My experience, for what its worth at Dell.
I am a computer consultant. I have been working with Dell and customers of mine for over 15 years. I have personally sold 100's of Dell computers for them.
Recently, I ordered a new poweredge server and in the sales process I tried very hard to explain to the rep that I needed to use SBS 2008 native backup and needed a backup solution that would allow me to swap drives and/or cartridges using windows sbs 2008 native backup.
I was assured things were in order and they sold the system to my customer.
Upon setup I was jolted when I discovered that the RD1000 internal tape drive and the 2 cartridges we ordered, would not work with windows SBS 2008 native backup, as the drives are simply not recognized.
Thus began my futile journey through blogs and google searches and countless customer care and tech support calls. This all ended of course in the same thing that everybody else who has been hustled by Dell with this particular problem.
I could either buy expensive backup software (which was not even recommended during the sales process) or I could return the drive.
I have spent over 2 weeks trying to return the drive and cartridges and have them replaced with a comparable external USB drive solution.
This began my sad and frustrating journey through Dell's "customer care" system. Each rep I spoke with was equally clueless and equally unable to help me in any way but very willing to transfer me to the next helpless person in the chain, while calls were dropped or their system was down for maintenance and I was asked to call back only to get put into voice recognition cues and the like.
Well,
At the end of the day, Dell might be loosing one of their best sales men.
If there is anybody from Dell reading this that thinks they can help, PLEASE respond to this post with a way to contact you.
I don't mean to take away from your problem (been there, done that) or deny the horrible experience within Dell's phone system maze that is Customer Care, but at a million PC's sold every 10 days, I doubt the hundreds of Dell PC's you sell or the thousands of PC's I sell in a year puts us anywhere close to being "one of their best sales [people]".
Hopefully there is someone from Dell here that can help you.
I'm Not even sure why you felt compelled to comment on my post, since you really had nothing to offer. But, since you have, allow me then a brief retort.
I assure you that when I said I was "one of their best sales men", I wasn't using "sales volume" as my criteria for what qualifies somebody in that category. The qualifying attributes I had in mind were more along the lines of loyalty, advocacy and passion.
Not ALL things are measured in dollars, love.
But, thanks for your input. I smiled when I was reminded of an old saying....
"Tis better to be silent and thought an idiot, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt."
As I recall, the RD1000 is shipped with a copy of Symantec BackupExec Quickstart on the Utility DVD. Quickstart will let you perform individual file/directory backups and restores to removable HDDs, whereas the Windows Server Backup will only let you do complete system backups and restores. If you really want to use the Windows Server backup in SBS, don't go through the SBS console to perform your backups (the RD1000 is not recognized), got to the Server Manager and under Storage, you will see Windows Server Backup there and it will see the RD1000 as a possible target for backups.
It only see's the drive in the 2008 console if you select a "one time" backup. This needs to be a scheduled nightly backup and the use of the SBS Console To setup the backup is a primary need. The server must be 100% SBS 2008 compliant. IE: no going outside the wizards, etc. Also, the incremental backup that SBS provides is key. But thank you very much for your suggestion.
Have you tried the Hotfix from microsoft for windows backup?
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/955561
One workaround for the changes made to Windows Server Backup on the 2008 version is to share the RD1000.
Be sure to set the appropriate share and security permissions.
With this done, you can then choose "Remote shared folder" as your destination type in the backup.
By doing this you will be able to restore single files to your system.
Sharing a folder locally on the RD1000 and backing up to the UNC path works. Here is a blog that describes this procedure:
http://blogs.bitwizards.com/Bryan_Soltis/post/2008/09/23/Windows-Server-2008-Backup-to-a-network-share.aspx
Using Yosemite software seems to be the Tech Recommended solution.
Then there is
Posted by viennacab replied on Mon, Feb 8 2010 5:29 PM
I think the answer with the RD-1000 is follows: 1. It is true that a standalone SBS 2008 installation does have problems with recognizing the RD1000 as a backup device ! Has any of you nerds though thought that this limitation with the RD1000 does not exist with a Hyper-V installation? Install Hyper-V with SBS 2008 first, make sure you also have Integration services installed (as well on client partitions with the guest operating systems) and also make sure you have a working virual machine with SBS 2008 installed (first server)! WIth working I mean with the external virtual adapter working and a running internet connection. Next ...2. Create a Virtual Hard Disk from within Hyper-V Manager. Right click on the SBS 2008 Virtual Machine Guest Operating System Link in Hyper-V, Select "Settings", select (most likely) IDE Controller, on the right side select harddisk and click on Add ! Under Media and Virtual hard disk (.vhd) click on New and then Next. Select Fixed Size. Next under location select the drive letter under which the RD-1000 is viewable. Click Next. Set the size you want the Virtual Harddrive (actually the pass-through disk as it is called in Hyper-V and give it a name. 3. Select the VHD Backup Disk you created by again selecting the Virtual Machine, Settings, IDE Controller but this time clicking on browse on the drive letter where the RD-1000 is stored and select the VHD file (drive !!!!). 4. Next start the Virtual SBS 2008 machine and go to server manage, storage and disk management. You should now see in the client partition Disk Managment the new storage. 5. Next go to Backup and Server Storage in the Windows SBS Console. Click on "Show all valid internal and external destinations" on the Virtual HD device. It will format the RD1000 HD automatically and perform the backup. This is a very flexible solution, because VHDs can be copied almost anywhere !
Report Unresolved Customer Service Issues here: Dell - Unresolved Customer Service IssuesI do not work for Dell. I too am a user. The forum is primarily user to user, with Dell employees moderating.
Locate and install driver R240362