Order auf Tapes being used?

[Philipp_Zimmerm]

Hello,
I�m currently using a trial version of Backup Exec 11d with an HP Ultrium 3 (HP StorageWorks 1/8 Autoloader)

Right now, we are using 5 of the 8 slots for each Weekday. Monday to Friday (Slot 1 is the Monday Tape, Slot 2 = Tuesday, etc)

The Tapes were labled as MON_1, TUE_1, WED_1 and so on until FRI_6, since we are making backups in a six weeks intervall. They have also an sufficient overwrite protection.

The Backup itself is doing fine, except that the tapes are not being used in order from 1 to 5. For example, This is the last weeks Tape Order:

Monday - MON_4 (OK)
Tuesday - WED_4
Wednesay - FRI_4
Thursday - THU_4 (OK)
Friday - TUE_4

Since we bought the backup device 4 weeks ago, all media are empty.
Is there an option to definde how the tapes are being used?


Thanks for help!

[Philip_Pearson]

It will use the oldest tape first I believe.

The way around it is to partition your library in the device manager window, highlight the library and look at the menu on the left or click on the library with the right mouse button.

You can then create a different backup job for each day, each one directed to a different partition.

[Ricardo_Pistari]

As Philip said, you can partition your library and create a different job for each day.
You can also rely on media sets so your backups will go to the right tape, despite the slot you put them.

[Keith_Langmead]

Yes without partitions the backups will automatically choose which ever tape hasn't been used for the longest time. Obviously if at any point a backup fails to start for some reason, therefore not writing any data to a tape the whole sequence will be screwed up.

As for using media sets, you can't use them to control which tape is going to be used. Just because a tape has been assigned to one media set, backup exec can still select that tape for use by any other jobs that are using a different media sets, at which point it will simply be moved to the new media set instead.

[Philip_Pearson]

I found that out tthe hard way Keith

[Ken_Putnam]

One thing that helps, even though it does not guarantee anything is to make sure that the Global Option is set to

"Use Overwriteable media in target media set before scratch media" rather than scratch first.

But as Keith said, the only way to be absolutely sure which tape is used is to partition the loader