups using these credentials fail whenever they are run - manually or on a schedule, while logged on or on standby. It is a new problem (for me) that has nothing to do with Modern Standby.
Jon, thank you for sharing the results of your investigation - really impressive, I've passed this thread to the RnD.
Thanks @Ekaterina,
Hope it helps :).
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