Backup Exec 2010 R3 - Job Rate reduced by 90% after changing to new tapes

[Eric_Sko]

Good morning all,

I am assisting in filling in for our network administrator while he is out on extended sick leave.  I recently changed the tapes in our Dell Powervault TL2000 from LTO2s to LTO3s.  Prior to the change, the job rate was in the neighborhood of 1,300MB/min - now the job rate is 133MB/min, and the jobs wiill take a ridiculous amount of time to complete.  The drive did show an inventory error when I first changed the tapes, but after a power cycle, the second inventory came up with no errors.

System:

• Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2
• Backup Exec 2010 R3
• Dell Powervault TL2000
• All servers being backed up are VMWare virtuals

Some things I have tried:

• I used a cleaning tape prior to inserting the new tapes.
• I can successfully perform a test run.
• I inventoried the tapes both on the drive and in Backup Exec 2010.
• I ran some service tests on the Dell Powervault TL2000 - Library Verify, System Test (10 cycles)

What steps can I take to get the job rate back up to where it was?

Any suggestions would be much appreciated.

[CraigV]

Hi,

Are you using the Symantec drivers for the device?

Thanks!

[Eric_Sko]

@CraigV - yes, I believe so.  I went to Tools-->Configure Devices-->Configure Tape Devices-->Install tape device drivers-->Use Symantec tape drivers for all supported tape devices and it said that the device drivers are already installed.

[pkh]

Click on the tapes and check the tape statistics to determine the number of errors, particularly hard errors.  If there are too much errors which will slow down your backup, then you probably have a bad batch of tapes which needs to be replaced.

What happens when you switch back to your old tapes?

[Eric_Sko]

@pkh - I checked each tape - no hardware errors on any of them.

Another night of backups, still capped at 133MB/min (which I canceled).

I have not switched back to the other tapes, but I will be trying that tonight in hopes that I can get some successful backups in over the weekend.

[Eric_Sko · Accepted solution]

I neglected my own first rule... "Did you try restarting your computer?"

I restarted the server, and the speed went back to normal.

D'oh!  Oh well.. thanks all for the assist!