Backup drive filled up in just 2 months

Norton Security | Norton Internet Security
1

I have a 2TB external drive for my primary file storage, and have a second 2TB external drive for backup.  I have just one back up set.  The primary had (and has) about 900GB.  The backup drive started out empty, after the intial backup had about the same as the primary drive, but is now completely full.  The N360_Backup folder has one primary folder and within it folders 0-9 and A-F.

 

I'm guessing that every file change results in a new complete copy of that file being backed up.

 

How do I tell N360 to delete the older copies of the same file, without going through a tedious list by myself?

How can I set up backup so it only keeps the latest revision file and automatically deletes or replaces prior versions?

 

I don't want to go through this every couple of months.

 

Thanks for any help.

Don

2

Hi dsttexas.

 

I like DaveH, am puzzled about what you are backing up from your first 2 TB drive.  Does that drive just have data files on it or does it have program files as well?  Where is you operating system based?

 

However that aside, you are not able to delete individual files from the N360 backup and it does not keep old copies of changed files.  Well not in any way that you can access them, as far as I am aware.

 

What I think may have happened is that there has been an error in the backup at some point and a second full backup has been added to the initial full backup file, but without allowing you access to any of the initial backup.  Can you tell us how long it is since you first ran this backup and when you first noticed the excessive size of the backup?  Can you also tell us roughly how long the initial full backup took and what size the backup software says it thinks it should be (run Preview).  

 

I assume that you have the backup set to run automatically (rather than at scheduled times or run manually).  If this is so, you might like to change it to Manual so that it does not try another backup before we can help you try and resolve this space issue.

 

We look forward to hearing back from you.

3

dsltexas, your issue sounds markedly similar to my own.  I have two internal 2 TB drives, one for programs and files, the other is used for backup only.  The Norton 360 backup file isn't the only one on the backup drive (all other backups = roughly 700 GB).  My only backup set is <150 GB in size, yet the N360 backup file has grown to well over 1 TB on several occasions.  When I start getting the notification that the backup drive is almost full, I purge the N360 file and start again (I've done this at least 3x since July 2013).  Like you, I am stymied by how quickly the file grows in size.  Although I've been assured multiple times (most recently less than ten days ago) that Norton backup is incremental by default, I suspect otherwise.  I have tracked several parameters of my N360 backup file, including size in GB, number of bytes, size of file on disk in GB, number of bytes on disk, number of files, and number of folders in an Excel spreadsheet since last July.  I don't do this daily, or even weekly, just when I think to check.  The size of the N360 backup file has increased by 100,000 files literally overnight when I was checking and recording file size daily.  Now I know that I've not added 100K files in a single day. I've discussed this via phone and e-mail with Norton Level 2 support multiple times in the past nine months, and even they can't seem to explain why this is happening.  I rewrote my backup set early in the process.  More recently, it was suggested that not  shutting down my computer each night, and leaving some webpages running minimized when the computer is on were responsible for at least part of the problem.  I'd really like to know why, if indeed Norton 360 runs an incremental backup, the size of the backup file can grow to over 1 TB when everything on programs & data drive, (not all of which is included in the backup set) equates to less than 250 GB.

 

4

The primary external drive (k:) is usually on my desktop computer and is for data only - no applications, no windows, no temp files, no email folders, no internet bookmarks, etc. etc. That is all on the internal c:/ drive.  I do this so when traveling I can just plug it into my laptop and have all my data with me.  The applications (not that many) are duplicated on both computers c: drives.

 

The backup was set to the k: drive, and I checked the relevent file types to include.  It was set to run "automatic" not on a schedule.  The first backup ran 3/18 starting at 10pm at night until about noon the next day.  The 900GB is mostly photos and videos, plus lots of much smaller Office files. 

 

I usually do a shutdown each night, but not always.

 

It was last "run successfully" on 4/11 according to N360 "backup details".  However many of the {1 through {F folders have modified dates since then up until yesterday, and many individual files within those folders also show modified dates as recent as yesterday. As best I know, the "red x" on the icon just showed up this morning.

 

So I don't know what it is doing to double the size of the backup set in just a few weeks.  Nor if the last successful backup was 4/11, why is it just now reporting a problem.

5

Thanks for that helpful response dsttexas.

 

Not sure about DaveH who may have other questions or suggestions but I think I now have a better understanding of the problem.  Sadly I have no easy fix and it is late here and I have a full day tomorrow.  So can I just leave a marker and get back to you in about 24 hrs?

 

I think you are suffering from a problem with N360 which I think I have seen many times but seemed to have gone away recently.  Apparently it has not, would you (and or MADgeek) be prepared to run some diagnostics on your systems so that the Norton team can get a better handle on this problem?

 

The reason the "red x" has recently appeared is because you are just over a fortnight since the last successful backup.  The system will have been trying, and failing for some reason between then and now but it only flags things up when the gap reaches about two weeks.

 

I will do my best to get back to you again tomorrow, and hope that you will be prepared to try and get some logs so that we can nail this problem.

 

All the best.

6

I have a 2TB external drive for my primary file storage, and have a second 2TB external drive for backup.  I have just one back up set.  The primary had (and has) about 900GB.  The backup drive started out empty, after the intial backup had about the same as the primary drive, but is now completely full.  The N360_Backup folder has one primary folder and within it folders 0-9 and A-F.

 

I'm guessing that every file change results in a new complete copy of that file being backed up.

 

How do I tell N360 to delete the older copies of the same file, without going through a tedious list by myself?

How can I set up backup so it only keeps the latest revision file and automatically deletes or replaces prior versions?

 

I don't want to go through this every couple of months.

 

Thanks for any help.

Don

7

I would be more than willing to run diagnostics if it would yield some solid answers and (hopefully) a permanent fix for this issue!

8

Thanks.  Be glad to try some diagnostics.  Have to either fix this or find a different backup solution as current situation just won't work long term.

9

Thanks both for agreeing to try and help the team get to the bottom of this. :smileyhappy:

 

I cannot guarantee that we will be successful, and I know it will mean you putting in more effort than you would normally expect to do, but without such help there is unlikely to be progress.

 

The aim of the exercise will be to get you doing manually triggered backups while running monitoring software that will hopefully provide the background data the team need, if/when the next problem backup occurs. The log files will be large and so to enable passing them to the team I am going to ask you both to install Norton Zone if you are not already using it.

 

I will try and run the process through this thread so that you can both see what is going on and so that the team can check what I am doing if they wish. However if you wish to handle anything through PMs then do so. I am sure I will need to exchange some information with you through PMs.

 

If you are happy with the above then I will move on to the monitoring software. For this you should use SymNRA – details about how to get it and how to use it can be found in this Knowledge Base article -

 

https://support.norton.com/sp/en/us/home/current/solutions/kb20080801181832EN_EndUserProfile_en_us

 

The aim is to start SymNRA before each of the test backups and then collect the resulting log – this will require two computer reboots for each backup. Hopefully we can get a log of a backup running as it should and then get one of things going wrong. As it will be necessary to run SymNRA several times you may find it helpful to create a SymNRA icon on your desktop. The way I run it is to close all no essential programs down, start SymNRA (this forces a reboot) then when the system is up again – run the backup and when that is done, save the SymNRA log (which again forces another reboot). If you have any questions about this – just ask.

 

Once you have obtained the relevant logs you can use Norton Zone to create a link which will enable the team to download them. I will go through that with you when you need to do it. However if you have any problems with Norton Zone in principle let me know a.s.a.p.

 

While you are thinking about all the above and playing with Zone and SymNRA can I ask you to both set your N360 backups to manual. I want to try and enable you to be as fully in control of the process as possible and having the programme try and run backups when it chooses may not help that. To set to manual open N360; select the Backup pane and then the Manage Backup Sets option. On that page select the “When” tab and choose the Manual option – then Save Settings.

 

To dsttexas – as I understand it your backup drive is full. So there is little we can do with things in that state. I suggest that you open Windows Explorer and delete the entire N360_BACKUP folder – as that will be more or less the whole of that disk it may take some time. Just let it run and check afterwards that the disk is clear. Sadly it will leave you without any backup for a while but I do not see we have another option unless you have another spare 2 GB drive we can use. Once the backup drive is clear then open N360; select the Backup pane and then Manage Backup Sets. Press the preview button and see how large it thinks the backup should be – note it for reporting back here. Then when you have the time to leave the machine to run – select “Ran Backup” and leave it until it has completed (no need for SymNRA yet). Report back what it tells you – hopefully that all was well – and tell us how much space the new N360_BACKUP directory is taking up on the backup drive.

 

To MADgeek – I am not clear how much spare space you currently have on your backup drive. If it is less than half full then I would suggest that we can start to log straight away. However if it is half or more full then I would recommend that you do as I have suggested to dsttexas. If you do have the space then I would suggest that once you are happy with both Norton Zone and SymNRA then you should start SymNRA (reboot will be required) and then when the system has settled down run a backup manually. This should just be an incremental backup (yes really!) and so should not take long. Note what it says at the end and then collect the SymNRA log (reboot required) – note the name of the SymNRA log file and where it is saved. You should also note the actual size on disk of the N360_BACKUP folder before and after this backup.

 

This post is already far too long and I have given you both a lot to think about, so I will stop and wait for you to read, think and ask any questions you wish.

 

I hope the above makes sense.

 

Thanks again to you both for offering to do this.

10

I moved my two external drives to my laptop, since that's where I'll be using them mostly in upcoming months. Besides, it has a quad core i7 and USB 3.0 vs desktop Core 2 and USB 2.0.

 

I deleted the N360_Backup folder on the backup F: drive (Toshiba 2TB).  Set N360 to manual, to backup the E: drive (Passport 2TB), selecting all file types except Email (there are none) and ran preview - results 33,922 files and 780GB.  Explorer says Passport has 818GB.  That's one suspicious thing.

 

Upon completion, Norton said it was successful. However, the properties for the backup said 29,455 files and 659 GB in 17 folders. But maybe it counts stuff differently in the backup drive.

 

Looking at the backup catalog created, it had many missing folders and files.  And a few times on trying to look at backed up folders/files it said "error loading catalog".  So maybe I have a corrupted catalog, or maybe it did not backup everything. That's two suspicious things.

 

So I once again deleted the N360_Backup folder, installed and started SymNRA, then rechecked backup settings and started a new backup.  Preview still shows 33,922 files and 780GB.  Backup is now running.

11

Thanks for the feedback dsttexas.

 

If there is anything odd with this backup I have a suggestion about setting up the backup in a slightly different way so let me know if there are any problems.  Otherwise - Good luck.  :smileywink:

 

P.S. roughly how long is the full backup taking?

12

Backup completed successfully. Properties of backup Toshiba F: drive 33,930 files, 780GB - same as source E: drive.

Clicked Finish on SymNRA and logs created but ended with "error occured during transfer operation, process did not complete successfully. Please try again."  I saw the zipped log files in Symantic Errlogs.  Then thought problem may because I did not install Norton Zone first.  So I did that, reran SymNRA and got same error and results as above, with a new log file.  I copied both zip files to the Norton Zone folder.

 

I noticed the Norton Backup Drive catalog was very erratic in trying to look at folders and files.  Sometimes click on arrow to expand did nothing and arrow just went away. sometimes double click on folder yielded "error loading catalog". Sometime right click and "expand" would work, sometimes not.  After some time later, it seems to now be showing all folders and files. Maybe it just takes an hour or so to get itself together?

 

See if the log files tell you or Norton anything.  Then I will modify a few files, and issue another manual backup and SymNRA log.

 

The backup took about 4 hours.

13

Hi dsttexas.

 

Glad the backup seems to have worked.

 

Not sure I understand everything about your post.

 

I think I said do not bother to run SymNRA when running the initial backup.  So the fact that it may have had problems does not worry me.  You may delete those files.

 

Also I am aware that I did not advise you what to do with the SymNRA files when they are needed.  When we have something we need I will advise you how to process them.  Which is why I just said, note their names and location.

 

So now you seem to have a good backup of your E: drive on your F: drive.  Can you just confirm that you think that is the case?  Have you tried restoring (or almost restoring - i.e. finding the file to restore, selecting it and getting ready to restore) on a couple of files?  If you can find a selection of files in the backup, that could be restored, then I think you can assume that the intial backup was good.  

 

If we have a sound base to start from, what you will need to do next is, start SymNRA - run an incremental backup (so a couple of files will need to have changed first) - save the SymNRA file and noted its name and where SymNRA put it.  Then report back on how things went.

 

Is that clear?  Any questions just ask.

 

Good luck.

14

Did a restore of a file, and ok.

Added one new file to source drive.

Started SymNRA for logging.  Started backup, preview reported one additional file than before (33923 vs 33922). Backup successful in about 5 mintues. Found the new file in Norton restore search, and in the catalog directory.

Finished SymNRA and got logfile stored and noted. SymNRA again said "error occured during transfer operation. Process did not complete." Properties on N360_Backup shows 33931 files vs previous of 33930.

15

Hi dsttexas.

 

So you seem to have backup working as it should.  :smileyhappy:

 

But SumNRA is broken.  :smileysad:

 

It seems like life is meant to test us.  :smileywink:

 

Can you tell me where SymNRA is installed? Disk and directory.

 

Can you tell me where SynNRA is trying to put the log files? Again Disk and directory.

 

Going back to the backup for a moment.  You mentioned that you use the two external drives on two machines.  I had assumed that when you ran the backup process it was from one of those machines only but realise that you must have N360 on both.  Was it set to run the backup automatically on either machine?

16

SymNRA in c:\SymNRA. Error logs in c:\users\don\my documents\symantic\errlogs.

 

The original and only use of the drives for backup (until this week) started in March on the desktop machine.  That's where it outgrew the backup drive in about 6 weeks.  It was run in automatic mode during that time. Both machines are Win7 and same level of N360.

 

After moving both drives to the laptop, I started over again with an empty backup external drive, and in manual mode for what we have been doing lately.  This is where I will do all backups in the future.  If I need access to files on the source external drive from the desktop, I can use my local home network or just plug it in, then put it back when needed to do a manual backup.  My assumption is that N360 uses date modified data or some standard windows file flag to determine whether a file is new or modified, and all that data resides on the source external drive and not somewhere on the local c drive of the particular machine it is connected to.

 

All my really critical files for up to date backup are in both c: drives Dropbox, for past couple of years, so both machines and my cell phone have access to latest levels. 

 

The question now is the best procedure going forward to do my backups, and try to catch the problem if it returns.  That is, leave it in manual and do it when I think needed, or but it back on automatic, and see if the drive space problem returns, and then do some more analysis and logging?  Or always start SymNRA and do manual backups capturing the log file each time in case there was a problem at that time or later?

17

Hi dsttexas.

 

Thanks for that response - very clear.  But it still leaves me puzzled as to why SymNRA seems to be having problems, and unless we can get good logs there seems to be little point in going on.  :smileyfrustrated:

 

I think what you need to do is run another manual backup once a few files have changed.  Do it with SymNRA running and once it has completed do not do anything else other than tell SymNRA to finish things off.

 

I had wondered if there might have been a network problem but as I understand it the backup and SymNRA are all running on the same machine and the drives are both wire connected.  So that should not be a problem.  Hopefully the next run will produce a clean SymNRA log.  If you want to look at the backup after it is complete I suggest that on this occasion at least you should leave it until after the reboot and SymNRA has reported its work done.

 

My aim is to get one or more good SymNRA logs of when the backup is working as it should and then to get one when it seems to go astray and backs up an excessive number of files.  However to get the data SymNRA needs to be running when the backup starts, so this precludes moving away from manual backups until we get the log we want or we give up.  :smileysad:

 

Going back to how the backup should work....  You said that you assume that "all that data resides on the source external drive and not somewhere on the local c drive of the particular machine it is connected to".  I am not sure that is true, normally N360 will expect to backup data from the drive that it is located on, it also has a default backup set name.  If two N360 backups (from different machines) were done to the same removable drive it would need to be able to differentiate between the two sets, which may have the same nominal titles.  Also even if the external drive is disconnected I would expect N360 to monitor whether a backup had been run.  Therefore I would expect some record to be kept on the C: drive.  That however is all speculation as I do not know how N360 backup works.

 

However, if, for the period of this experiment, you stick to manual backups from one machine only, the two machine setup should not complicate things.  You will however probably want to disable the backup feature on the other machine (the desktop?) so that it does not start nagging you about not having run the backup recently.

 

So - I recommend running another backup monitored by SymNRA to try and get a clean log.  Lets know how you get on with that.

 

I also recommend that you continue to keep the backups manual and that you only run it when the two drives are wired in to the test computer.

 

I hope the above is clear and helps.

 

If at any stage you want to give up and go back to a peaceful life.  Just say so.  :smileywink:

 

All the best.

18

I discovered that my backup settings were not getting all my files, with about 20,000 missing.  I assumed the setting to include "all other file types" would do just that, but no, you would have to individually specify every file type other than those covered by the other options.  After some research, I learned to add the folder "My Documents" and that would force every file in it to be backed up regardless of file type.  There a lots of applications that have their own filetypes that are not included with the default selections.

 

This could be a major bad assumption for many users who think they are covered but are not.

 

Anyway, I then deleted the backup N360 folder, started SymNRA and did a new complete backup that was successful.  SymNRA once again failed at the end with the same message.

 

Also, I noticed only a few of the file icons had the bar on them indicating they were backed up, mostly PDF files, and no doc or xls files or many others it appears.

 

Not feeling a lot of confidence right now in Norton 360 backup.  I will continue with manuals and logging for a while and see what happens.

19

Hi dsttexas.

 

You said - " I will continue with manuals and logging for a while and see what happens."  Does that mean you want to do your own thing or do you wish me to continue to give advice?

 

I note that you ran a full backup with SymNRA again, though I thought I had advised against it.  I also notice that you continue to change your backup definitions.  If we are trying to run a trial we should really try and keep things as constant as possible.  Let us try and solve one problem at a time.  What I would like to try, with a consistent backup set definition, is to get a SymNRA log of a good incremental backup, followed by a SymNRA log of a faulty one (this is likely to mean that you have to run several logs before you get one to catch a faulty backup).  So far we have failed to get SymNRA to produce a single valid log.  :smileysad:

 

 

As for what you are backing up.  I had taken the view that you had been running your backups for some time and that it did not make sense to question your choice of files..   However now you have found out, I will agree with you that the default selection of files by N360 can leave some big gaps.  So what I do is to totally ignore the files selection on the right hand pane if "What" (all my boxes are unchecked).  I select just the C: drive (you can choose any drive you like) then, perhaps oddly, exclude all folders on the disk, and manually add back in just the folders that I want backed up.  This would normally be more than just My Documents as one may want images, downloads, music and even data files that are no where near the "Users" directory.  However be warned that N360 does not like anything that it thinks is encrypted and files associated with programmes (other than pure data files) can often appear "encrypted" to it.  If you include one "encrypted" file in the backup set definition, then the backup will report failure, and you may have to scroll through the whole list to find the troublesome file, and then exclude it from the next backup.

 

I hope that helps explain a little further how the backup works.  But it does not seem to get us any nearer to a good SymNRA log and hopefully, moving towards the problem of backup file growth.

 

Where do you want to go next?

20

Since I discovered I was missing 20K files, I had to change the definitions to include those.  I took your statement  "So - I recommend running another backup monitored by SymNRA to try and get a clean log.  Lets know how you get on with that." to mean using SymNRA again, so I did that on the that new initial backup.  

 

Unless you suggest otherwise, what I had intended to was continue doing peridoc incremental manual backups against the new backup base, using SymNRA each time and save those log files.  Hopefully one or more of those will be a good log file and I'll note those.  Then if I see growth that seems unreasonable I will post back again and hopefully will have good log files to compare.  If things go fine for some time (?), I may quit the SymNRA steps every time as they do add time.

 

Sound ok?

 

Another question too - does the backup of files that have changed cause a new copy to be added everytime, and old versions never go away?  Hence, growth in the backup set would always get larger and larger compared to the source.  Since a lot of what I do is with photos and videos, those changes can add up fast.  However, the little work I did from my mid-March start until the backup set had more that doubled (adding about 1 TB in about 6 weeks) does not seem even remotely possible.

 

Thanks for your help.