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MatBams's avatar
MatBams
Level 4
4 years ago

LTO4 tape reading on LTO6 drive

Hi everyone,

We try to read an old LTO4 tape without barcode to duplicate the data on our new LTO8 tape.

In my robot, i've one HP LTO6 drive. I saw that you can read LTO4 tape in LTO6 drive but i've an issue with this.

I define my LTO6 drive in NBU as an HCART density and my LTO4 tape as too an HCART density. When I try to initiate import from catalog, i've an error "Robot operation failed : Unmountable tape". When i used robtest i've this error "Incompatible medium installed".

I'm ready to put the tape directly in the drive but i'm not sure that's the good way.

Please can you help on this topic ?

Regards.

 

8
Windows Server 2016
  • Marianne's avatar
    Marianne
    4 years ago

    You need to find out what format the barcode label should be for STK.
    My guess it that it needs a suffix that indicates the media type (e.g. L4, to indicate LTO4).
    That is how the library knows that the tape is compatible with the drive.

    The alternative is to use the drive as standalone.
    Maybe remove it in NBU from the robot, then open the door and load the tape manually in the drive.
    Use 'vmoprcmd -d' to see if NBU picks up the internal label.

  • Marianne's avatar
    Marianne
    Level 6
    4 years ago

    MatBams 

    Which make/model tape library?

    I know that some tape libraries will not load any tapes without barcodes.
    STK libraries for example.
    This is to prevent an incompatibile tape being loaded into the drive.

    Can you use 'robtest' to manually load the tape in the drive?

    Can you use vmphyinv to perform a 'physical' inventory?

    • quebek's avatar
      quebek
      Moderator
      4 years ago

      Hi

      so your robot  number for this HP drive is 1 and it is STK

      Port: 5; Bus: 0; Target: 1; LUN: 0
      Inquiry : "STK SL3000 4.55"
      Vendor ID : "STK "
      Product ID : "SL3000 "
      Product Rev: "4.55"
      Serial Number: "571030210022"
      WWN : ""
      WWN Id Type : 0
      Device Identifier: ""
      Device Type : SDT_CHANGER
      NetBackup Robot Type: 8
      Removable : Yes
      Device Supports: SCSI-5
      Number of Drives : 1
      Number of Slots : 25
      Number of Media Access Ports: 26
      Drive 1 Serial Number : "HUJ546549M"

       

      as Marianne said... Most likely the STK won't do it. Any idea what is the physical media ID for this LTO4? I would have printed the same barcode for it... witl L4 suffix... or any barocode and then played around with vmchange once NBU will not like that ;)

      • MatBams's avatar
        MatBams
        Level 4
        4 years ago

        Hi

        Yes it's STK.

        In my opinion, this is an very old tape at the begining of this internal network and i think that there were an independant drive connected directly to the media. Now we use this STK. There aren't any barcode on this tape, only a label created manually and named A00005

  • quebek's avatar
    quebek
    Moderator
    4 years ago

    Hello

    This should work... Can you please provide output from

    scan

    tpconfig -d

    bpstulist -U

    vmoprcmd

    vmquery -m LTO4TAPE_label - what ever it is maybe A00001 or so ...

    to which drive you wanted to mount this LTO4 tape? Are you 100% positive it is LTO4 - what color it has... I think in HP work these were green... if my memory serves me correctly.