Hi everyone,
We’ve had a number of cases arise where an ESET anti-virus security product and BackupAssist being installed on the same machine has resulted in the system entering a ‘Blue Screen of Death’ (BSOD) towards the end of the backup.
We have a previous blog item which outlines early details of this important issue here.
We’re pleased to say that we are now satisfied, by testing results and user feedback, that we have a suitable resolution to the issue as well as an effective workaround available.
Environment and Symptoms
The common environment and symptoms (that we’ve been able to identify) are as follows:
- Running a 64-bit version of the Windows Server 2008 platform or later.
- Using the Windows Imaging engine within BackupAssist v6.
- An ESET Anti-virus/security product is installed (typically NOD32).
- The BSOD occurs during the ‘cataloging’ phase of the backup process. You can determine this by watching the backup run on the ‘Monitoring’ screen within BackupAssist.
Resolution
ESET have made a release publicly available which addresses this particular issue.
Specifically it’s NOD32 Version 4.3.10023.0. This can be downloaded from here.
Any questions should be directed to your ESET contact.
Workaround
The reason for the BSOD occurring is that BackupAssist mounts the .vhd file generated by the Windows Imaging engine to be able to catalogue the backup properly. It’s during this mounting process when the conflict occurs.
The development team have added an option in BackupAssist v6.2.7 which will allow for a ‘quick catalogue’ to be generated without mounting the .vhd file (removing the chance of the BSOD to occur). The downside of using this option is that you can’t perform a file search within the image backup; however you can still restore individual files and applications through the BackupAssist Restore Console as expected.
Note: You can download BackupAssist v6.2.7 (or later) from here.
The steps to enable ‘quick cataloguing’ are as follows:
1. Click on ‘Jobs‘ at the top of the BackupAssist console and double click on the Windows Imaging job you have configured.
2. Click on ‘Imaging Options‘ down the left hand side.
3. Scroll to the bottom of the main window and tick ‘Quick catalogue‘ and apply your changes (see screen shot below):
If you are unsure if your system is affected by this issue, please submit some diagnostics to our support team and we can confirm this for you. The steps to submit diagnostics are:
1) Go to Contact Support (from the bottom-left corner of the console) -> Contact Support
2) Fill out the form and ensure that the Submit system diagnostics check box at the bottom is checked.
Any further questions or comments can be submitted to support@backupassist.com.
Thanks,
The BackupAssist Support Team
