Archive Integrity Errors: Could Anti-Virus Software Be Causing Them ?

Discussion in 'Paragon Drive Backup Product Line' started by garioch7, Jan 18, 2014.

  1. garioch7

    garioch7 Registered Member

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    I am running Windows 7 x64 Pro with HDM Suite 12. On one of my computers, full image backups have reported archive integrity errors when the Archive Integrity is checked. It reports a range of sectors. This first occurred about three months ago, and has happened twice in the last month. I have been backing up this computer with HDM12, without other issues for about two years now.

    The target backup drive is an internal WD Black Caviar, 2TB. I have run chkdsk /r on each occasion and it comes back with no errors. I am suspicious now that something is interfering with the writes to the target drive. I have shut down my Bitdefender Total Security 2013 on my last backup attempt and it proceeded normally, in fact, faster, and the archive integrity checked out fine.

    Anyone have any other ideas? For now, and in the future, I am going to shut down my a/v solution when doing backups.

    Have a great day.

    Regards,
    -Phil
     
  2. Robin A.

    Robin A. Registered Member

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    To avoid this kind of problems, try doing your backups from a boot WinPE or Linux medium.
     
  3. Paul Nutt

    Paul Nutt Registered Member

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    Instead of shutting down Bitdefender you may exclude the HDM process in the AV settings or exclude the target destination of your backups (file or folder or file extensions). This way you won't be without AV protection.
     
  4. garioch7

    garioch7 Registered Member

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    Thank you, Robin and Paul, for your responses. I will try Paul's suggestion first, but if the problem persists, I will go with booting from my Paragon Recovery Disk. It has been a pain, those archive integrity errors, particularly when you then have to run chkdsk /r for six hours to confirm that the target drive is not corrupt in any way.

    Thanks again to both of you. Good to know that my "diagnosis" was not totally off of the mark. Funny, it only afflicts the one computer. The laptop runs Bitdefender as well and there have never been any problems, but then each computer is a unique beast.

    Regards,
    -Phil
     
  5. fireworker

    fireworker Registered Member

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    SMART parameters is OK? Is it possible to try to save the backup to a different drive, to check? Simply to connect another and try to it for the test. I had something similar with Paragon three years ago. Everything worked fine and only Paragon occasionally gave strange errors. Two weeks could not understand what was happening, then replaced SATA cable and everything was OK. I do not think that you have the same case, just version.
     
  6. seekforever

    seekforever Registered Member

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    Download and run the disk diagnostic provided by the vendor of the disk. Chkdsk /r is a start but it will not do the same level of test that the diagnostic will.

    Look in the Windows Event Viewer which might provide some insight.

    This may not be related to your problem:
    I was getting verification errors with a different product and the Windows Event Viewer had fault entries. Expanding them said to replace the SATA cable which I did and fixed the problem.

    This was some time ago but since then I found that the SATA cables included with my ASUS motherboard are garbage - they are made with very light gauge wire and I have now replaced them all. Don't know if current ASUS motherboards still provide them.
     
  7. garioch7

    garioch7 Registered Member

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    Thanks for your additional responses. I will run the Western Digital diagnostics on my target drive. The drive in question is a directly mounted in a pre-wired backplate on my Maingear computer, done by the techs at Maingear when they built the system. The motherboard is a Gigabyte model. No other programs are reporting issues with that drive, which is why I suspect that something, probably my a/v solution, is intermittently interfering with the HDM12 backup writes, probably caused by auto-scanning or auto-updating. I will continue to monitor the situation and will post any new information.

    Thanks again. Have a great day.

    Regards,
    -Phil
     
  8. garioch7

    garioch7 Registered Member

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    Just an update. I ran the Western Digital diagnostics for my WD Black Caviar 2 TB target drive. Took five hours. SMART was a PASS and the Extended Test was a pass.

    Not sure where I would look in the Windows Event Log to determine what might be going wrong. Paragon HDM12 reports a successful backup, but the backups intermittently fail the Archive Integrity Check with reports of a range of bad sectors.

    My guess is still that my current version of Bitdefender Total Security 2013 is somehow interfering with the writes, by either auto-updating or auto-scanning during the Paragon backups.

    Will update my Bitdefender to the latest version (was running TS2013) to see if that makes a difference and also exempt Paragon processes from scanning and turn off Auto-Update during backups.

    Thanks for all your help and insightful suggestions. Have a great day.

    Regards,
    -Phil
     
  9. fireworker

    fireworker Registered Member

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    And what are the indicators, such as Current Pending Sector Count?
    Another would be a idea to test your RAM.
     
  10. garioch7

    garioch7 Registered Member

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    Current pending sector count was 200.

    Windows Memory Diagnostics found no memory errors.

    Thanks for your help. Have a great day.

    Regards,
    -Phil
     
  11. seekforever

    seekforever Registered Member

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    Look in Win 7's Computer Management - Event Viewer - Windows Logs - System as a start. You can also check the other logs. There will be a lot of stuff in the logs but most of it is just information. Especially look for things with a red X beside it or the word "Disk".

    I had a similar problem with an internal a few years ago and it was caused by a flakey SATA cable. It was caught in the event log when I did the verify but this was not with Paragon. You could try reseating all your SATA cables.

    RAM indeed can be the cause. I don't know how good Windows Memory Test is since I always use free Memtest86+ available from www.memtest.org - notice the + and the .org on the site address. There is another memtest without the + and with a .com.

    You don't seem to have a hard verify error so I would let the diagnostic run overnight as a minimum. Even so, a diagnostic is not real world conditions and may not detect intermittent errors. The best test is to substitute the RAM with known good RAM. If you don't have spare, you can often remove 1 stick in multi-stick computers and run without it. If no failures then swap the stick. You should check your motherboard manual for permitted RAM configurations when doing this.
     
  12. fireworker

    fireworker Registered Member

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    I believe that the cause of the error can be found. Search should be logical. First, determine which is the nature of error, software or hardware. For it's enough to take Robin's advice and perform backup booting from external media. If the same error is, then fault not in the host software, problem with the hardware. In this case sequentially one after another, substituting known-good, check the cable, disk, memory ... Sooner or later failure is localized.
    Event Viewer and reading Paragon logs will help you learn the time and place of the errors, but it is unlikely they will indicate the reason. Although it may be, indirectly. IMHO.
    By SMART. More interesting are current parameters (Raw or Warranty). Although if DlgDiag after a long test says that drive is OK - probably so.
    I read (on forums from users) about Paragon incompatibility with separate hardware (eg mobo), but never seen. I can neither confirm nor deny. Probably Paragon support has this information.
     
  13. seekforever

    seekforever Registered Member

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    Actually, in my case the Event Viewer showed, IIRC, what it called disk parity errors and the recommendation from the Event data was "to change the cable". Can't get more help than that - especially since it worked.

    I have subsequently thrown out several ASUS SATA cables that came with the MBs at the time - they were of very light gauge wire. From my verify experience anytime a disk acted up in normal operation and had one of these cables I replaced it and cured the problem.

    Yes, finding the cause is frequently a process of elimination rather than going right to the cause.
     
  14. fireworker

    fireworker Registered Member

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    Really? I did not know that the Event Viewer provides recommendations, I thought that only a different event ID and time shows.
    Then must begin with the study of logs.
     
  15. seekforever

    seekforever Registered Member

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    It was a while ago but I likely checked out the event ID and the linked to more information. I agree that the specific causes are not usually listed probably because there are often many reasons for lots of issues.

    The main thing is that the Event Viewer showed that the disk was having problems for whatever reason and I was lucky that the cable was given as a probable cause.
     
  16. garioch7

    garioch7 Registered Member

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    I appreciate all of the help. During the week, I upgraded my Bitdefender to the latest version (Total Security). I added Paragon as an excluded process and listed it as a game, so that Bitdefender would automatically go into Game Mode while Paragon HDM12 Suite is running.

    I did two full image backups yesterday successfully. Archive integrity was a pass. I also did a Window Image Backup and it too was successful. No other programs are reporting any issues with the WD Black Caviar 2 TB drive, so I have assume that it might well have been a Bitdefender issue.

    In any event, until I have another archive integrity failure, there is not much point that I can see in monitoring the Windows Event Logs, but I will keep that in mind, if and when I get another Archive Integrity failure.

    Thank you all for your interest and advice to assist me resolve this issue.

    Have a great day.

    Regards,
    -Phil
     
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