I run a laptop, using Ubuntu, with a portable HDD permanently connected
to a USB port, for backups as required. Usually, when the laptop
hibernates, or whatever it's called, a couple of 'Enter' taps brings it
back to life, I enter my password, and away we go. Yesterday, it would
not wake up, just showing me a screen with the sign-on page, and some
chevrons moving up from the bottom of the screen. Nothing I could do
would get it out of this, so eventually I had to do a hard shut-down
and reboot. When it was back in action, the main back-up folder on the
portable HDD was missing. Lots of other stuff was there, but not the
major folder with all the up-to-date files.
I can recreate it from other sources, so it's not the end of the world,
but is there a way I could try to find the missing folder on the HDD?
It is not in the Rubbish bin, and seems to have disappeared without
trace. Has it gone to the great bit-bucket in the sky?
--
Davey.

Questions:

- were there any power surges or dropouts recently?

- how old is the laptop and what sort of condition is it *and its battery*
in?
- How old is that backup drive? You'd probably need to need to have smartd
installed to know that.

- do you run fsck after a backup? If not, then run it now.
What does it say about the health of that disk?

- what does fsck say about the health of the laptop's internal drive?

- what do fsck and smartd say about the age and health of the disk you
were backing up?

FWIW I do something similar except that:
- I have a WD Essentials USB drive permanently attached to my house
server. A cron job runs an overnight backup to it every night using
rsync and followed by a fsck check of the backup disk. This backup is
merely protection against finger trouble because mains spikes, house
fires, etc could destroy it.

- my main backups are run weekly to a cycle of two WD Essentials USB
drives which are kept offline in a fire safe when not being used to
take a backup. Each backup run uses rsync to make the backup and then
immediately runs fask to check that the backup is valid.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 08:48:26 +0100, Davey wrote:

> I run a laptop, using Ubuntu, with a portable HDD permanently connected
> to a USB port, for backups as required. Usually, when the laptop
> hibernates, or whatever it's called, a couple of 'Enter' taps brings it
> back to life, I enter my password, and away we go. Yesterday, it would
> not wake up, just showing me a screen with the sign-on page, and some
> chevrons moving up from the bottom of the screen. Nothing I could do
> would get it out of this, so eventually I had to do a hard shut-down and
> reboot. When it was back in action, the main back-up folder on the
> portable HDD was missing. Lots of other stuff was there, but not the
> major folder with all the up-to-date files.
> I can recreate it from other sources, so it's not the end of the world,
> but is there a way I could try to find the missing folder on the HDD? It
> is not in the Rubbish bin, and seems to have disappeared without trace.
> Has it gone to the great bit-bucket in the sky?

--
--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 08:59:31 -0000 (UTC)
Martin Gregorie <martin@mydomain.invalid> wrote:

> Questions:
>
> - were there any power surges or dropouts recently?
Not that I know of, but I can't say 100% that were were none. Surely
the laptop PSU would ride that out, though?
>
> - how old is the laptop and what sort of condition is it *and its
> battery* in?
>
The laptop is about a year old, and as far as I know, the battery is
in good condition. I'll run without the mains connected for a while to
confirm.

> - How old is that backup drive? You'd probably need to need to have
> smartd installed to know that.
>
That is now several years, maybe three or four. I have never used
smartd, so I need to research that to use it.

> - do you run fsck after a backup? If not, then run it now.
> What does it say about the health of that disk?

No, I don't.
>
> - what does fsck say about the health of the laptop's internal drive?
>
$ sudo fsck /media/Expansion_Drive
fsck from util-linux 2.31.1
e2fsck 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
/dev/sdb2 contains a filesystem with errors, check forced.
Pass 1: Checking inodes, blocks, and sizes
Pass 2: Checking directory structure
Pass 3: Checking directory connectivity
/lost+found not found. Create<y>? yes

Pass 4: Checking reference counts
Pass 5: Checking group summary information

/dev/sdb2: ***** FILESYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
/dev/sdb2: 66294/14958592 files (1.9% non-contiguous), 27144482/59813632 block

> - what do fsck and smartd say about the age and health of the disk you
> were backing up?
>
Don't know yet, need to unmount HDD to run fsck.

> FWIW I do something similar except that:
> - I have a WD Essentials USB drive permanently attached to my house
> server. A cron job runs an overnight backup to it every night using
> rsync and followed by a fsck check of the backup disk. This backup
> is merely protection against finger trouble because mains spikes,
> house fires, etc could destroy it.
>
That is similar to my regime. I run an rsync job each evening on
shutdown, to both my Zoneminder PC and the portable HDD. Never done
fsck, though.

> - my main backups are run weekly to a cycle of two WD Essentials USB
> drives which are kept offline in a fire safe when not being used to
> take a backup. Each backup run uses rsync to make the backup and
> then immediately runs fask to check that the backup is valid.
>
snip.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 10:47:00 +0100
Davey <davey@example.invalid> wrote:

> On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 08:59:31 -0000 (UTC)
> Martin Gregorie <martin@mydomain.invalid> wrote:
>
> > Questions:
> >
> > - were there any power surges or dropouts recently?
> Not that I know of, but I can't say 100% that were were none. Surely
> the laptop PSU would ride that out, though?
> >
> > - how old is the laptop and what sort of condition is it *and its
> > battery* in?
> >
> The laptop is about a year old, and as far as I know, the battery is
> in good condition. I'll run without the mains connected for a while to
> confirm.
>
> > - How old is that backup drive? You'd probably need to need to have
> > smartd installed to know that.
> >
> That is now several years, maybe three or four. I have never used
> smartd, so I need to research that to use it.
>
> > - do you run fsck after a backup? If not, then run it now.
> > What does it say about the health of that disk?
>
> No, I don't.
> >
> > - what does fsck say about the health of the laptop's internal
> > drive?
> $ sudo fsck /media/Expansion_Drive
> fsck from util-linux 2.31.1
> e2fsck 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
> /dev/sdb2 contains a filesystem with errors, check forced.
> Pass 1: Checking inodes, blocks, and sizes
> Pass 2: Checking directory structure
> Pass 3: Checking directory connectivity
> /lost+found not found. Create<y>? yes
>
> Pass 4: Checking reference counts
> Pass 5: Checking group summary information
>
> /dev/sdb2: ***** FILESYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
> /dev/sdb2: 66294/14958592 files (1.9% non-contiguous),
> 27144482/59813632 block
>
> > - what do fsck and smartd say about the age and health of the disk
> > you were backing up?
> >
> Don't know yet, need to unmount HDD to run fsck.
>
> > FWIW I do something similar except that:
> > - I have a WD Essentials USB drive permanently attached to my house
> > server. A cron job runs an overnight backup to it every night
> > using rsync and followed by a fsck check of the backup disk. This
> > backup is merely protection against finger trouble because mains
> > spikes, house fires, etc could destroy it.
> > fsck
> That is similar to my regime. I run an rsync job each evening on
> shutdown, to both my Zoneminder PC and the portable HDD. Never done
> fsck, though.
>
> > - my main backups are run weekly to a cycle of two WD Essentials USB
> > drives which are kept offline in a fire safe when not being used
> > to take a backup. Each backup run uses rsync to make the backup and
> > then immediately runs fask to check that the backup is valid.
> >
> snip.
>
>
Update:
smartd (short) test on the laptop drive passes. Only odd thing is there
are several Unknown Attributes, as in:
160 Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age Always - 0
161 Unknown_Attribute 0x0033 100 100 050 Pre-fail Always - 100
163 Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age Always - 17
164 Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age Always - 470
etc etc....

Trying to configure smartd to recognise the portable HDD, it is a
Passport, on /media/Expansion_Drive. I cannot get smartd to recognise
it, though. See above for fsck report.

--
Davey.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:19:23 +0100
Davey <davey@example.invalid> wrote:

> On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 10:47:00 +0100
> Davey <davey@example.invalid> wrote:
>
> > On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 08:59:31 -0000 (UTC)
> > Martin Gregorie <martin@mydomain.invalid> wrote:
> >
> > > Questions:
> > >
> > > - were there any power surges or dropouts recently?
> > Not that I know of, but I can't say 100% that were were none. Surely
> > the laptop PSU would ride that out, though?
> > >
> > > - how old is the laptop and what sort of condition is it *and its
> > > battery* in?
> > >
> > The laptop is about a year old, and as far as I know, the battery is
> > in good condition. I'll run without the mains connected for a while
> > to confirm.
> >
> > > - How old is that backup drive? You'd probably need to need to
> > > have smartd installed to know that.
> > >
> > That is now several years, maybe three or four. I have never used
> > smartd, so I need to research that to use it.
> >
> > > - do you run fsck after a backup? If not, then run it now.
> > > What does it say about the health of that disk?
> >
> > No, I don't.
> > >
> > > - what does fsck say about the health of the laptop's internal
> > > drive?
> > $ sudo fsck /media/Expansion_Drive
> > fsck from util-linux 2.31.1
> > e2fsck 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
> > /dev/sdb2 contains a filesystem with errors, check forced.
> > Pass 1: Checking inodes, blocks, and sizes
> > Pass 2: Checking directory structure
> > Pass 3: Checking directory connectivity
> > /lost+found not found. Create<y>? yes
> >
> > Pass 4: Checking reference counts
> > Pass 5: Checking group summary information
> >
> > /dev/sdb2: ***** FILESYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
> > /dev/sdb2: 66294/14958592 files (1.9% non-contiguous),
> > 27144482/59813632 block
> >
> > > - what do fsck and smartd say about the age and health of the disk
> > > you were backing up?
> > >
> > Don't know yet, need to unmount HDD to run fsck.
> >
> > > FWIW I do something similar except that:
> > > - I have a WD Essentials USB drive permanently attached to my
> > > house server. A cron job runs an overnight backup to it every
> > > night using rsync and followed by a fsck check of the backup
> > > disk. This backup is merely protection against finger trouble
> > > because mains spikes, house fires, etc could destroy it.
> > > fsck
> > That is similar to my regime. I run an rsync job each evening on
> > shutdown, to both my Zoneminder PC and the portable HDD. Never done
> > fsck, though.
> >
> > > - my main backups are run weekly to a cycle of two WD Essentials
> > > USB drives which are kept offline in a fire safe when not being
> > > used to take a backup. Each backup run uses rsync to make the
> > > backup and then immediately runs fask to check that the backup is
> > > valid.
> > snip.
> >
> >
> Update:
> smartd (short) test on the laptop drive passes. Only odd thing is
> there are several Unknown Attributes, as in:
> 160 Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age
> Always - 0 161 Unknown_Attribute 0x0033 100
> 100 050 Pre-fail Always - 100 163
> Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age
> Always - 17 164 Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100
> 100 050 Old_age Always - 470 etc etc....
>
> Trying to configure smartd to recognise the portable HDD, it is a
> Passport, on /media/Expansion_Drive. I cannot get smartd to recognise
> it, though. See above for fsck report.
>

Got it. Briefly, it looks healthy. Summary is:

"SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num Test_Description Status Remaining LifeTime(hours) LBA_of_first_error
# 1 Short offline Completed without error 00% 42793 -
# 2 Short offline Completed without error 00% 0
-

SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 1
SPAN MIN_LBA MAX_LBA CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
1 0 0 Not_testing
2 0 0 Not_testing
3 0 0 Not_testing
4 0 0 Not_testing
5 0 0 Not_testing
Selective self-test flags (0x0):
After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.
If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute
delay."

To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good. I can only
assume that the failed Hibernation interrupted the normal data exchange
process, and f****d up the file system. I'll run a long test tonight.
--
Davey.

Davey wrote:

> To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good

Did anything end-up in the lost+found directory?

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:34:08 +0100, Davey wrote:

> On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:19:23 +0100 Davey <davey@example.invalid> wrote:
>
> To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good. I can only
> assume that the failed Hibernation interrupted the normal data exchange
> process, and f****d up the file system. I'll run a long test tonight.
>
Agreed, though the reported age of 47K hours is possibly a warning sign:
I've run a few disks into the ground and all have started to report errors
at around the 50,000 hours mark.

In both cases I bought new disks at when the errors started to appear, got
hold of a CloneZilla CD image, burnt it, and used it to duplicate the
failing disk.

I've not had any backup disks fail (yet) but they're easier to replace:
simply format them to suit your OS, and bin the old disk as soon as you've
made a backup on the new one.

Apart from that all I'd suggest is:

- installing smartd on all your machines, configured to report disk
status on a weekly basis.

I run logwatch on all my systems, configured to send their daily reports
to the computer I usually read mail on, so this means I'll see trouble
reports within 24 hours of their happening

- extend your backup scripts to run fsck after a backup is made.

--
--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:41:00 +0100
Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> wrote:

> Davey wrote:
>
> > To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good
>
> Did anything end-up in the lost+found directory?

There was no lost & found directory! That was missing in action as
well. One was created.

--
Davey.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:46:33 -0000 (UTC)
Martin Gregorie <martin@mydomain.invalid> wrote:

> On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:34:08 +0100, Davey wrote:
>
> > On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:19:23 +0100 Davey <davey@example.invalid>
> > wrote:
> >
> > To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good. I can only
> > assume that the failed Hibernation interrupted the normal data
> > exchange process, and f****d up the file system. I'll run a long
> > test tonight.
> Agreed, though the reported age of 47K hours is possibly a warning
> sign: I've run a few disks into the ground and all have started to
> report errors at around the 50,000 hours mark.
>
> In both cases I bought new disks at when the errors started to
> appear, got hold of a CloneZilla CD image, burnt it, and used it to
> duplicate the failing disk.
>
> I've not had any backup disks fail (yet) but they're easier to
> replace: simply format them to suit your OS, and bin the old disk as
> soon as you've made a backup on the new one.
>
> Apart from that all I'd suggest is:
>
> - installing smartd on all your machines, configured to report disk
> status on a weekly basis.
>
> I run logwatch on all my systems, configured to send their daily
> reports to the computer I usually read mail on, so this means I'll
> see trouble reports within 24 hours of their happening
>
> - extend your backup scripts to run fsck after a backup is made.
>
Thanks for the input.
As it happens, I have recently bought a new larger potable HDD, but it
was not destined to replace the existing one, but add to it. Hmm.

I'll look at the other suggestions, thanks.
--
Davey.

On 23/04/2022 09:59, Martin Gregorie wrote:
> - do you run fsck after a backup? If not, then run it now.
> What does it say about the health of that disk?
>
> - what does fsck say about the health of the laptop's internal drive?
>
> - what do fsck and smartd say about the age and health of the disk you
> were backing up?

Probably a bit late now but for future consideration if I had a suspect
drive then running fsck against the drive wouldn't be a first move as
the drive could degrade further and it only permits single recovery options.

My first action would be use dd or similar to write the data off to a
raw image file and then run fsck/other disk recovery utils against
copies of that copy.

This enables the original disk to be powered down and set aside to avoid
further damage and also permits multiple recovery options (against the
image files).

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 13:12:51 +0100
Mike Civil <mike@duncodin.org> wrote:

> On 23/04/2022 09:59, Martin Gregorie wrote:
> > - do you run fsck after a backup? If not, then run it now.
> > What does it say about the health of that disk?
> >
> > - what does fsck say about the health of the laptop's internal
> > drive?
> >
> > - what do fsck and smartd say about the age and health of the disk
> > you were backing up?
>
> Probably a bit late now but for future consideration if I had a
> suspect drive then running fsck against the drive wouldn't be a first
> move as the drive could degrade further and it only permits single
> recovery options.
>
> My first action would be use dd or similar to write the data off to a
> raw image file and then run fsck/other disk recovery utils against
> copies of that copy.
>
> This enables the original disk to be powered down and set aside to
> avoid further damage and also permits multiple recovery options
> (against the image files).

It's probably not worth my making a copy, as the main folder that was
its purpose is the one that's missing!
Since I see no way of finding it, I will recreate it from the other
backups, and also I will unmount the drive unless I am using it.
I don't even know if this drive is suspect, it passes the tests. I
still reckon it was a corruption of communication when the laptop didn't
hibernate properly.
But I appreciate the thoughts.
--
Davey.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 10:47:00 +0100
Davey <davey@example.invalid> wrote:

> > - how old is the laptop and what sort of condition is it *and its
> > battery* in?
> >
> The laptop is about a year old, and as far as I know, the battery is
> in good condition. I'll run without the mains connected for a while to
> confirm.
It's now nearly three hours of on/off action, and the battery is shown
as at 79% of capacity. Looks good to me.

--
Davey.

On 23/04/2022 13:30, Davey wrote:
>
> On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 13:12:51 +0100
> Mike Civil <mike@duncodin.org> wrote:
>>
>> Probably a bit late now but for future consideration if I had a
>> suspect drive then running fsck against the drive wouldn't be a first
>> move as the drive could degrade further and it only permits single
>> recovery options.
>>
>> My first action would be use dd or similar to write the data off to a
>> raw image file and then run fsck/other disk recovery utils against
>> copies of that copy.
>>
>> This enables the original disk to be powered down and set aside to
>> avoid further damage and also permits multiple recovery options
>> (against the image files).
>
> It's probably not worth my making a copy, as the main folder that was
> its purpose is the one that's missing!
> Since I see no way of finding it, I will recreate it from the other
> backups, and also I will unmount the drive unless I am using it.
> I don't even know if this drive is suspect, it passes the tests. I
> still reckon it was a corruption of communication when the laptop didn't
> hibernate properly.
> But I appreciate the thoughts.

While a plug-in backup disk can be useful, for example when you're doing
significant work away from home or your normal workplace, they are
rather vulnerable to this sort of failure. Rather than buy another one,
if that's where you're heading, I'd invest in a NAS. They're more
expensive up front, but IME more reliable long-term. Most modern ones
will run smartd, and RAID, so you should get some warning if things are
going pear-shaped, and be able to swap out a failing disk, though in
fact my version of RAID is actually to use two identical NASs! I hate
to tempt fate, but in this way I haven't lost significant amounts of
data for a long time.

You can back up via your network just changed data using rsync either
manually or on an overnight schedule, or an entire operating system
periodically. I keep both Linux and Windows PCs backed up this way.
The Linux OS partitions are backed up using Clonezilla, the Windows OS
partitions using Ghost (others favour other imaging software which is
just as good), and for both data is backed up daily using rsync, which
is basically what the DeltaCopy programme for Windows is, it's a GUI
rsync launcher.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 14:04:23 +0100
Java Jive <java@evij.com.invalid> wrote:

> While a plug-in backup disk can be useful, for example when you're
> doing significant work away from home or your normal workplace, they
> are rather vulnerable to this sort of failure. Rather than buy
> another one, if that's where you're heading, I'd invest in a NAS.
> They're more expensive up front, but IME more reliable long-term.
> Most modern ones will run smartd, and RAID, so you should get some
> warning if things are going pear-shaped, and be able to swap out a
> failing disk, though in fact my version of RAID is actually to use
> two identical NASs! I hate to tempt fate, but in this way I haven't
> lost significant amounts of data for a long time.

Hmm, I know nothing of NASs, except that they exist. Maybe it's time to
do some research.

>
> You can back up via your network just changed data using rsync either
> manually or on an overnight schedule, or an entire operating system
> periodically. I keep both Linux and Windows PCs backed up this way.
> The Linux OS partitions are backed up using Clonezilla, the Windows
> OS partitions using Ghost (others favour other imaging software which
> is just as good), and for both data is backed up daily using rsync,
> which is basically what the DeltaCopy programme for Windows is, it's
> a GUI rsync launcher.

That is pretty much what I do now. I rsync folders to the Zoneminder
desktop, then also to the portable HDD. This is on nightly shutdown. I
also do the same to a couple of other large portable HDDs, used for
video backup, but that is only when I access them for video work.

--
Davey.

snip
>
> It's probably not worth my making a copy, as the main folder that was
> its purpose is the one that's missing!
> Since I see no way of finding it, I will recreate it from the other
> backups, and also I will unmount the drive unless I am using it.
> I don't even know if this drive is suspect, it passes the tests. I
> still reckon it was a corruption of communication when the laptop
> didn't hibernate properly.
> But I appreciate the thoughts.

Update: I have recreated the missing folders and populated them, then
performed an rsync backup, which showed no problems or missing folders.
So I am back where I was yesterday pre-problem.

--
Davey.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:41:00 +0100
Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> wrote:

> Davey wrote:
>
> > To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good
>
> Did anything end-up in the lost+found directory?

Update, as in "WTF?"

All worked well during the day, with several rsync runs, all working
properly.
Then at evening shutdown, it reported that the backup folder again did
not exist! And it was correct.

What I think I will do is to create the backup folder under a different
name, change the name in the rsync script to match, and re-re-create
the backup folder, and see if that makes any difference.
Other things to try might be to re-format the drive.
Again, fsck reports a happy healthy drive.
A busy morning looms for other reasons, so this will be delayed.

--
Davey.

On Mon, 25 Apr 2022 08:23:32 +0100, Davey wrote:

> On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:41:00 +0100 Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk>
> wrote:
>
>> Davey wrote:
>>
>> > To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good
>>
>> Did anything end-up in the lost+found directory?
>
> Update, as in "WTF?"
>
> All worked well during the day, with several rsync runs, all working
> properly.
> Then at evening shutdown, it reported that the backup folder again did
> not exist! And it was correct.
>
> What I think I will do is to create the backup folder under a different
> name, change the name in the rsync script to match, and re-re-create the
> backup folder, and see if that makes any difference.
> Other things to try might be to re-format the drive.
> Again, fsck reports a happy healthy drive.
> A busy morning looms for other reasons, so this will be delayed.

Might be best to buy one or two USB hard drives (or USB memory sticks) of
the same or bigger capacity than the drive you're backing and use them
rather than relying on a backup folder on the same ageing disk.

IMO 2 backup drives, used in rotation, are better then one because this
means that you'll always have a backup for your most recent backup and,
since the backup drive(s) are mostly offline, they will age a lot slower
than your usual main drive.

Last, but not least, doing overnight backups is a good idea: that way
you're never hanging about waiting for a backup to finish. Next morning
you check logwatch to make sure the backup went OK and swap backup drives
ready for next night's backup.

--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

On Mon, 25 Apr 2022 08:22:16 -0000 (UTC)
Martin Gregorie <martin@mydomain.invalid> wrote:

> On Mon, 25 Apr 2022 08:23:32 +0100, Davey wrote:
>
> > On Sat, 23 Apr 2022 11:41:00 +0100 Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> Davey wrote:
> >>
> >> > To my admittedly very unprofessional eye, it looks good
> >>
> >> Did anything end-up in the lost+found directory?
> >
> > Update, as in "WTF?"
> >
> > All worked well during the day, with several rsync runs, all working
> > properly.
> > Then at evening shutdown, it reported that the backup folder again
> > did not exist! And it was correct.
> >
> > What I think I will do is to create the backup folder under a
> > different name, change the name in the rsync script to match, and
> > re-re-create the backup folder, and see if that makes any
> > difference. Other things to try might be to re-format the drive.
> > Again, fsck reports a happy healthy drive.
> > A busy morning looms for other reasons, so this will be delayed.
>
> Might be best to buy one or two USB hard drives (or USB memory
> sticks) of the same or bigger capacity than the drive you're backing
> and use them rather than relying on a backup folder on the same
> ageing disk.
>
> IMO 2 backup drives, used in rotation, are better then one because
> this means that you'll always have a backup for your most recent
> backup and, since the backup drive(s) are mostly offline, they will
> age a lot slower than your usual main drive.
>
> Last, but not least, doing overnight backups is a good idea: that way
> you're never hanging about waiting for a backup to finish. Next
> morning you check logwatch to make sure the backup went OK and swap
> backup drives ready for next night's backup.
>
>
> --
> Martin | martin at
> Gregorie | gregorie dot org

I already have a new bigger drive, so that will come into play. I'll
still try to get the orignal one working reliably, and I always have
the backups that I send to the Zoneminder desktop every evening.
--
Davey.