Backup Media showing as cleaning media

[Scott_Dunbar]

I am running Backupexec 10d on an HP 360 2003 server with a Dell PV 128T library. Ever since upgrading to 10 from 8.6 media is showing as cleaning media.

The problem is further confusing in that when I do a complete inventory aprox 40% of the tapes will then show as backup media but when I come back the next day they are all back to cleaning media. Even when doing a quick erase on the media its not guaranteed to register correctly or be appendable when registered.

I have seen another post on this issue and a few people found it to be hardware problems. However the library was working fine with 8.6 and does manage to do backup successfully if I am lucky enough to get a tape to register correctly after a quick erase.

I am also running the latest veritas drivers which include the PV128T.

Any advise/help appreciated as its getting rather critical.

[Scott_Dunbar]

Sorry to bump... but any ideas please?

[Marc_Hall]

had this problem when I upgraded from Arcserve to BENT10d on my HP DLTIV library.
I had to do a complete removal of any and all existing drivers, Upgraded the drive to the latest firmware, then installed BENT10d. then installed the latest Veritas drivers.

Make sure that you do not allow the OS (win2k/win2k3) to install the drivers for you. If they do you will be back to square one. I have found that the Veritas drivers will not overwrite or supercede the OS drivers, regardless of the checkbox selection on the install.

[Gauri_Ketkar]

Hi,

-Is the Inventory successful ?

-Have you tried with a new tape ?

-After erasing the tape if you run Backup on it , can you see this tape as backup tape ?


Update us on the same and revert for any further Query
Hope this will help you


Thank you
Gauri


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[Scott_Dunbar]

Thanks for the reply.

I did as advised. The firmware updated successfuly. Im a little unsure if I have managed to remove the OS drivers fully before installing the veritas drivers (latest as well). I remove the medium changer driver (showing as HP Tape Library) and then the tape drives. However I cant remove all tape drives without it doing a reboot at which point they will autodetect. So I removed as much as I could before installing the veritas drivers and then rebooted. Do you think thats enough?

In any case the results seem to be just the same. Any further hints?

[Scott_Dunbar]

Yes inventory works fine.

All tapes show as cleaning media when I check on it the next day. However I am still able to do a restore.

An inventory will show approx 40 - 60% of tapes as backup media but like I say... this lasts a day.

Very bizzare.

[Ashutosh_Tamhan]

Hello Scott

Make sure that your SCSI settings are like this:
1) The Medium changer is running with the SCSI ID 2
2) All the tape drives are assigned a SCSI ID 3 and above in an ascending order.


Regards,
Ashutosh

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[Scott_Dunbar]

Thank you but forgive my ignorance I am not sure how to change these settings. Going to properties of the libaray in Devices I see the changer has Port 2 Target ID 0 in SCSI info and drives one and two have Port 2 Target ID 1 and 2 respectivly.

Is this what you mean and if so how do I change it?

Im also interested to understand your reasoning behind the solution.

[Ashutosh_Tamhan]

Most of the times such issues (cleaning media false identification issues) are resolved by changing the SCSI settings as mentioned above. The reason for doing so is that SCSI ID (TAR ID) 0 & 1 are reserved for bootable devices, which not the case in your case!

How to change the SCSI ID(i.e TAR IDs)?

Kindly refer your hardware handbook.
But generally, if you have a tape library, which normally has an LED display in the front side, then it should be possible to change these IDs from there.

Hope it helps.



Regards,
Ashutosh

NOTE : If we do not receive your reply within two business days, this post would be marked assumed answered and would be moved to answered questions pool.

[Scott_Dunbar]

Thanks for the advice.

The SCSI ID's have been changed exactly as advised. This is now registered in Bacupexec devices.... however same problem when doing an inventory. Several tapes are showing as cleaning media and by tomorrow morning they will all have magically changed overnight to cleaning media.

Any other ideas?

Thanks for your help.

[Scott_Dunbar]

Not being impatient... but please do not close my case the issues remain unresolved.

[Russ_Perry]

I'm guessing you have more than one tape drive in the tape library?? From the sound of it, if you get about 40% cleaning media during an inventory, you have a bad or dirty tape drive... During an inventory, all drives are used to check the tape headers with one reporting correctly and the other not finding anything. Try going into the devices screen in backup exec, right click on the first drive under the library and disable it. Then run your inventory or backup. Backup Exec marks tapes as cleaning media when nothing ever gets returned from a tape drive regarding the tape header.

Russ

ps: if you only have a single drive in your library, try disabling the Removable Storage Service. In some situations, RSM will interfere with Backup Exec's communication with the tape device.

[Scott_Dunbar]

Some good news!

Thank you for the advice... I had suspected as much but as yet not tried it because both drives perform backups ok. An inventory has not shown all media as backup media with the dodgy drive disabled. We will see tomorrow as so far every morning all tapes were showing as cleaning media.

[Scott_Dunbar]

Everything seems fine this morning! Thanks for the help forum.