Author Topic: Major issue with 291 version (Read 11485 times)

MerleOne · « **on:** September 23, 2014, 05:00:01 am »

Hi,
I have noticed something very wrong with 2.9.1 on a 7 pro system : whenever I user Registry Backup, with VSS, it sorts of hide C: from the system, and you can imagine what is does. I was able to shutdown the system. After reboot everything seemed back to normal, and it started again after I performed a new registry backup. Maybe a VSS mess-up. I hope I can recover my system after this second crash...

PS : sorry for posting here instead where I should have, I was quite upset, this PC is very important to me...

Shane · « **Reply #1 on:** September 23, 2014, 01:19:07 pm »

The registry backup simply calls VSS to make a shadow copy and map it to a drive letter, once VSS does its job the registry backup simply copies the files from the vss copy and thats it.

In the advanced settings of the registry backup you can set the drive letter you want vss too map to, make sure it isnt set to C: for some reason

But other than that my registry backup doesnt touch the system, so if it isnt the drive letter in the advanced settings then it sounds like it is something with VSS.

Shane

MerleOne · « **Reply #2 on:** September 23, 2014, 03:55:41 pm »

I have noticed that the drive used by VSS is B: a USB Flash Key quite full, is it possible to chose C: where there is plenty of space ? For the current time I have disabled VSS usage for Registry Backup. Maybe the issue is not due to the Repair Now Version but rather the fact that the Deivce for VSS was lacking empty space, more than before (I installed a few more portable apps on it).

After a hard shutdown, it seems there is no issue even if it's not easy to tell. But I least after several hours all seem to perform correctly, but I can assure you it was scary, more than Freddy The Revenge or whatever horror movie one can prefer. For instance, trying to open the Computer resulted in a strange message saying something was wrong with explorer.exe.

In that cas, I never know if it's better to force power down or to try to shut "gracefully" the PC.

Thanks for the reply !

Shane · « **Reply #3 on:** September 23, 2014, 04:02:10 pm »

Quote

I have noticed that the drive used by VSS is B: a USB Flash Key quite full, is it possible to chose C: where there is plenty of space ?

Thats the problem right there, drive B: was in use by the system. You want to choose a drive letter in the program that is not in use because vss is map the volume shadow copy it makes to that drive letter. So if you choose a letter that is in use windows gets all confused and upset until you reboot where after the reboot it is fine

The volume shadow copy that vss makes is already on the drive, but no way for the program to access it, thats why it maps a drive letter to it, so then my program can copy the registry files from it.

So if B: and C: are in use on your system try one that isnt, like V:. You want to use a drive letter that you know you are not using on the system. I have B: as the default because most people dont use drive B:. That was the old 2nd floppy drive letter that was used lol.

I am working on an update to the registry backup, I think I will add a check in there to have the program check to see what drive letters are in use and auto skip them and choose a different letter. That will keep it from freaking people out who are using B: on their system and making windows get upset. But dont worry it didnt mess anything up on your system, after a reboot the mapped drive is gone and windows is happy again.

Shane

MerleOne · « **Reply #4 on:** September 24, 2014, 03:13:48 am »

Hi and thanks for the reply. I am not sure I understand all of it, but what is strange is that it did worked fine until recently, always with the same setting using B: as target. B: is used also by eBoostr, a readyboost equivalent.
I am not quite sure what I should do if I want to continue to use VSS : select a non existant drive letter ? I thought the drop down menu only proposed existing drives.

Shane · « **Reply #5 on:** September 24, 2014, 01:25:22 pm »

No, the drop menu showed all drive letters. I just put out v1.10.0 of the registry backup and I will also update the version in WR on monday. I updated it to where it will auto change the vss letter to use if it is already in use

You dont have to use vss, the fallback method is just fine and is the one I use since I have it set to backup at startup (Only allowing 1 backup per day). I use fallback since it is way faster than vss

Shane

MerleOne · « **Reply #6 on:** September 24, 2014, 03:43:10 pm »

Thanks, you're right, all letters are present. I have chosen Z: as default VSS drive. If I may insist on something, it would be nice if the installation of a new version could preserve the settings of the former one, when applicable. Maybe it's already the case, all the better !

Regarding VSS, or Fallback, it seems to me that now you consider VSS as the Fallback method, which is indeed faster and apparently safer. I also remember that you indicated VSS was the best method in previous versions.

Shane · « **Reply #7 on:** September 25, 2014, 12:45:32 pm »

Quote

If I may insist on something, it would be nice if the installation of a new version could preserve the settings of the former one, when applicable. Maybe it's already the case, all the better !

The installer wont overwrite the settings.ini file so you should be good. Remember that the Registry backup can be downloaded and installed by itself as well

Quote

Regarding VSS, or Fallback, it seems to me that now you consider VSS as the Fallback method, which is indeed faster and apparently safer. I also remember that you indicated VSS was the best method in previous versions.

Microsoft says that VSS is the best way to back it up, and I normally use it. But when the computer is starting up and the drive is already under a heavy load trying to load up everything then trying to do a registry backup at startup slows things down because VSS is working away on the drive making a shadow copy of the files. So instead I simply use the fallback method which is just a API call to windows to ask it to save the registry to a new file.

So far though I have yet to ever run into a problem backing up the registry using the fallback method (The API) perhaps it is only really loaded up servers that might ever run into the problem, it is hard to tell.

Shane

MerleOne · « **Reply #8 on:** September 25, 2014, 01:25:34 pm »

Thanks. Actually I had an issue using the fallback method once or twice, the program said some parts of the registry were not saved correctly. But it only happened so many times.