I have an automation process that uses Robocopy to copy backups (WindowsImageBackups and other backup files) from my Virtual Servers to a seperate Physical Server (WIndows 2008 R2).
This process has worked great for quite some time - however recently the physical server has started to 'hang'. I am unable to connect to the server remotely, and if I try to log in it hangs. I have even tried shutting down the computer by using the power button - but it doesn't shut down unless I completely power off the system (I left it trying to shut down for 24 hours once). One interesting thing is that there are 3 VM's on this physical box - and they respond normally. I'm able to shut them cleanly down before trying anything with the Physical Server.
After the last hang - I restarted the system and left it logged in (no screensaver) with both Process Explorer and Resource Monitor (on the hard disk page) running. When the system locked up next - I was able to view what was happening via the console.
What I found is that the system was still writing the VHD for one of the Virtual Machines (41.8 gig). Processor Usage was varying between 30 and 70% - so I'm not sure why I still couldn't connect to the system (but might explain why the VM's were still working) - and the local console was non-responsive (but both Proc Explorer and Resource Monitor were still updating).
I checked the log file created during the backup process - and found the following error message from Robocopy: 2011/11/29 06:53:18 ERROR 6 (0x00000006) Copying File B:\WindowsImageBackup\SQL\Backup 2011-11-27 110150\8d06cd49-c574-11de-b39b-806e6f6e6963.vhd
The handle is invalid. This is the file that was still being written to - 6 days later!!! (BTW - that backup started on 11/27 - so it was two days before Robocopy complained - and that is when the system stopped responding).
Here is the Robocopy Command: ROBOCOPY "B:" "\\Server\Backups\%ComputerName%" /e /copyall /v /r:0 /np /mir /b /xd "System Volume Information" "$RECYCLE.BIN" "RECYCLER" "Diskeeper" "Virtual Machine" "System Images" VM /xf *.BAK "Backup.Log" >>%BackupLog% 2>&1
I ran a test copying the file to a non-compressed directory and it worked. So it would appear to be a problem copying to the compressed directory. In searching on this I have seen some issues reported that are similar.
Any suggestions - While I could leave compression off (and have for the moment) - I'm really tight on space and need to see if I can resolve this.
Joseph W. Leathlean