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Tuesday, December 10, 2024

How to Re-register VSS Volume Shadow Copy Service in Windows server 2008 R2

Lets says Backup runs on your Exchange Server. Where it failed due to Disk space or some connectivity issues

 

VSS – Volume Shadow Copy Service – is responsible for your Backups on your Exchange Server

To Check for your Available writers you can run the below command in your command prompt

Vssadmin list writers

And some writers may be unstable or in waiting for completion state.

Especially “Microsoft Exchange Writer”

if that is unstable or waiting for completion for a long time , Eventually your Next backup will fail

You can try restarting Microsoft Exchange Information store Service to refresh it

or you can reboot the server

to get the writers back to stable.

image

If nothing could get your writers to stable state.

As a Last resort you can try Re registering the Vss dlls

 

Re-registering Vss Dlls


cd /d %windir%\system32
net stop vss
net stop swprv
regsvr32 /s ole32.dll
regsvr32 /s oleaut32.dll
regsvr32 /s vss_ps.dll
vssvc /register
regsvr32 /s /i swprv.dll
regsvr32 /s /i eventcls.dll
regsvr32 /s es.dll
regsvr32 /s stdprov.dll
regsvr32 /s vssui.dll
regsvr32 /s msxml.dll
regsvr32 /s msxml3.dll
regsvr32 /s msxml4.dll
vssvc /register
net start swprv
net start vss

It does help in getting the Vss service to function properly

Satheshwaran Manoharan
Satheshwaran Manoharanhttps://www.azure365pro.com
Award-winning Technology Leader with a wealth of experience running large teams and diversified industry exposure in cloud computing. From shipping lines to rolling stocks.In-depth expertise in driving cloud adoption strategies and modernizing systems to cloud native. Specialized in Microsoft Cloud, DevOps, and Microsoft 365 Stack and conducted numerous successful projects worldwide. Also, Acting as a Technical Advisor for various start-ups.

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31 COMMENTS

  1. Hello Satheshwaran, great article. I have a question for you though regarding back ups of Exchange 2007 database level and document level (on Windows Server 2003 servers.) In order for our software to achieve the backup window of 12 hours we run as many as 16 simultaneous backup streams on our Exchange server. Given this load, is that too much for the VSS writers to handle?
    We are getting VSS writer issues and failed backups because the VSS writer cannot create a snapshot and the event log shows the following error: Volume Shadow Copy Service error: Unexpected error querying for the IVssWriterCallback interface. hr = 0x800706bf.
    Running the Windows server backup seems to work fine as does running our Arcserve backups with no multiplexing but that leaves us in a position where the backup window balloons to exceed more than what we can accept (24 or more hours.)

    Any suggestions or comments would be appreciated.

    Thank you for your time.

    Carson

    • we might need to think in much more broader perspective.

      If something is not failing with Windows server backup . it means . Your writers are fine.

      Backup window of 12 hours. that’s fine.. but it should not conflict with the database maintenance interval.

      Then you might have some issues with the backup.

      Make sure it fails on a Specific database . Narrow it down.

  2. I have done what your article stated and I am still getting some failed state on some of the units.

    C:\Windows\System32>vssadmin list writers
    vssadmin 1.1 – Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool
    (C) Copyright 2001-2005 Microsoft Corp.

    Writer name: ‘Task Scheduler Writer’
    Writer Id: {d61d61c8-d73a-4eee-8cdd-f6f9786b7124}
    Writer Instance Id: {1bddd48e-5052-49db-9b07-b96f96727e6b}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘VSS Metadata Store Writer’
    Writer Id: {75dfb225-e2e4-4d39-9ac9-ffaff65ddf06}
    Writer Instance Id: {088e7a7d-09a8-4cc6-a609-ad90e75ddc93}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘Performance Counters Writer’
    Writer Id: {0bada1de-01a9-4625-8278-69e735f39dd2}
    Writer Instance Id: {f0086dda-9efc-47c5-8eb6-a944c3d09381}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘System Writer’
    Writer Id: {e8132975-6f93-4464-a53e-1050253ae220}
    Writer Instance Id: {6d6d17c8-1c03-4016-a009-78f45a5bc46d}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘SqlServerWriter’
    Writer Id: {a65faa63-5ea8-4ebc-9dbd-a0c4db26912a}
    Writer Instance Id: {b9d926b7-33c6-44c1-b99f-f583f70ed4a6}
    State: [7] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Writer name: ‘ASR Writer’
    Writer Id: {be000cbe-11fe-4426-9c58-531aa6355fc4}
    Writer Instance Id: {6e662f95-9586-4dcc-8286-2897e7f29f00}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘Shadow Copy Optimization Writer’
    Writer Id: {4dc3bdd4-ab48-4d07-adb0-3bee2926fd7f}
    Writer Instance Id: {3364ba73-335c-4819-975d-cc86a1f1df0f}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘WMI Writer’
    Writer Id: {a6ad56c2-b509-4e6c-bb19-49d8f43532f0}
    Writer Instance Id: {3496c4ad-4d83-45bd-8e80-70a3b498bd5f}
    State: [7] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Writer name: ‘FRS Writer’
    Writer Id: {d76f5a28-3092-4589-ba48-2958fb88ce29}
    Writer Instance Id: {fb84a043-74c9-4146-9e24-6939ace7cd41}
    State: [7] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Writer name: ‘NTDS’
    Writer Id: {b2014c9e-8711-4c5c-a5a9-3cf384484757}
    Writer Instance Id: {362b5e37-e2b5-4963-87c4-833a7e69ef93}
    State: [7] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Writer name: ‘Microsoft Exchange Writer’
    Writer Id: {76fe1ac4-15f7-4bcd-987e-8e1acb462fb7}
    Writer Instance Id: {6688fedf-fdd0-4b45-8242-b961a78db6d9}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘Registry Writer’
    Writer Id: {afbab4a2-367d-4d15-a586-71dbb18f8485}
    Writer Instance Id: {bb952c45-a4a8-4aa1-b0db-c6d759548b65}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘IIS Config Writer’
    Writer Id: {2a40fd15-dfca-4aa8-a654-1f8c654603f6}
    Writer Instance Id: {27578d4d-a39d-4fdd-91c3-4c4ebcb1d268}
    State: [7] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Writer name: ‘COM+ REGDB Writer’
    Writer Id: {542da469-d3e1-473c-9f4f-7847f01fc64f}
    Writer Instance Id: {5d20abeb-037d-4918-ad27-10bbe1eff003}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘IIS Metabase Writer’
    Writer Id: {59b1f0cf-90ef-465f-9609-6ca8b2938366}
    Writer Instance Id: {644bf3a3-68a5-477d-802f-3fe0973dd0f2}
    State: [7] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Can you help please?

    • Check any agent is making them to fail ? Try removing the agent and verify the agent is causing the issue or not.

  3. Hi

    I am trying to take backup of exchannge 2010 databases through Netbackup 7.6.1 but i got an issue with the exchange writer. could please help regarding this issue.

    Writer name: ‘Microsoft Exchange Writer’
    Writer Id: {76fe1ac4-15f7-4bcd-987e-8e1acb462fb7}
    Writer Instance Id: {838c53b8-8b97-42cf-b4b0-a2bf620a76a3}
    State: [5] Waiting for completion
    Last error: Retryable error

  4. Hi Satheshwaran,,

    After running the commands still the System Writer in Failed state. Can you help me to fix this and due to this backups are getting failed for this server.

    C:\WINDOWS\system32>vssadmin list writers
    vssadmin 1.1 – Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool
    (C) Copyright 2001 Microsoft Corp.

    Writer name: ‘System Writer’
    Writer Id: {e8132975-6f93-4464-a53e-1050253ae220}
    Writer Instance Id: {30344199-e7af-4440-a6a6-15170612161a}
    State: [9] Failed
    Last error: Retryable error

    Writer name: ‘SqlServerWriter’
    Writer Id: {a65faa63-5ea8-4ebc-9dbd-a0c4db26912a}
    Writer Instance Id: {af083aee-7db1-4726-811e-abd98cf23843}
    State: [9] Failed
    Last error: Retryable error

    Writer name: ‘MSDEWriter’
    Writer Id: {f8544ac1-0611-4fa5-b04b-f7ee00b03277}
    Writer Instance Id: {a25c2b1b-4666-413c-b876-00f78cc480b5}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘Registry Writer’
    Writer Id: {afbab4a2-367d-4d15-a586-71dbb18f8485}
    Writer Instance Id: {e2104e4d-111e-49aa-868c-8147582a8af5}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘SPSearch VSS Writer’
    Writer Id: {57af97e4-4a76-4ace-a756-d11e8f0294c7}
    Writer Instance Id: {e6f9953c-796f-447c-b3de-b2c450029c10}
    State: [9] Failed
    Last error: Retryable error

    Writer name: ‘Event Log Writer’
    Writer Id: {eee8c692-67ed-4250-8d86-390603070d00}
    Writer Instance Id: {032042af-0766-4d6b-8a9d-b0e819a761d8}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘COM+ REGDB Writer’
    Writer Id: {542da469-d3e1-473c-9f4f-7847f01fc64f}
    Writer Instance Id: {8c160c7c-60dd-4208-88f0-fc1c3e15bb30}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘FRS Writer’
    Writer Id: {d76f5a28-3092-4589-ba48-2958fb88ce29}
    Writer Instance Id: {2cf7b512-3993-42a4-98c2-a83c6e6f846f}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘IIS Metabase Writer’
    Writer Id: {59b1f0cf-90ef-465f-9609-6ca8b2938366}
    Writer Instance Id: {833c9e93-a35d-4188-8e25-1736c595179e}
    State: [9] Failed
    Last error: Retryable error

    Writer name: ‘BITS Writer’
    Writer Id: {4969d978-be47-48b0-b100-f328f07ac1e0}
    Writer Instance Id: {dff647c8-b213-45f9-a4de-52d1b408e69f}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘WMI Writer’
    Writer Id: {a6ad56c2-b509-4e6c-bb19-49d8f43532f0}
    Writer Instance Id: {99aca2d2-9156-489d-b972-c5f98c8fd540}
    State: [9] Failed
    Last error: Retryable error

  5. Hi Saha,

    Restart the cryptographic service from services.msc and then again run vssadmin list writers
    Hope fully system writer will be stable

  6. Hi Satheshwaran ,

    Last few days ago Backup team reported a issue that there are few servers which backups are failing and we checked and found this is because of SQL VSS Writer is not stable.

    Anyway, I read many articles and found that restart is only a solution. Correct me if i am wrong ?

    Do you know what are the cause behind it and how to troubleshoot or fix this issue.

    Note : Using Symantec Netbackup and Windows server 2012 R2 servers

    • There are variety of backup solutions available in the market. When those solutions interact with the Vss. there are various reasons where VSS goes unstable. Only solution is using a reputed backup software. keeping the firmware of the solutions update to date. and the windows machines fully patched, to reduce the issues. but cannot overcome them completely.

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  10. Hi Satheshwaran,

    I am facing a issue because of Cluster Shared Volume VSS Writer. I have a backup scheduled in Azure for a couple of VM’s. Whenever the backup starts running, the Cluster Shared Volume VSS Writer fails and then the backup gets completed with a warning “The following set of VSS writers failed during snapshot – Cluster Shared Volume VSS Writer,”

    And i see that the writer is stopped inside the VM.

    Writer name: ‘Cluster Shared Volume VSS Writer’
    Writer Id: {1072ae1c-e5a7-4ea1-9e4a-6f7964656570}
    Writer Instance Id: {3b1d63d4-b70b-4742-af95-0c5564e98242}
    State: [8] Failed
    Last error: Timed out

    Even if i start the writer through command prompt, the backup operation stops it. I had tried re-starting the VM, still it didn’t get solved.

    The issue occurs in a SQL server installed VM. Can you help me with any suggestion?

    • Did you ever resolve this? Having the same issue for a AG with nodes that are in 2 separate subnets. No load balancers. 2 subnets, one node per subnet. 1 cluster.

      1045 – No matching network interface found for resource ‘Cluster IP Address LISTENER_IP_SUBNET_1’ IP address ‘LISTENER_IP_SUBNET_1’ (return code was ‘5035’). If your cluster nodes span different subnets, this may be normal.
      1045 – No matching network interface found for resource ‘Cluster IP Address LISTENER_IP_SUBNET_1_x.x.x.0’ IP address ‘0.0.0.0’ (return code was ‘5035’). If your cluster nodes span different subnets, this may be normal.
      1011 – Cluster node NODE_NAME_SUBNET_1 has been evicted from the failover cluster.
      1011 – Cluster node NODE_NAME_SUBNET_2 has been evicted from the failover cluster.
      1045 – No matching network interface found for resource ‘Cluster IP Address LISTENER_IP_SUBNET_1_x.x.x.0’ IP address ‘NODE_IP_SUBNET_1’ (return code was ‘5035’). If your cluster nodes span different subnets, this may be normal.

  11. What do you do, if your VSS Writers all says “stable” but your team still insist on re-registering them.

    Please advise. Thank you

  12. Writer name: ‘SqlServerWriter’
    Writer Id: {a65faa63-5ea8-4ebc-9dbd-a0c4db26912a}
    Writer Instance Id: {5055405f-07ac-4079-a377-79de80294329}
    State: [8] Failed
    Last error: Inconsistent shadow copy

    Writer name: ‘System Writer’
    Writer Id: {e8132975-6f93-4464-a53e-1050253ae220}
    Writer Instance Id: {e0b4d327-459f-4298-adaa-d86843444167}
    State: [5] Waiting for completion
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘Registry Writer’
    Writer Id: {afbab4a2-367d-4d15-a586-71dbb18f8485}
    Writer Instance Id: {4fc7e9cb-5a55-4ef7-bead-5b00d721f425}
    State: [1] Stable
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘IIS Config Writer’
    Writer Id: {2a40fd15-dfca-4aa8-a654-1f8c654603f6}
    Writer Instance Id: {8c9126e1-97e0-4773-9f1c-7ced59e434b3}
    State: [5] Waiting for completion
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘WMI Writer’
    Writer Id: {a6ad56c2-b509-4e6c-bb19-49d8f43532f0}
    Writer Instance Id: {91261dcc-7832-40ae-815e-5ae7b2a9d1b8}
    State: [5] Waiting for completion
    Last error: No error

    Writer name: ‘IIS Metabase Writer’
    Writer Id: {59b1f0cf-90ef-465f-9609-6ca8b2938366}
    Writer Instance Id: {22e8437b-d5a2-41a2-90cf-ba24284e71fd}
    State: [5] Waiting for completion
    Last error: No error

    The issue occurs in a Windows 2008 R2 Backup. Can you help me with any suggestion?

      • Hello,

        On my organization servers, VSS services are missing in the services.msc and due to that backup is getting failed. Please help me to install VSS service back on the servers.

  13. Hi Sateshwaran, I’m have below SQLserverwriter error while the SQL server gets backed up to Azure SIte Recovery.

    Writer name: ‘SqlServerWriter’
    Writer Id: {a65faa63-5ea8-4ebc-9dbd-a0c4db26912a}
    Writer Instance Id: {424758c0-97c0-4aa9-ba2f-6ca49d7dd4de}
    State: [11] Failed
    Last error: Non-retryable error

    I carried out below task to de-register and register VSS with below complete command to run on cmd

    net stop vss
    regsvr32 ole32.dll /s
    regsvr32 vss_ps.dll /s
    Vssvc /Register
    regsvr32 /i swprv.dll /s
    regsvr32 /i eventcls.dll /s
    regsvr32 es.dll /s
    regsvr32 stdprov.dll /s
    regsvr32 vssui.dll /s
    regsvr32 msxml.dll /s
    regsvr32 msxml3.dll /s
    regsvr32 msxml4.dll /s
    net start vss

    From Programs and Features, I uninstalled and reinstabled Microsoft VSS Writer for SQL Server.

    Nothing helped.

    Could you please have any solution to resolve the SqlServerWriter issue?

    Thank you.

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