xp_sqlbackup.dll access violation on backup

amillis

We just purchased sqlbackup 4.1 yesterday and it was working well.

After about 12 hours of backups, I am getting this on the server doing the backups on every backup, data or log:

ODBC: Msg 0, Level 10, State 1
Execute interrupted by exception: Access violation at address 09B77F65 in module 'xp_sqlbackup.dll'.  Read of address FFFFFFFC

Connecting via the SQL Backup GUI give sthe same message.

We are backing up 10 databases, ranging in size from 50meg to 80gb. At the time, only 5 had scheduled log dumps. I had manually dumped full dumps about 6 hours before the dll started failing. The log dumps are happening every 5 minutes, each happening in a separate job (so at the time this started failing, there were 5 sqlbackup commands doing a Log dump simultaneously). They all appear to have stopped working at the same time (4:20am was the last successful dump for all 5 that were enabled). The DB's would have had little changing in them around this time, dumps would have been around 3-10kb with the lowest level compression.

I have attempted restarting the SQL Backup Agent service with no change.

Running a

dbcc xp_sqlbackup(FREE)

completes quickly without errors.

The syntax in the backup log job:

DECLARE @exitcode int
DECLARE @sqlerrorcode int
exec master..sqlbackup N'-sql "BACKUP LOG [DATABASENAME]
 TO DISK = ''S:\redgate_logship\DATABASENAME\LOG__DATABASENAME_<DATETIME yyyymmdd_hhnnss>.sqb''
 WITH NAME = ''<AUTO>'', DESCRIPTION = ''<AUTO>'',
 COPYTO = "\\10.0.0.206\redgate_logship\DATABASENAME",
 COMPRESSION = 1, THREADS = 1"', @exitcode OUTPUT, @sqlerrorcode OUTPUT

(10.0.0.206 is a crossover link on a gig connection to the secondary)
I saw a few posts about copyto possibly being broken, removing it doesn't allow the command to run (though I will remove it after this is working again and use a file system copy).
Edit: I dont know if the copyto statement is really the issue here since we aren't getting the local backup, the access violation error occurs immediately on running the sqlbackup command.

I am unable to restart this SQL server outside of weekly maintenance windows so I have not been able to see if this fixes it (rebooting the server would be similar). Since this was my initial deployment, my secondary is not viable to be brought online either.

System info:
Windows 2003 Server SP1
Quad P4 Xeon 3.2GHz
4gb Ram
SQL 2000 SP4 (8.00.2039)
RedGate SQL Backup 4.1.0.207 - Standard (downloaded yesterday)



Should I not be doing simultaneous backups?
Should I avoid using copyto for now (only the copyto is going across a crossover cable network)?
Should I avoid doing simultaneous restores on my secondary (not part of this problem, the secondary is fine that I can see)?

Neil Davidson

@version will tell you this).

amillis

5 lines up.
SQL 2000 SP4 (8.00.2039)

petey

After you ran DBCC xp_sqlbackup(FREE), were you able to start a backup?

amillis

No, I have found no way to start a backup since this error happened.

petey

Could you pls try the following test:

Make a copy of xp_sqlbackup.dll in the SQL Server Binn folder, say xp_sqlbackup_ex.dll

Redirect the sqlbackup xproc to this copy i.e.

sp_dropextendedproc sqlbackup
sp_addextendedproc sqlbackup, 'xp_sqlbackup_ex.dll'

Try making a backup. Note that this is not a solution if it works, but only to assist us in eliminating some possible causes of the error.

Also, is SQL Server running in fiber mode?

Thanks.

amillis

Renaming the dll and redirecting the stored procedure does create a successful backup when I run the backup code above.

And 'no' to fiber mode.

petey

Can I send you a debug version of the xproc to help trace the error when it next occurs? You would need to redirect the xproc to this other DLL though.

amillis

Sure thing. Send it to amillis@outserv.net (or contact me via IM for a download location)

petey

Couldn't get the mail out to you. Have sent you the download location via private message.

amillis

I've made the change to the debug version. Will update when the error pops up again.