Backup to a New Tape Every Night

[Unbeliever]

I want to create a backup that will let me use a new tape every night. Even thought I tell the Backup to eject the tape after each backup, it still appends to the the same tape.

Thanks!

Backup Exec 2014  Version 14.1 Rev. 1786.1059 (64-bit)

HP MSL G3 Series Autoloader, 1 HP Ultrium 5 tape drive.

[CraigV]

...set your append period for an hour and try again.

Alternatively, if you run your backups to an autoloader/library, then create partitions and target specific jobs to these.

Thanks!

[Larry_Fine]

Telling BE to eject the tape after each backup is irrelevant when using a robotic tape library.  That option is for single, stand-alone, tape drives.

[Colin_Weaver]

Eject does not apply to an autoloader - eject is a function of a stand alone drive, which is why the tape is available to be used in your loader. (Loaders do Exports if you have mailslots)

If you set you overwrite protection to 1 day less than when you will re-use the tape and set your append to maybe 12 hours (to cover running more than one job each night, you can set 0 hours if only 1 job), and set the first job of each day to start as Overwrite then it will not use the same tape.

BTW if you are running mulitple jobs per day and need to append every job but the first then when the job starts  cannot overlap with running jobs to avoid your append jobs possibly changing to overwrites

[Unbeliever]

Thanks for the comment, do you have an answer to my question?

[pkh]

If you want your job to write to a new tape, then you should specify overwrite in your job. Do not specify append otherwise overwrite.

[sk7777]

Hi, 

i see you are using HP MSL G3 Series Autoloader, 

1 HP Ultrium 5 tape drive is this male slot where you will insert the tape into the drive ? please confirm ... 

check tape library model document and confirm how many slots it contains like 10 , 15 , 20 .. 100 slots in HP MSL G3 Series Autoloader. 

Thanks, 

[pkh]

What has the mailslot and the number of slots in the library for to do with the user's problem?

[sk7777]

Unbeliever , 

Since you want to "create a backup that will let me use a new tape every night"

Reason i asked to check HP MSL G3 Series Autoloader & Slots because you can insert 7 new tapes in library with retention 7 days ( Overwriteable ) and label them accordingly.

So your backup job will use new tape everyday and after 7 days it will overwrite monday tape accordiingly followed by other tapes on consecutive days. At any point of time , if you want to restore something you will data for 7 days also. 

[Colin_Weaver · Accepted solution]

Sorry SK but if he sets 7 day retention it will fail because overwrite protection is start at the end of the job but looking for overwriteable media starts at begining so if job takes 8 hours to run when the second week's rotation starts the tape will still be protected for 8 hours

You always need to set your required rotation minus the time the job should take to run (- a little bit more to cover variations) hence we usually recommend 6 day overwrite protection for a 7 day rotation

[sk7777]

Colin .. Totally agree with you .. Cheers... 

6 days retention for a 7 day rotation. 

Thanks. 

[pkh]

Inserting tapes into the tape library and setting the OPP is not sufficient to ensure that a new tape is used each night which is the OP's objective.  If the job is set to append, then it would probably use an old tape.  As I said earlier, the job needs to be set to Overwrite and not append if it is to use a new tape.