Backup Exec 11d tape drive in use, can't use it for backups

[Andrea_Casini]

Hi everyone,

i have this VERY annying problem on a BE 11d with a single, direct-atteched VXA-320 tape drive.

When the nightly job ends with success, the next night the process never starts because the tape drive is marked with a green arrow and displays the "In Use" lable. This is almost systematic. I check the state of the device before che backup and it's NOT in use; it all happens when the job starts, it puts the unit in use and then it can't complete the job because no unit was available.

I updated the software via LiveUpdate and i installed the latest drivers with no luck. This is becoming very annoying because when i find it stuck in the morning i have to manually stop every BE service so that the job goes to an error state and only THEN i can start the services and start a manual backup, but the next scheduled job produces the same problem. No other way to operate in this situation has proven to work.

Please, anyone who can help is VERY welcome. I don't know what to do anymore.

[Michael_McKenne]

Use the tapeinst to remove all drivers from your OS.  Reboot and use BE tapeinst drivers only.   Check to see if your controller is configured properly.   I use two VXA-3.    Make sure you have the latest SCSI firmware on the controller.   Use the controller drivers and not the OS native drivers.   If Adaptec controller, use the Adaptec site latest drivers.   Set the tape drive to 40 MHz, SCSI disconnect=enable, wide negoiation on controller.

[Andrea_Casini]

Tryied the above indications with no luck. It seems like i have to cycle the services before starting a backup of it gets stuck in a "queued" status with the usual green arrow and the "in use" label on the device.

Stop all services and start back again and everything work.

[Michael_McKenne]

Do the jobs finish and you can restore the tapes?   Are you using the latest BE drivers?   Try running the tape tools to check for a bad terminator.   I have seen this prevent disconnect. 

[Patty_McGowan]

Hi Andrea,

It sounds like Backup Exec isn't the only service trying to access the tape drive.

When you uninstalled Symantec Drivers were the drivers that took its place IBM's?

If so, there should be an uninstall executable with in the IBM drivers directory I would suggest running that.

When the IBM drivers were installed, they leave a footprint in the registry and never really let go of the drive.  This causes the conflict that you are seeing.

Once you are able to completely uninstall the IBM drivers and can install the Symantec Drivers this should be resolved.

[Andrea_Casini]

I'll check this but i'm pretty sure that it's correctly terminated because IBM Technical Support came over to check hardware configuration and performe a firmware update on the tape. Using tapetool reports no error.

[Andrea_Casini]

Thank you Patty, i'm willing to think that there may be a driver misconfiguration like you suggest but there are two things i can't explain:

1) IBM drivers have never been used on that machine;

2) When i updated to the last Symantec drivers available after a reboot i had the new drivers already installed.

When i removed the Symantec driver the tape driver was unrecognized, which i think is correct.

[Patty_McGowan]

Hi Andrea,

IBM didn't install their drivers when they came out?

If when you uninstalled Symantec drivers and IBM drivers didn't take its place that is a good indication they are not installed.

Is Removable Storage stopped and set to disabled?

Patty

[Andrea_Casini]

IBM does not produce the tape drive and does not provide any driver; IBM also reccomands to install your software application specific drivers and install Exabyte drivers when your application does not provide any driver.

Removable Storage is stopped, now i've set it to disabled to be sure (even if i have to say this has never been done in any other implementation of Backup Exec i did)

Message Edited by Andrea Casini on 04-16-200707:40 AM

[Michael_McKenne]

Tapeinst.exe has a remove feature to remove all tape drivers.   Run it and reboot.   When you come up, don't let Windows load tape drivers, cancel it.  Rerun tapeinst.exe to use BE drivers. 

[Andrea_Casini]

Micheal,

I've already done that before asking in the forum. Thanks anyway.

[Michael_McKenne]

So your backup finishes, lists in the logs its done.  You can view the successful job.   It does not release the tape until you stop the service.  

I run two VXA-320 drives with 11D.   SCSI Disconnect problems are usually hardware related.   Is this the only device on the SCSI channel?  If you are running concurrent SCSI devices on a SCSI channel, all must be set to SCSI disconnect enabled.   Upgrade the firmware on the VXA-320, their was a early issue with not disconnecting.  

[Andrea_Casini]

"So your backup finishes, lists in the logs its done.  You can view the successful job.   It does not release the tape until you stop the service."

Yes and no. The problem is the job not starting. Sometimes when you start the job (or the job is started based on schedule) the job itself goes on state "Queued" and there remains until someone works around it stopping the services (causing the job to fail). Then you start all services, run the job and that time it works! But the next time the issue returns until some one stop all services again, and so on and on....

The only thing i noticed is that the tape drive has a green symbol (a "play" symbol) in the Devices section of Backup Exec. It seems that the tape is working (in fact the green light is blinking) and this is stopping the job to start because there's no free device to use for backups.

I hope i was able to be as clear as needed, this is all so weird that it's also hard to explain (considering that i'm english/american)

The tape unit has latest firmware level.

Message Edited by Andrea Casini on 04-16-200712:26 PM

[Ken_Putnam]

Do you have the "eject on end" option selected for your jobs?

Is there an outstanding alert to "remove tape and respond OK"?

[Michael_McKenne]

If the tape is full and asking for another tape to be inserted and not set to eject, it may appear to be locked.   Does the backup complete on a single tape or need another tape?