I'm trying to add multiple USB external disk targets to a Windows Server 2012 Backup schedule.

Having gone through the steps in the GUI to add an additional target, the process fails with the error The system cannot find the path specified.

I followed the steps in this article:

• Option 1 is a non starter, because we have over a dozen removable disks, and I don't want to buy a box full of USB hubs and hang all these disks out the back of the server rack. So in this instance, the article suggests moving on to step 3.
• Option 2 removes old disks from the backup schedule, not an option, for obvious reasons.
• Option 3 suggests running the command WBADMIN ENABLE BACKUP -addtarget:{DISKGUID}, but this fails with the error message ERROR - The specified backup location could not be found or is not a supported backup storage location.

I've found numerous threads with some people reporting success on option 3, but others with, like myself have the exact same problem.

I've checked event logs, and the files in the directory C:\Windows\Logs\WindowsServerBackup, but haven't found anything helpful. I've also tried deleting the volume on the disk and repeating the process, as well as pre-creating an NTFS volume on the disk.

I'm using a series of USB disks with an unformatted capacity of 2TB (1.82TB formatted) if that is of any relevance.

Has anyone else had this problem and managed to resolve it?

Update 1

An answer to this question suggested putting quotes around the GUID e.g. WBADMIN ENABLE BACKUP -addtarget:"{DISKGUID}". This goes a step further as it asks me if I want to format the device, however, after formatting, it then fails with the error The system cannot find the path specified.

Solution 1:

I don't think there is a way to do this reliably with built-in Windows tools. However, BackupAssist allows you to use multiple USB disks with Windows Server Backup in the same way that one might use multiple tapes, e.g. for rotating offsite backups. It also will automatically "safely remove" USB disks when a backup job is complete, so that the person responsible for taking the USB disks offsite doesn't need administrative access to the server.

Solution 2:

I'm rather disappointed that I ran into this fairly serious problem 2 years after this question was posted - and this was on a new install of Windows 2012 Essentials with (I think) all updates installed.

Fortunately, a HotFix was released last year: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2833738

This worked for me. I was able to add a new disk to backup with the command:

WBADMIN ENABLE BACKUP -addtarget:{DISKGUID}

Before installing the HotFix, I was getting the "The system cannot find the path specified." error.