[VANCO]

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Unable to backup Winfax useing Winfax Backup utility.
**
Winfax version: 10.03
Windows XP Pro, no updates not connected to the internet.

I am unable to backup Winfax useing the Winfax backup utility. The problem seems to have started a month or two ago when I had a database problem. I restarted my computer and something glitched and the database got corrupted. I subsequently rebuilt the database useing Winfax database rebuilder and I think I also optimized it. After that I have been unable to backup useing Winfax backup utility. A couple of the folders in the log got garbled and I had to manually reorganize a few hundred faxes.

Now when I use the backup utility it pretty much seems like its backing up everything. It reaches the end and says something like “backup completed unsuccessfuly. click to view log…..” Inside the log everything has an “<>” but one item has an <> next to it. The item is a log either a .FXR or a .FXD file below that it writes <> ** Did not commit chages to the above store ** . So none of the actual faxes ever get backed up.

I’ve tried deleting the faxes that the backup utility hangs on, but more keep coming, and it seems endless.

My data folder has about 8500 files and is about 500 megabytes.

I checked Symantec website for help, scoured the internet, and looks like some other people encountered similar problems like this. Usually when installing SP2 onto XP but I haven’t done that. Symantec says the fix is to delete the affected references inside Winfax or to put dummy files in place if they don’t exist. I’ve tried this but it doesn’t work either.

I suppose my files could be corrupted but they seem to open just fine in a fax viewer.

Anyone have any ideas? Is there a program that backs up Winfax externally? So far I’ve just been backing up the entire data folder manually. I was thinking about reformatting the entire computer and reinstalling a fresh Winfax, I’d like to avoid that if possible though, or atleast make sure I can get a nice single backup file for Winfax.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Elliott

[Administrator]

The problem is the volume of faxes you are trying to backup at once. We’ve encountered this issue with some clients, and the root of the problem is always

1) the volume of faxes (files) stored in the DATA folder, and
2) how the fax logs are managed/organized within WinFax.

The WinFax Manual (Chapter 8) states …

Quote:

The default message store, “Messagesâ€

[VANCO]

Yes I do have many many many subfolders under the Messages store.

I’m going to try to create a few more stores and organize some of the larger folders that way.

Lets hope this works.

[VANCO]

I have created a couple new stores and moved and split a few sub-folders up into them. Still unable to backup…

Please let me know if I should try something else.

Thanks.

[Administrator]

When you create a new message store, the set location option should be used and a different directory should be set to store the data, such as a sub-directory underneath the WinFaxData directory, such as WinFaxDataFaxes2007. The sub-directories need to exist prior to using the set location option. If you do not use the set location option, then all faxes are stored in the DATA folder. The reason you don’t want this is because Windows can’t handle a large number of files in a single folder, I’ve seen where it can take 1-2 minutes just for Windows Explorer to open the DATA folder when there are 10,000+ files in that directory alone. The DATA folder should really only be used for temporary storage of incoming and outgoing faxes, this helps prevent problems in the future.

Create several sub-directories underneath WinFaxData in advance, and name them according to the message store names you want to create. For example. 2001Faxes, 2002Faxes, 2003Faxes etc. You can then go into WinFax and create a set of new message stores, setting the appropriate location for each one. If you like, you can then go ahead and create sub-folders for each of the message stores to organize them further into specific categories.

The goal here is to reduce the actual # of fax events (sent and received) in your default message store, and distribute “move” the faxes into other message stores you create. This will reduce the # of files in the DATA directory, and move the data into easy to use sub-directories with their own corresponding message store.

You can move your faxes into several message stores and still encounter the backup failure problem because it is unknown what is considered too much in a message store to cause it to fail. .By setting up seperate message stores, during the backup you can pick and choose what message stores to backup, so you can determine which message store causes the failure and continue from there.

[Author]

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