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Inventory results in Cleaning tapes

Peter_van_Leeuw
Level 4
I've been through the forum and knowledgebase but can't find anything that could be the cause in this particular case.

This has started out of the blue on a BE9.1 Build 4691 installation that has been running without these kind of issues for almost a year now. An inventory job will result in a bunch of cleaning tapes (sometimes used several times according to the BE statistics) that are data tapes in the real world.
These are fresh empty tapes that are recognised as cleaning tapes, even tapes that I labeled 30 minutes ago through BE after restarting the services again will show up as cleaning tape in the next inventory run or after the next backup job that tried to get a fresh tape from the autoloader.

Details:
BE 9.1 build 4691
Autoloader Exabyte 110L (SCSI ID 2) with only 1 LTO1 drive (SCSI ID 3) connected to an Adaptec 29160 (SCSI ID 7).

I'm a bit reluctant to apply BE 9.1 SP2 on the server since that means updating all Remote agents and the BE push technology is all but failproof in my experience. Any solution without updating is very welcome.

11 August: It get's better every day, tapes that could actually be used and are full with data are now also recognised as cleaning tapes. According to BE it was first used a month ago ?!?!?!
The event application log shows ADAMM mover errors and retries, the library log has no retries logged at all.
Please, please enlighten me somehow cause I'm out of a backup now.

Thanks in advance,
Peter van LeeuwenMessage was edited by:
Peter van Leeuwen
2 REPLIES 2

Renuka_-
Level 6
Hello,

Please check in the properties of the slot whether they are marked as cleaning tapes.


Additional Information :
For information on the recent VERITAS Backup Exec security vulnerabilities, including links to the downloads for the necessary hotfixes, please refer to the following document:
Patch summary for Security Advisories VX05-001, VX05-002, VX05-003, VX05-005, VX05-006, VX05-007

http://seer.support.veritas.com/docs/277429.htm

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

Peter_van_Leeuw
Level 4
A bit obvious, they're not marked as cleaning slots (unless I missed something and BE nowadays decides to determine that for himself)

Answer my own question::

Replace hardware, the drive recognises the difference between a data tape and a cleaning tape by checking for a gap in the cartridge on a certain position. This is a mechanical action in the drive. If the hardware has problems loading/unloading the tape in the drive or it takes too long the "gap-check" fails and the library/autoloader tells BE that it's a cleaning tape. I've replaced the drive and the symtoms disappeared.