Failed to prepare guest - Access is denied - Dell KACE

[KiwiJJ]

Hi,
Has anyone else come across this,I am getting the following error when running my backup jobs, (version 6.5)

Failed to prepare guest for hot backup. Details: Cannot upload guest agent's files to the administrative share [\\x.x.x.x\ADMIN$]. Cannot create folder [\\x.x.x.x\ADMIN$\VeeamVssSupport]. CreateDirectoryW(\\?\UNC\x.x.x.x\ADMIN$\VeeamVssSupport<file:///\\%3f\UNC\x.x.x.x\ADMIN$\VeeamVssSupport>) failed. Win32 error:Access is denied. Code: 5

What I have found is that the "c:\windows\veeamvsssupport" folder stays after the backup job finished and is unable to be deleted and since then all backups then come up with the above error message. A restart of the server clears the folder, the first backup works and then it fails again as Veeam is not getting rid of the folder when the backup finishes.

Support seemed to think it was the anti virus but I uninstalled the anti virus and it made no difference. I have not had a good backup for days now and it is getting urgent.

Case # 00485270

[Vitaliy S.]

Hi John,

Do you have UAC enabled on this server? Are you using built-in admin account or account that only belongs to the admin group?

Thanks!

[KiwiJJ]

Hi Vitaliy,
I have tried it with both the local administrator account and the domain administrator account. These backups have been working fine for years, but since last Friday I have not had a good backup. I will have to use Microsoft's backup product to backup Exchange as I need to clear the log files. The servers are a mix of Windows 2003 (no UAC) and Windows 2008 R2.One of the Windows 2008 R2 servers does not have a problem, but all the rest do. One issue I have with support is that she does not start until 4 PM NZ time which means I only get an hour to work on things, be good if I could talk to someone in support during our working hours.

cheers,

John

[Gostev]

These backups have been working fine for years, but since last Friday I have not had a good backup.

Then I would look no further the infrastructure changes documentation from last Thursday, as this sort of behavior is a strong indication that some settings were changed in the environment. May be some GPO changes pushed, or even something basic like account's password change ("Access is denied" is pretty telling on what exactly the issue is here).

[KiwiJJ]

Hi Anton,
There were no infrastructure changes made last week. Windows Updates were applied on Saturday night. When the server is restarted the VeeamVssSupport folder is removed from the C:\Windows directory and the backup of the server runs fine. When the backup finishes the VeeamVssSupport folder remains and is unable to be deleted and the next backup fails. This indicates to me that something is causing Veeam not to delete the folder. It can create it fine if it does not already exist which means credentials etc are ok.

cheers,

John

[Gostev]

What OS does your Veeam server run on? If not 2012 R2, then I am about 99% positive this is a security / account issue.

[KiwiJJ]

Hi Anton,
Looks like I have found the issue. We use a Dell KACE appliance for pushing out software, asset monitoring etc. This was patched last week, part of the patch included software metering which looks like it installed a service on each machine. I ran Process Explorer on one of the affected servers and found that a service installed on the server from this appliance was locking the VeeamVssSupport folder. When I stopped the service the VeeamVssSupport folder disappeared. I will raise this with Dell. I think others who use this appliance and Veeam will have the same issue.

regards,

John

[KiwiJJ]

Hi Anton,
I have had a reply back from Dell and they are aware of the issue. The resolution at the moment is to turn off software metering and they will release a fix in the next version.

cheers,

John

[Gostev]

Great, thanks for the update!
Yes, Process Explorer is awesome

[jlingg1]

Hi John - we have the exact same issue and your post saved us. Do you have any news from Dell on when they will have a fix?

Thanks
Jason

[KiwiJJ]

Hi Jason,
Haven't heard anything from Dell regarding this. Will have to check out the release notes for the next version whenever that may be and see if it is listed. I have turned off software metering on all servers until they get this sorted.

cheers,

John