Backup always fails

[Ben Hanchett]

I had backup issue when the live lock screen came out. Deleted the app and everything was good until....I just noticed my phone hasn't made a backup since WP8.1 Update 1. Tried four times to backup, gets to 10% and just hangs. I let it sit for an hour and it never got higher than 10%. NOKIA 1520

 

[DJRedLine]

When you say 'resolved itself after a hard reset', I would like to know whether you mean it restored your phone settings ok from a previous failed backup.
I have tried everything. Just come off a very long chat with Nokia support, but no answers.
I'm getting to 100% ok but it still says "problem with your backup. try again later".
Will be like Russian roulette trying a hard reset when I don't know if I have a successful backup.
I did have a successful backup from 3 weeks ago, but as recommended in this thread I deleted it to try to get backup working again. I for one can recommend NOT deleting your old backup! It didn't resolve the problem and now I don't know if I have any good backups!
I would rather have restored from an old backup than have no backup. :unhappy:

I did a hard reset and it did restore everything even though I had the 'backup failure' issue. Since restoring it now works correctly.

 

[dailynail]

I had to laugh today when my phone's Notification Centre told me I'd not backed up for a while, funny that, it's because it doesn't work!

 

[Manojkumar_25]

Just change your lockscreen wallpaper to low sized image even if you have live lockscreen..

 

[dailynail]

Sorry but like others have experienced, this doesn't work for me. At best it gets to 96% before failing. Doesn't matter what picture I use. But like others have said, if I look in my OneDrive account on my Mac it shows that there's a backup file there. Who knows if it's any use though!

 

[mikewarner]

I succumbed to the back-up issue recently and just fixed it.

Background:
I have a Lumia 920 running Lumia Black with WP 8.1 Update, firmware 3051.40000.1349.0007; Back-up always auto on and backing up; last recorded back-up to 18 September (the phone indicates this); running Developer Preview and have the 0x80188308 issue (two months of meaningless communication from Microsoft!).

In the last few days I've had the same error message as everyone else and my phone stops at 97%. Looked on OneDrive and it said last update was 10 minutes ago. This is at odds with what the phone says (last Thursday which is 18 September). Question - is the back-up on OneDrive a full back-up or not? Kept trying to manually back-up over last few days but always same outcome with error message. Not sure (as didn't look into) whether auto back-up was running properly and saving to OneDrive - any thoughts?

Solution:
Read through this thread and did the following:
- changed Lock Screen background from Bing to Photo; chose the simple grainy blue background; tried Back-up and it failed
- took the big step to delete Back-up from OneDrive (using OneDrive on my Mac deleted this); then tried back-up and didn't work; scratched my head and looked at phone settings and realised deleting back-up had switched off Back-up function on phone; toggled this back on and ran manual back-up and it took longer than usual with some halts at various stages but completed without issue.
- Furthermore, I then changed the Lock Screen back to Bing and re-ran the Back-up and it worked.

Conclusion:
It look, given my experience, that deleting the back-up on OneDrive and then turning the Back-up settings back on (as they are cancelled on deletion of Back-up) fixed the problem. I cannot say that changing the Lock Screen image from Bing to simple, grainy blue Photo was also responsible as I did this prior to deletion of Back-up from OneDrive - I can say that with Bing Lock Screen (as I've always had it) chosen my Back-up is working.

Now, if Microsoft could communicate more we wouldn't be trawling the internet and discussing solutions to an OS we can't get into. And as always I hopeful every day that there will be a solution to the 0x80188308 error!

 

[adrian1338]

I bet the 0x80188308 error and the failing backup are related with each other. I guess your backup will fail again soon and I bet you will not get this sorted until you hard reset it. If you go into the backup settings I also see 464.69 MB of data sitting on One drive. Cant believe this will be the backup of the settings etc so it will have backed up part of the things that also corrupt the update - if not the update files itself.

 

[bixcy]

Hey guys
I tryed all ur solutions described below but nothing helps. Then i thinking " maybe i need to change region!". I changed region, language and keyboard ( to US) and it works.
Also i have lumia 920 8.1 DP

 

[anon(5969054)]

Changing region fixed it for me too.

 

[Nguyen Doan]

I get this error too.
i delete the old backup , and create new backup, and it's worked

 

[vs6xfx]

Both my 920 and 1520.3 were having backup error lately after updated to DP 8.11.

I logon to OneDrive and deleted the old backups on both, then backup work fine.

 

[udit gupta7]

-Change language,region,keyboard n location to united states
-lock screen pic must be very low size
- delete old backups on OneDrive
- make sure OneDrive is logged on mobile

 

[Hugo Cavalier]

Been having this problem myself, just got Cyan on pdk on my L920 in the UK and been trying to back up only getting to 96% like everyone else here. Seems my culprit was the live lockscreen beta app as for some others.
Uninstalled the app and set lock picture to default background pic and have successfully back up.
Hope this fix works for others as well, great forum for what seems to be a common prob, glad I looked!!!

 

[JaEida]

Backup finally works (in Preview for Developers)!

I was on Lumia 930, Windows Phone version 8.10.12397.895 and Cyan. This was a clean install using the Nokia Software Recovery Tool 1.5.0. This is what I tried:
Try 1:
- Step 1: Executing backup now on the Lumia 930 alone failed at 96%.
Try 2:
- Step 1: Deleting the backup via Setting -> Backup -> apps+settings -> manage backups -> delete on the Lumia 930
- Step 2: Executing backup now on the Lumia 930 failed at 96%.
Try 3:
- Step 1: Deleting the backup via Setting -> Backup -> apps+settings -> manage backups -> delete on the Lumia 930
- Step 2: Logging in into outlook.com -> Onedrive -> Options -> Device backups -> Deleting the backup
- Step 3: Executing backup now on the Lumia 930 failed at 96%.
Try 4:
- Step 1: Deleting the backup via Setting -> Backup -> apps+settings -> manage backups -> delete on the Lumia 930
- Step 2: Logging in into outlook.com -> Onedrive -> Options -> Device backups -> Deleting the backup
- Step 3: Changing the lock screen (which for me was Twitter) to photo via Settings -> lock screen -> Background: photo
- Step 4: Executing backup now on the Lumia 930 failed at 96%.

Fed up with all of this I updated from Windows Phone version 8.10.12397.895 to 8.10.14176.243 using Preview for Developers. During that update the following versions were applied:
8.10.12400.899
8.10.14147.180 (Windows Phone 8.1 Update)
8.10.14157.200
8.10.14176.243
Btw see Wikipedia for a nice overview of Windows Phone versions.

Try 5 (on 8.10.14176.243):
- Step 1: Deleting the backup via Setting -> Backup -> apps+settings -> manage backups -> delete on the Lumia 930
- Step 2: Logging in into outlook.com -> Onedrive -> Options -> Device backups -> Deleting the backup
- Step 3: Changing the lock screen (which for me was Twitter) to photo via Settings -> lock screen -> Background: photo
- Step 4: Executing backup now on the Lumia 930,succes!

Apparently between Windows Phone version 8.10.12397.895 and 8.10.14176.243 this problem got fixed.

If you want to be sure before updating, save your photos and documents by plugging your phone via USB to a computer and copy the folders. Anyway a good idea to do.... (learned the hard way).

Hope this helps.

 

[MartLea]

Thanks Jaida for your detailed steps, glad it worked for you. I have had this 'fails at 96%' error ever since updating to 8.1 and the various PfD updates since have not resolved the issue for me. Like zillions of others I have trawled 'tinternet for solutions and tried most of 'em without success. Today I finally received Cyan for my L620 CV GB PfD (hooray!) the update went super smoothly and was quickly followed by a PfD re-update. Sadly the Backup - for me at least - still fails even after all that. Perhaps by the time WP10 is rolled out MSFT will have figured out how to ensure their phone backups actually work.

 

[PepperdotNet]

Thanks for all that. I am on the same Windows version as you, 8.10.14176.243 with Cyan on an ATT Lumia 1020 RM-877.

I followed all the same steps as your Try 5, but it still dies at 97% with "There was a problem backing up your settings. Try again later."

 

[Ben Hanchett]

Performed a backup last week. Unfortunately, need to replace my week. Try doing a backup last night and it got to 97% and failed. Man, I have been on this thread about six different times! I hate having to come back and figure what the hell is going on. ATT 1520 8.1 Update 1, change lockscreen to photo, no transparent tiles, deleted backup. Still fails

Great now backup hangs at 10%.! I deleted Flipboard trying to see if that may have been the problem. I tried three times now. Hangs at 10% for over an hour

 

[dailynail]

What a farce, I get constant updates to other system apps yet the one thing that is massively broken never gets updated. How can anyone easily upgrade to another phone if their backup doesn't work??

 

[PimpBot5001]

After months of trying every suggestion and consistently having my backup fail, I finally decided to do a hard reset. After the hard reset, the backup succeeded once...and has failed every subsequent time since. The good news is that the "failed" backup that I executed prior to the hard reset seemed to restore my phone just fine.

I downloaded an official microsoft app name "Field Medic" hoping that maybe it would give me an indication of why the backup was failing, but I haven't had a chance to test it out...

 

[neo158]

I found that deleting the previous backup in OneDrive, waiting a few minutes and trying again worked for me.