External drive and FD-ISR problem

I have had 3 archives on an external drive for a couple of years now, updating them at least once a week.

On that external drive I also have a Karens Replicator backup of 'my docs' These have existed happily together until this morning.

Occasionally I have had to change the drive letter if I have had other things plugged in but it hasn't happened too often, and it's easy to change the archive location in FD-ISR anyway.

This morning when I plugged in the external and fired up Karen I noticed the drive letter was one out so I changed it in Karens settings and pressed the 'my backup job' button. I watched in fascinated horror as it deleted everything on the drive at the speed of light and laid on a fresh backup to the drive of 'my docs'

My FD-archives are gone and it won't recognise the drive no matter how hard I try. Windows sees it, Karen sees it, I can see it, but FD-ISR cannot or won't.

Would formatting the external help? Uninstalling it in device manager perhaps?

Any suggestions are welcome.

 

It is NTFS.

When I plug in the external and open FD-ISR I usually see my archives listed underneath secondary.

Also there is nothing listed under archived snapshots.

FD-just doesn't see that I have the external plugged in. I have checked the drive letters etc but nothing seems to work.

What does export snapshot do, copy primary to an external of your choice?

 

It is sorted

Since I first installed FD a couple of years ago and made an archive on that very first day, I have never seen the FD user interface when it had no archives made.

Also when I plugged in the external it showed no archives because there were none as Karen's Replicator deleted them and then re-backed up all it's own jobs.

I had expected that FD would show the external drive listed even with no archives, because I knew no better.

I changed the drive letter of the external through disk management, and then thought ''why not just try making an archive to the drive and see what happens?''

So I did, and it is made, and it shows in FD when it is plugged in

However I am now considering what to do about Karens Rep. The backup job is set up for the old drive assigned letter and I know from what happened this morning that Karens seem to see the change of drive letter in it's settings as a go ahead to wipe out my FD archives.

Thank you pandlouk for your interest in my post

 

Hi Stapp

I use AJCSoftwares, sync and have never had an issue, but I am careful to just to it with specified folders.

I would long and hard to see if you can identify what you did wrong. If not, Karen's would go.

 

Well I looked hard and long and have found out what happened.

When I went to change the drive letter for the backup in Karen's setting I chose browse to go to the new drive letter. Unfortunatly I didn't also specify to go to the folder that I use for backups on that drive as well. So Karen thought it was a new backup to a new drive and wiped it for me

My fault entirely but a lesson learnt, make sure the backup is not only to the right drive but also the right folder.

Both Karen and FD-ISR are working fine together again.

 

Hi Stapp

I discovered using syncing can be a dangerous thing if not careful. I use the AJC software to sync between two machines. Originally I used it in full sync where it makes stuff the same, using the latest time/dates. I discovered that can be a real disaster.

Now I use it like FDISR works. It makes the target look like the source, but doesn't do a two way sync.

Pete