question

Checkpoints happen at various times and are fired by the database engine, you generally do not need to manually run or configure the checkpoint schedule. In fact a database backup will cause a checkpoint to happen before the backup is started. A checkpoint (or absence of one) would not stop you being able to see a backup file on the file system - are you sure the backup task is configured correctly, and is completing successfully.

Perhaps they do not have valid extensions. Can you browse to the file locations and check that they are either .bak or .trn. I believe that you can restore files without these extensions but you will have to type the path as they will not show up when browsing. If not I will have another think.

I've several times been unable to find my backup file until I remembered that I was sitting on a client pc, and the backup took place on the SQL Server. So if you are looking at C:\MyBackupDir for the file MyDBBackup.bak, then try to check the c: of the server. HIH Henrik Staun Poulsen Stovi Software

Unable to see the backup on the server? Check with the following query to see if the backups are going to the right place: SELECT msdb.dbo.backupset.server_name AS Source_Server, msdb.dbo.backupset.database_name, msdb.dbo.backupset.user_name, CASE msdb..backupset.type WHEN 'D' THEN 'Database' WHEN 'L' THEN 'Log' WHEN 'I' THEN 'Differential' WHEN 'F' THEN 'File' WHEN 'G' THEN 'Dif File' WHEN 'P' THEN 'Partial' WHEN 'Q' THEN 'Dif Partial' END AS backup_type, msdb.dbo.backupmediafamily.physical_device_name, msdb.dbo.backupset.backup_start_date, msdb.dbo.backupset.backup_finish_date, msdb.dbo.backupset.backup_size FROM msdb.dbo.backupmediafamily INNER JOIN msdb.dbo.backupset ON msdb.dbo.backupmediafamily.media_set_id = msdb.dbo.backupset.media_set_id WHERE 1 = 1 AND ( CONVERT(DATETIME, msdb.dbo.backupset.backup_start_date, 102) >= CONVERT(DATETIME, CONVERT(VARCHAR(10), Getdate() - 31, 120), 102) ) ORDER BY backup_start_date Check the "Physical_Device_Name" field - make sure that's visible, but remember to browse it from the server rather than your client PC. Also check that the account you're using to view the location has rights to view those stores that SQL Server / SQL Agent is using.