Adding new HDD to Server Backup

[Pepi1677]

I thought I had got this sorted. I have just bought a new 3tb external drive with the intention to use it for server backup. When the hdd is installed dashboard gives me a warning but no option to format, it say's I can add it to the server back up. I go to computer in the dash select set up back up the it offers me the disk at 3tb and proceeds to add it to the server backup as a full 3tb disk. If I then remove the drive from disk management and and a simple drive of 200 0000 it formats it to this size. When I then go to the dash and add it to server back up it then formats it to a full 3tb. Ideally I would like it to be within the 2tb rule to ensure I can get full backup service.

 

Any ideas?

[Pepi1677]

The plot thickens, I just went out a got a 2TB seagate drive, only for the back upto fail again. Error code 2155348010. From what I can read it means the disk has the wrong byte size. This is turning into a bit of a nightmare. Any ideas?

[ikon]

A byte has always been the same size: 8 bits. What I suspect you mean is the wrong sector size: 512 byte sectors vs 4096 byte sectors for example. Many advanced format drives now come with 4K (4096) byte sectors. That can be a problem for some software like Windows Server Backup.

 

I'm not sure which drive you bought, but some models of drives have a 512 byte sector emulation mode. This is a feature whereby the drive makes itself appear to the operating system as though it has 512 byte sectors instead to the 4096 byte sectors it really has.

 

One thing you could do is check if you have hotfix http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2553708. Supposedly, it improves compatibility of WHS2011 with Advanced Format drives.