Local Backup via USB is failing [merged thread]

[cread]

Here is another data point for what works and what does not. I am currently testing with B4.0 and there are no changes.
Interface with J Micron 20337 (SATA/PATA/USB) works fine
Interface with J Micron 20336 (SATA/SATA/USB) does not.
One Thing I did notice on the data sheets is that the USB to SATA interface on the 337 goes through an IDE bridge. This would prevent any unique SATA<-> USB interactions (if there are any). It does appear that the interface support is similar, but who knows.

[sjeph8je]

Good point,
to add some more data: my usb backup is working perfectly, its interface is indicated as JM 20329

[Touchstone64]

Looks like my experience is inverted - my JM 20329-connected backup is not OK, but the 'Hi-Speed USB to SATA Bridge'-connected backup is (ref: http://forum.synology.com/enu/viewtopic.php?f=160&t=46393).

(I've edited this post as I got the information the wrong way around. And there was me thinking I was sane. Apologies.)

[gunrunnerjohn]

One odd thing about these backups. I currently have a DS212 in house for a customer, and I'm setting it up before delivery. The USB 2.0 drives that fail on my DS209 work fine for large backups on the DS212, I'm using the same version of the DSM. Note that the DS212 has USB 3.0 ports, which may explain why it works in a different manner than the previous versions of the Synology.

[cread]

One odd thing about these backups. I currently have a DS212 in house for a customer, and I'm setting it up before delivery. The USB 2.0 drives that fail on my DS209 work fine for large backups on the DS212, I'm using the same version of the DSM. Note that the DS212 has USB 3.0 ports, which may explain why it works in a different manner than the previous versions of the Synology.

I wonder if support for USB 3.0, broke the 2.0 interfaces?

[fabtech]

My last try to attempt to resolve this issue was to use my older 207+ as a Synology-to-Synology backup, avoiding the USB and eSATA ports. This type of backup (Backup & Restore) almost reaches the end then it stops with an error message (@ about 395GB out of 405GB).

I also tried unsuccessfully a USB3 Digitus DA-70543 (could not see the brand name of the internal interface) docking station connected to the USB2 of the DS712+. This was the 4th enclosure I tried (USB2 with and without ferrite and eSATA).

At this point, I decided to manually backup my data and requested Synology to remote login to DS712+ to find and hopefully to resolve the problem. My expectation is that the new DSM 4 will fix this backup problem (I have not tested the Beta yet).

Will post again after the Synology engineering guru experience.

[gunrunnerjohn]

My expectation is that the new DSM 4 will fix this backup problem (I have not tested the Beta yet).

I think you assume facts that are clearly not in evidence! I reported this problem originally with DSM 2.x for my DS209, and it's yet to be resolved. Back in the DSM 2.x days, Synology actually issued me a special patch file that fixed it, then for one release after that it worked, now it's dead again. I have no expectation that they'll suddenly fix this for DSM 4.x, my guess is they're adding yet more whistles & bells, not addressing real problems.

[gunrunnerjohn]

One odd thing about these backups. I currently have a DS212 in house for a customer, and I'm setting it up before delivery. The USB 2.0 drives that fail on my DS209 work fine for large backups on the DS212, I'm using the same version of the DSM. Note that the DS212 has USB 3.0 ports, which may explain why it works in a different manner than the previous versions of the Synology.

I wonder if support for USB 3.0, broke the 2.0 interfaces?

Since this issue started with DSM 2.x, my guess is that USB 3.0 support doesn't have anything to do with it.

[cread]

I can verify that this has not changed for me on Beta 4.0. Still fails and works the same way. Also that my backups were fine with 3.0 and 3.1. YMMV

They could involve the backup program itself to be more fault tolerant. Like if a file or files fail, pause and resume from the last known good file copy. This way if this fault shows up the drive will have been re-mounted and OK before it resumes. It does not fix the USB problem, but it does fix the Backup.

PS: I think they are quite draconian on faults. I had a a backup that specified a folder that did not exist and it declared a failure. this is a fault of the backup specification and not the backup itself.

[gunrunnerjohn]

I prefer they just fix the USB timing issue so the USB ports work, that would fix the backup and everything else that uses the USB!

[fabtech]

The backup (the App Backup & Restore) worked just fine for me with my DS207+ and DSM 3.1-1636 (I believe this version is the last possible with the DS207+). The backup issue started for me with my DS712+ and its DSM 3.2-1955 and the previous one (I think it was 3.2-1944). As I said before, even the Network backup (Synology server) which does a data backup from the DS712+ to the DS207+ fails! I am starting to thing that I am doing something wrong with the backups ...

[gunrunnerjohn]

The backup (the App Backup & Restore) worked just fine for me with my DS207+ and DSM 3.1-1636 (I believe this version is the last possible with the DS207+). The backup issue started for me with my DS712+ and its DSM 3.2-1955 and the previous one (I think it was 3.2-1944). As I said before, even the Network backup (Synology server) which does a data backup from the DS712+ to the DS207+ fails! I am starting to thing that I am doing something wrong with the backups ...

That's about my chronology as well. I had the problem initially with 2.x, and I submitted a trouble ticket and eventually got a special patched version. That fixed it for me, and the next 2.x release also worked. When 3.1 came out, it also worked, so I figured it was behind us. DSM 3.2-1922 broke it again, and DSM 3.2-1955 didn't fix it. I submitted another trouble ticket. Synology had their tech connect to my box to "fix" this, they made it worse. After two attempts, I went back to the stock DSM 3.2-1955 and used the only disk that works with the current versions, a USB 3.0 drive that I recently got.

I don't think you're doing anything wrong with the backups, what can you really screw up?

There is a timing issue in the USB port handler, and it escapes me how it gets fixed, broken, fixed, broken all the time. Fix the damned thing and leave it alone!!!!

[marymac]

I've been struggling with this for a while using a Vantec (NST-400MX-S2) 2-drive USB 2.0 with 2 WD 1Tb Caviar Green drives in it. The drive works fine for everything except backing up: it would eventually fail, and in the logs I could see that it ejected.

I finally took one of the drives out and reformatted in NTFS on my laptop to start from scratch, then I attached it to the Synology using a Thermaltake BlacX eSATA USB Docking Station. Finally! A completed backup (613Gb). Next step is to try a single drive enclosure (the docking station seems too vulnerable to dust getting in - it's for short-term troubleshooting.)

I know someone mentioned earlier in this thread that using a single drive enclosure instead of a dual drive seemed to work better and that was definitely the case for me.

[gunrunnerjohn]

FWIW, all my failures were with single drive enclosures, so at least in my case, that wasn't the silver bullet. After the last DSM update, even NTFS didn't work, that was an earlier crutch that I used.

I finally got things stable with a USB 3.0 drive, apparently something about the interface timing of the USB 3.0 controller allows me to bypass the timing bugs in the Synology USB driver.

[marymac]

Thanks for the reminder gunrunnerjohn. I'm planning to get a USB 3.0 to see if that works for me as well.