Media question

[Shahin]

Hi,

Could someone explain to me how Backup exec choose a tape in a pool?

I have a pool with 15 slots and also have 4 jobs, week1,week2, week3 and week4. each job use 2 slots and each 2 slots has its own Media set, media set 1,2,3 and 4. each media set have 2 weeks of over write time.

Last Friday Job week1 starts and there was 2 empty tape in media set 1, Today I see that Job week 1 toke a correct tape from where it should but the second tape was taken from a slot that was for last month week 2 and tapes in that pool had expaired backup sets.

I understand if both tapes of week 1 pool was full and job would pick a tape from a different slots and it would take an tape with expaired backup sets, but there was a empty tape in week 1 media sets!!

Any suggestion??

Thanks

[pkh]

Read the tape management section of the Admin Guide

[Shahin]

Thank you for your feedback.

I already read the media menagement of the BE 16, What I dont understand is why BE job that should use the tapes that are in its own media set  and choose a scratch media that is in a different media set!?

[RogRubin]

Within the General Backup Exec Settings you have a radio button which allows you to choose between these two options:

Overwrite scratch media before overwriting recyclable media contained in the targeted media set

Backup Exec will overwrite scratch media first before overwriting recyclable media when an overwrite job occurs. If there is no scratch media in any of the storage devices, Backup Exec overwrites recyclable media in the targeted media set. If there is no recyclable media found, Backup Exec automatically searches for other media to overwrite. Which media is overwritten depends on the level of overwrite protection (Full, Partial, or None) that has been set. If this option is selected, more media may be required for the same number of jobs as compared to when it has been chosen to overwrite recyclable media first. Because this option affects the order in which Backup Exec overwrites media, choosing to overwrite scratch media first may allow the recyclable media to be preserved longer for possible recovery.

  Overwrite recyclable media contained in the targeted media set before overwriting scratch media

Backup Exec will overwrite recyclable media in the targeted media set before overwriting scratch media when an overwrite job occurs. If there is no recyclable media in any of the storage devices, Backup Exec overwrites scratch media. If no recyclable or scratch media are found, Backup Exec automatically searches for media to overwrite. Which media is overwritten depends on the level of overwrite protection that has been set (Full, Partial or None). If it has been chosen to overwrite recyclable media in the targeted media set first, the same media will be reused more frequently as compared to when it has been chosen to overwrite scratch media first.