BackupAssist Classic v12

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.7

Released March 6th, 2024

  • Cloud Backup

    • Add support for S3-compatible cloud providers that do not support chunk encoding transfers.
    • Add S3-compatible support for Synology C2 Storage.
    • Avoid potential restore issues that can occur with backups where skipped files are retried in some cases.
    • Improve handling of high load conditions for some S3-compatible providers (including NAS devices) that close connections unexpectedly.
  • Imaging Backup

    • New (cbfsconnect) encryption driver version that fixes BSOD and other system issues seen in rare cases. These issues can only affect new imaging jobs where encryption is enabled.
    • Fix so that more than one granular recovery can be performed from imaging backups, using the same Integrated Restore Console session.
    • Fix to avoid possible metadata file corruption during new imaging backups.
    • Fix issue causing some VSS writers to be in a failed state “Inconsistent shadow copy” after backup.
    • Fix VSS application recoveries using the backup catalog saved on backup destinations (used via “Discover backups”).
  • Other

    • Allow Test Restore to be configured to verify less than 10% of the data.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.6

Released October 26th, 2023

  • New System Protection.
    • Added dedicated iSCSI backup destination .
    • Fix the display of backup progress for hidden volumes.
    • Add support for BMR from systems with FAT32 partitions created by Linux tool mkfs.fat.
    • Improve failure response for ERROR_DISK_FULL to avoid hung backups in rare cases.
    • Updated CBFSConnect driver version.
  • Cloud Backup

    • S3-compatible backups no longer use the ListAllMyBuckets API call, improving the ability for users to configure privacy settings for their clients’ buckets.
    • Multiple improvements to improve performance and handling of very large backups (>20 million chunks).
    • Minor update to AWS SDK version to better handle rare Delete API responses.
    • Add progress reporting to the garbage collection step at the end of the backup.
    • Enable multiple backups per day for Cloud Backups.
    • Update region list for Amazon S3.
  • Recovery

    • Fix iSCSI disaster recoveries from iSCSI devices on Windows 11 and Server 2022 where the service dependencies have changed.
    • Improve handling of VM validation responses during VM recoveries.
    • Allow recoveries from New System Protection backups where the only the contents of the BackupAssistBackups folder are available, and not the BackupAssistBackups folder entry itself.
    • Fix RecoverAssist booting issue where boot disk was created on a system where ucrtbase.dll and related dlls are not present on the boot.wim (may only be on some older 2012R2 systems).
  • Exchange Granular Restore

    • Minor UI improvements.
    • Fixed a bug when the program was unable to see folders in an Exchange 2010 database.
    • Fixed a bug with reconstruction of folders tree in an Exchange database.
  • Other Fixes

    • Fix for crashing settings import scenarios.
    • Partial fix to prevent corruption of Backup User Identity settings.
    • Fix for BA728 issue for backups where the MSMQ VSS Writer is selected on Server 2019 and the file msmqreq.bkp is unexpectedly missing.
    • Fix rare race condition causing backup crashes on startup.
    • Fix a minor Test Restore issue with Cloud Backups for some sparse files.
    • Fix one rare service startup issue.
    • Avoid some invalid MBC registration check warnings.
    • Avoid BackupCare expiry warnings when connected to MBC.
  • Other

    • Clarify reporting of recovery options for Bare Metal Recovery capable backups.
    • Improved logging for MBC request failures.
    • Avoid CSG scanning “System Volume Information” to reduce clogging of logs.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.5

Released September 28th, 2023

  • Fixed occasional race condition causing the BackupAssist Service to sometimes crash on startup.
    • The issue is more prevalent in 12.0.4r1.

  • Fixed a backup issue affecting many jobs configured using Legacy System Protection (wbadmin) to NAS destinations.

    • The backup executor process crashes fairly early in the backup process, and is later reported as a failed backup with a BA5 backup error.
    • The error has been reported on most operating systems.
    • iSCSI jobs are not affected, and local disk and external hard disk backups are not affected.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.4r1

Released August 28th, 2023

Urgent fix release

  • Urgent: Avoid “black screen” and other Remote Desktop/Team Viewer connection issues after reboots on installations that have applied Windows update KB5028166 on Windows 11 and KB5028171 on Windows Server 2022.
    • The root cause is a change in the OS that causes some services to fail to start when driver operations are unexpectedly handled as failures (eg. in CryptoSafeGuard Shield, various Anti-Malware drivers, etc).

  • Fixed regression error BA2526 “Unable to back up file catalogue to backup destination” for legacy System Protection backups to iSCSI destinations, introduced in 12.0.4.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.4

Released August 2nd, 2023

Important: Due to a new driver in this release, users will be asked to reboot after the installation, if they upgrade to 12.0.4 or later from a previous v12 release. A new warning is now included on the Welcome screen of the installer, so users can make an informed decision about when to run the installer.

Advanced System Protection fixes and improvements

  • Fixed unexpected network connection issues during encrypted backups to NAS.
  • Fixed resumption from out of space issues when backups fail to complete and never deleted the oldest backup.
  • Added dynamic old backup deletion that monitors diskspace during the backup.
  • Improved handling of encrypted backups on slower machines, via increased API timeouts.
  • Improved resumption after backups are interrupted/killed during the reverse incremental phase.
  • Improved detection of complex disk setups.
  • Updated the encryption driver version to avoid unhandled and other exceptions during encrypted imaging backups on some machines.

Other backup fixes and improvements

  • Fixed VSS veto issues during backup, caused by conflicts with the CryptoSafeGuard protector driver.
  • For File Protection, improve the error shown if the source VSS snapshot disappears during the backup, due to loading issues or insufficient storage space availability (no longer suggests that the files are encrypted by NTFS).
  • Fixed a minor bug with Cloud Backup retry code when an InvalidOperationException is thrown by the Azure SDK.

Recovery and restore fixes and improvements

  • Fixed Test Restore integrity checking for sparse files in Cloud Backups when Windows Delivery Optimization is enabled.
  • Fixed Lifeline Recovery error “LBK_GetImageInfo failed” when selecting some encrypted backups for recovery.
  • Fixed VM Instant Boot discovery of downloaded Cloud Backups.
  • Fixed restore of alternate data streams (eg. ADS, NTFS streams) from File Archiving backups when the size is > 65536 bytes, instead of restoring a “.auz” metadata file.

Exchange Granular Restore

  • Added the ability to restore compressed MS SQL tables.
  • Fixed a bug when the program was unable to see folders in an Exchange 2010 database.
  • Fixed a bug with reconstruction of folders tree in an Exchange database.
  • Fixed a bug when the program crashed during an injection into original mailbox for objects with ID longer than 19 symbols.
  • Fixed a bug when some objects were not displayed in the database after restore for some users.

Other improvements

  • Updated the AWS and Wasabi regions list for Cloud Backups.
  • Fixed reporting of Bare Metal Recovery capabilities for BMR capable local and cloud backups.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.3r1

Released July 4th, 2023

Urgent maintenance release

  • Fix for unrecoverable files in File Archiving backups made using version 12.0.3.
    • Files <200MB in size cannot be recovered from backups > 4GB.
      • Files written in the first 4GB can be recovered.
      • Files larger than 200MB can be recovered.
    • Affects unencrypted and zip-encrypted backups.
    • Note: Zip-to-Tape add-on backups are NOT affected by this issue.

The fixed release will rectify File Archiving backups made after the upgrade. Older backups cannot be fixed, so we highly recommend starting new backups as soon as possible after the upgrade.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.3

Released April 12th, 2023

Important backup fixes

  • Fixed faulty BA720 “missing writer” error being reported in some rare installations, since v12.
    Note: If used, WID writer services should also be set to Automatic to avoid these issues.
  • Fixed BA5 errors occurring due to an InvalidOperationException.
  • For File Archiving to Tape, fixed issues in Zip64 content generation to avoid warnings shown in new versions of 7zip.
  • Fixed the monitoring and reporting of VSS component results for VSS writer backups, so that the statuses reporting match across the activity monitor and VSS Application Backup sections.
  • Updated the New Imaging encryption driver version to avoid unhandled and other exceptions during encrypted imaging backups.

Other backup fixes and improvements

  • New Imaging: Automatically fix the partition layout when required, in order to avoid issues during recovery.
  • File Protection: Fix BA4940 error when “Use full path” is disabled while using the Mirror scheme.
  • File Protection: Fix BA701 error occurring when an old backup should be removed/replaced, when diskspace runs out.

Lifeline Recovery

  • Fixed detection of some iSCSI devices, to enable recovery from those backups.
  • Improved reliability of driver installation when driver sources are large.
  • Improved reliability of installation for RAID drivers without a device description.
  • Allow installation of drivers that are not found (virtual or unidentified at the time).
  • Support installation of drivers that require a reboot after installation.

Test Restore, CryptoSafeGuard and Cyber Black Box

  • Avoid redundant warnings logged when testing some NAS backups.
  • Show a specific warning when attempting to test files when the “Quick Catalog” option is enabled for old imaging jobs.
  • Temporarily ignore failures for NTFS-encrypted files when testing Cloud Backups, as these are not currently backed up.
  • Improved the reliability of the CryptoSafeGuard Protector driver when Classic and ER are accidentally co-installed.

Other improvements

  • Fixed false-positive validation of incorrect URL / bucket combinations with BackBlaze / S3 destination.
  • Show the “Limit kept backups” option for old imaging jobs on Windows 11.
  • Fixed error “Object reference not set to an instance of an object” seen during some EGR recoveries from File Archiving backups, introduced in v12.
  • Fixed detection of Exchange Server 2019 for some scenarios.

General infrastructure

  • Update version of email sending library to fix handling of SSL/TLS in combination with external firewalls (and other fixes).
  • Improved handling of licensing issues that can cause disconnection from the Managed Backup Console in rare cases (MSP builds only).
  • The BackupAssist Service now uses the “Delayed Start” mode, in order to avoid race conditions on server (re)startup.
  • Improved diagnostics collection capability for support requests.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.2

Released January 23rd, 2023

  • Implemented new retry mechanism in Cloud Backup, for files that would otherwise be skipped (sometimes causing the backup to abort).
    • Reminder: If the number of skipped files reaches 100, the backup will be aborted. This number can be adjusted in the advanced “Cloud options”.
    • Fixed minor monitor issues when skipped files occur in Cloud backups.
  • Fixed ejection issue when ejectable media (eg. rdx) are backed up to as a network share from another machine
  • Fixed rare regression in 12.0.1 causing unhandled exceptions for some users using File Protection (BA103) and others using Test Restore (BA110).
  • Fixed BA6125 “network error” for encrypted System Protection backups to local disk, by handling unexpected ERROR_RETRY error codes properly.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.1

(Not Released Publicly)

  • Fixed regression in NAS test connection causing Major Warnings in some environments (all protection types).
  • Fixed performance regression in File Protection, also fixed directory deletion issues (BA735 and others) in Basic and similar schemes.
  • Align Cloud Backup code between Classic and ER bringing incremental fixes and improvements.
  • Add VM Instant Boot support for encrypted backups.
  • Improve Test Restore’s ability to find the latest available backup to test.
  • Add password check before showing the selection options for restore from encrypted New System Protection backups.

BackupAssist Classic v12.0.0

Released November 3rd, 2022

NEW Advanced System Protection

  • Encryption support across all destinations
  • Full control over backup history
  • Hyper-V host level backup.
  • Instant virtual boot into backups.
  • Bare metal recovery to smaller disks

NEW Test Restore

  • Works across most backup engines
  • Runs as a scheduled task
  • Tests both backup accessibility and backup integrity testing
  • Simple to consume test results report

NEW MBC Integration

  • You can now use the MBC online portal to monitor backup results