After Inventory 23 out of 28 brand new LTO-2 Tapes are labeled as <Bad Media>

[burroughs1]

I'm using BackUp Exec 10d (on Windows Server 2003) and swapped out 28 LTO-2 tapes with a brand new set of LTO-2 tapes. After I ran an inventory, BackUp Exec returned <Bad Media> for 23 out of 28 tapes. The tapes are managed by the Overland Neo 2000 robotic library. Just before I swapped the 28 tapes, I verified that I could restore data from the older tapes.  Any ideas?

Thank you in advance for your time,
Steve

[AmolB]

Hello

 Refer to http://support.veritas.com/docs/280026

[pkh]

Did you do an erase of the new tapes?

[burroughs1]

After the inventory, I only have the option of "Quick Erase" or "Full Erase" (e.g. right-clicking on Slot X uder Devices tab) on the 5 LTO tapes that have <Blank Media> under the Media Label column. Is there some way outside of Backup Exec that I can verify that a tape is actually bad? Please note that I'm using a Neo 2000 robotic tape library. The robotic library was working correctly minutes before I replaced the old tapes with the new ones (I verified that I could restore a number of files and folders). I am having trouble believing that 23 out of 28 new LTO tapes have issues.

[CraigV]

You can check the tape under your media set and see what sort of errors you are getting. Anything excessive (couple of 100 write errors I would say) would be enough for me to mark the tape as bad.

[burroughs1]

None of the 28 tapes are listed under any Media Set (nothing listed under All Media or under Online/Offline Media).

[Ken_Putnam · Accepted solution]

I know that BackupExec is supposed to do it automagically, but have you tried labelling these tapes, and then doing the Inventory?

[burroughs1]

Thanks for everyones feedback, unfortunately I still cannot move on. After a tape gets marked as <Bad Media>, the "Label Media" options is greyed out; when I right-click the mouse on a <Bad Media> tape the only options I have are: Inventory, Scan, Catalog, Import, Export and Properties. Any other ideas? I also reinstalled the software but still having the same problems.

[burroughs1]

Ken's suggestion to label the tapes allowed me to finally inventory the tapes. In order to remove the <Bad Media> label after the initial inventory, I removed all the tapes from the robotic library. After removing the tapes, I ran another inventory that changed <Bad Media> to empty. Then I repopulated the robotic library. After this step I was able to label the media (which also erases the tapes).

[CraigV]

Hi,

I think that Ken should be the 1 to get the solution. It was his suggestion that got things working.

Cheers!

[burroughs1]

Updated to reflect proper resolution to problem.