Blancco Drive Erase crash reporting is a feature that is available since Blancco 5 (version 5.8.0 and newer). Blancco Drive Eraser crash report is a detailed report that contains additional system information and log files which can be used to understand and reproduce problem that has occurred with Blancco Drive Eraser. It is very similar to the Blancco 5 issue report. The difference between the issue report and the crash report is, that the crash report is generated if the erasure software has crashed. The issue report is something that a user is able to manually save when the software is still operational. The crash report file is also encrypted and it can only be opened only by Blancco personnel. The crash report file's default name is in the following format: "YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS_issue_report.ir.xml". If the crash report file is opened, for example with some text editor software, the following comment line can be found: "Generated by Blancco Drive Eraser Crash Reporter". This comment entry makes it possible to quickly tell the difference between a normal report, issue report and a crash report.

If Blancco Drive Eraser freezes or crashes, the software will try to generate a crash report automatically.  If there is a USB stick plugged in when the software crash happens, a crash report will be copied on the USB stick. The crash report will be copied on all detected USB sticks. If a USB stick is connected later to a computer, where the crash has occurred, the report is automatically copied on the USB stick. 

If Blancco Drive Eraser freezes before the UI is loaded, it is possible to collect a crash report manually. For collecting crash report manually user has to modify certain startup parameters.

When booting from a USB:

  1. Make sure that you have created your bootable USB stick by using the latest Blancco USB Creator version.
  2. Boot the computer from the USB stick.
  3. Select any startup mode (FLR / native / safe / messages).
  4. Press “e” to edit the command before booting.
  5. From version 5.8 to 5.10: Add “cr” to the end of the following string: “linux /isolinux/vmlinuz …”. Currently “memtest=00” is the last parameter, so “cr” should be added right after it: “memtest=00 cr” (note the space in between the parameters).
    From version 6.1 onward:  Add “cr” to the end of the following string: “linux /arch/boot/x86_64/vmlinuz …”. If “flr” is the last parameter, “cr” should be added right after it: “flr cr” (note the space in between the parameters).”
  6. Press Ctrl + “x” or F10 to continue booting.

When booting from a CD/network/MSI:

  1. Make sure that you have a FAT32-formatted USB stick connected to the computer.
  2. The USB stick has to be labeled as: BLANCCO
  3. Boot the computer (from optical media/network/MSI).
  4. Press up or down arrow key, before the first Blancco screen appears, to access the boot menu.
  5. Select any startup mode (FLR / native / safe / messages).
  6. Press Tab key to access startup options.
  7. Add “cr” to the end of the line, and remember to add a space in between the parameters, and press Enter.

In manual mode (when the “cr” parameter is used), one smaller report package ("early booting report") is created during the startup phase and it contains Linux booting logs, which are collected at very early stage. The booting logs are quite generic and do not contain any Blancco specific information, so the information is not encrypted like with the issue and crash report files. The full crash report contains the same information early booting report information, so this file is mostly meant for the worst case scenarios when there is nothing else available.

Early booting report is saved to a USB media's root directory using static filename: "debug_info.tar.gz". The file will be saved to a USB stick which has "BLANCCO" label. This does not mean that Blancco Drive Eraser needs to be booted from USB. Saved file will be overwritten during the next boot, so it must be copied from the media for a further investigation. This file can be helpful if there is something wrong with the hardware detection phase and Blancco Drive Eraser cannot be started properly. This early booting report is actually generated twice during the boot phase, and only the last successful one is saved. First report "version" contains only the minimum set of hardware Drives information. The second one contains the full hardware detection information. If the Linux kernel crashes or Blancco Drive Eraser cannot detect the connected USB stick, there is currently nothing that can be done to collect any troubleshooting data directly from the software itself.