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Breaking Syncrify Functionality

Discover several ways that can fatally compromise Syncrify's functionality. Learn what to look out for, and what to avoid so that Syncrify backups remain quick, reliable, and efficient.

Fatal Errors

Ensure that all installation files are present in your Syncrify Installation folder.
- You should see these files and folders in the $INSTALL_DIR\Syncrify directory. (NOTE: You will see additional files/folders if you are using a Branded Server, Branded Client, or if you are using the ISP Edition)
Left, Windows OS; Right, Mac OSX

Not Enough Space on the Server's Hard Drive

Although it may already be obvious that the Server should have enough space in order to store all backed up data, there may still be a number of factors that would allow a hard drive to fill up to its capacity. Always be aware of the amount of free space on your Server; otherwise, a backup will not be able to run successfully (if at all).
Out of Disk Space may cause the server to corrupt files, and eventually crash.
Syncrify Client would be affected in the same way.

Syncrify Registration - You may notice a Registration error in one of the following situations:

Purchase a new Machine License via Syncrify's Web Interface in order to add to the license count for your current Serial Number. Otherwise, if you purchase via our website, you will receive a brand new Serial Number with a License Count of ONE.

Syncrify Client Registration

If you run a backup, but the server has run out of machine licenses.
It is possible that one of your clients is connecting from two different networks, and therefore Syncrify Server recognizes the connection as two seperate machine licenses. In this case...

Log in as admin, go to the About section, click the link to View Registrations.
Unregister all clients on this list.
NOTE: When Syncrify Client makes a connection to the Server, that client machine is automatically registered to the server.

If you have used up all of your machine licenses, then you must purchase an additional license via Syncrify Server's web interface.

Syncrify Server Registration

When logging into the web interface as admin, rather than the Home Screen showing up, you get a screen asking to register the Syncrify license. [See image below:]
In this case, allow Syncrify Server to connect to the internet (even if just temporarily)
Locate AppConfig.xml file in $INSTALL_DIR\config folder and send it via email to support@synametrics.com along with the following information:
- Your name
- Your company name
- Phone number
Our Support Department will make necessary changes to the file and send it back to you.

Download a Newer Version of Syncrify Server than what your Serial Number is Compatible with.
Incorrect SSL Installation / Configuration
Local and Network Firewalls

Ensure that all necessary firewalls (both on your local computer as well as your network router) are not blocking Syncrify's default port 5800.
Please refer to Firewall Configuration for details.

No Network Connection

Functional, but Will Include Errors

Mapped Drives

Backing up a mapped/network drive

If you include a mapped/network drive in Syncrify Client as part of your backup data set, ensure that the User running Syncrify Client has full access to that mapped/drive.
A manual backup may run successfully if the User is able to supply the appropriate credentials for this drive.
Since a scheduled backup elevates Syncrify's usage to the local SYSTEM account, it is possible that the System account does not have proper privileges to access the mapped drive, and therefore the backup will not be successful. Please see here for more details.

Specifying the Backup Repository on a mapped drive:

If the Backup Repository is located on a mapped drive, that means the data will have to "hop" across another network path.
Rather than one "hop" across the internet (or intranet), the data needs to transfer across the mapped drive as well; this may cause some network errors and slower backups if the network is not stable enough.
This configuration may also create some permissions issues if the mapped drive requires credentials for access.

Backup Locked Files

If you choose to enable VSS in order to back up locked files, ensure the User that is running Syncrify has administrative access to these files.
A manual backup may complete successfully since Syncrify Client is run from the User's account (which typically has administrative access to the backed up data).
A scheduled backup may result in errors. This type of backup elevates Syncrify's usage to the local SYSTEM account, which may not have full privileges to the files/folders in the data set.

User Permissions

For a Manual Backup - If the User who is running Syncrify Client has full permissions to the files and folders that are being backed up, this should not be a problem. However, without proper permissions, a backup will result in Access Denied errors; Syncrify will not backup any data that requires elevated permissions.
For a Scheduled Backup - Permissions for a scheduled backup are typically assigned to the SYSTEM account, which may or may not have full access to the files and folders that are involved in your backup. Either include this SYSTEM account as part of the Administrator group on your OS, or modify the permissions for the Syncrify Client Service so that they are assigned to a User with full access.

Not Enough Space on the Temp Folder

You may notice that sometimes the Temp Folder fills up with .merge and .tmp files - this may occur when backups do not complete correctly.
Normally, these files are automatically deleted after a backup has finished.
If any of these files are older than 24 hours, they are safe to delete.
There are a variety of reasons as to why a backup may not complete successfully; in this case, it is helpful to check the log files to see what may be the root cause.

Client instance buildup (Clients take longer than the time in hours specified as stale job threshold)
Client and Server have different volume label/syntax for file names

(If you backup a file from a Mac with the file name ?trj@#94kjg.t, to a windows Syncrify server..you will get a successful report from the client even byte length
but if you look on the server you'll see NOTHING in the repository and you'll see a stack trace of error in the Syncrify.log with volume label/syntax errors in the file name.

Functional, but Not Recommended

Compressed Backup Repository

When choosing a location for your Backup Repository, ensure that it is not a compressed folder or drive.
After data has been transferred, it would take the OS some time to compress the backed up data.
Compression will definitely increase amount of time it takes to complete a backup; you can test this by moving a file from your Desktop into a compressed folder. You will notice the difference in time it takes to compress even a 10mb file and then copy it into the compressed folder, as opposed to moving it directly to the Desktop (an uncompressed location).