Backup Exec wont use tape drive number 2

[KennChristensen]

Hi all

I have a server with 2 tape drives, 1 x LTO 5 and 1 x LTO4. Only 1 backup job. backup starts with one of the drives (usually LTO 5) and then when that tape is full it automatically moves on to the LTO4 drive.

I start running out of space on the tape so i decide to replace 1 of the drives. I take out the LTO4 and replace it with a LTO6 drive.

LTO6 Drive is recognised by Backup exec upon reboot - i put in a LTO5 tape (i have loads of those :) - i can see in backup exec that the LTO6 drive now has a LTO5 tape inserted. Everyone should be happy - status of the LTO6 drive is "ready"

Backup starts normally and the LTO5 drive stars to backup. I return to the office this morning and i see the LTO5 drive has ejected its tape and is requesting a new tape put into LTO5. i can see that the tape in the LTO6 hasnt been used. and i can see as per normal the LTO5 tape is full.

Only way i could complete the backup was to put in a new tape into LTO5 drive.

Can someone help me? how do i make the new drive pick up where the LTO5 drive stopped.

The LTO4 drive i took out is still listed in Backup exec, but i disabled it in backup exec.

The backup job is set to use all devices

Kind regards

Kenn Christensen

[KennChristensen]

Additional info:

I run Backup 2010 R3

I can see from other posts here that beyond BEWS 2010 this feature of 1 job 2 tape drives isnt support. But i didnt change anything besides replace a tape drive.

[pkh]

That is correct.  This tape pooling feature was removed even before BE 2010, so I don't know how you managed to get it to work.

You should be looking at getting a tape library.

In case you are not aware, BE 2010 is EOL and you should be planning to upgrade to the latest version of BE which is BE 16.

[KennChristensen]

That is odd - its been working for years in my setup.

Only thing i did was replace a tape drive.

the new tape drive works fine too - i tried creating a small job with only a few GB's and it was put on the tape no problem at all.

I have now tried to create a new device pool, once that does not contrain the old LTO drive (the one i removed)

ill respond tomorrow with results.

Kind regards

[KennChristensen]

I mentioned in my post from yesterday that i did a small job to the new tape drive and it completed. But that isnt 100% accurate, i had to reboot 1 extra time before i was able to access the drive. And upon that reboot the LTO4 drive was marked as offline.

I think the extra reboot did the trick, because the backup job ran successfully last night, using 100% of the tape in the new drive and about 40% of the tape in drive number 2.

Just to let everyone know that tape pooling is indeed possible in Backup 2010 R3 :)

Kind Regards

Kenn