Partitioning problem

[Marcus-Ki]

Hi

I am running backup exec to control a sl150 tape library (windows server 2012 r2). I have not figured out how to configure the partitions the way i would like it.

I would like to have use multiple partitions with the ability to add tapes to them. Right now I am running ~120 tapes in my library. I would like to create 5 partitions like follows:

Partition 1: tape 1 - 10
Partition 2: tape 11 - 20
Partition 3: tape 21 - 30
Partition 4: tape 31 - 40
Partition 5: tape 41 - 50

Partition 6: rest of the tapes as a extra pool.

If i now add tapes to one partition it will cange to 1 - 11, 12 - 21 et.c.

What I would like is to be able to exten the partition to unused tapes so that if i add new tapes to the first partition i can add the forst emtpy tapes in my "spare" partition. This would then look like:
 

Partition 1: tape 1 - 10; (+) tape 50 - 55
Partition 2: tape 11 - 20
Partition 3: tape 21 - 30
Partition 4: tape 31 - 40
Partition 5: tape 41 - 50

And ofcorse i would then shrink my "spare" partition with the amount of tapes i used. This would allow me to distribute the tapes as they are needed.

Is there a way to do this with backup exec? if I extend a partition with more tape and all it does is moves the the tapes from the following partition in to the first on i dont get any more storage space since it will contain the data of from the partition it was in before.

Was this understandable or do I need to make it clearer?

I hope anyone of you can tell me how to do this.

BR

Marcus

[CraigV]

These partitions are not dynamic in any way. They won't look for tapes outside of a partition if a backup job requires them. In a situation like this, the job will either queue, or fail. Not search outside of it.

You need to make sure that the slots assigned to partitions are enough to allow backup jobs to continue...otherwise you'll have to import/export tapes.

Thanks!

[Marcus-Ki]

I think you answered my questions, but I will clarefy a little.

I dont expect the system to look for a free media. I just want the abilety to add tapes that are not sequential to the partition.

Right now I can only exten the partition to the next sequential tape. So if i have 3 partitions. 1: tape 1 to 20. 2: tape 21 - 40 and a spare pool of tapes 41 - 100.

If i add tapes to the first partition it grabs the next in the sequence e.g. tape 21, 22, 23 et.c. But those are already part of the second partition. This makes my new partition table like this:

partition 1: tape 1 - 23, partition 2: 24 - 44, and partition 3: tape 45 - 100. 

Problem here is that tape 21, 22 and 23 already carries data from partition 2. 

So what would I like to do is add non sequentioal tapes to the partition. so if I i use the above table:

partitions. 1: tape 1 to 20. 2: tape 21 - 40 and a spare pool of tapes 41 - 100.

I would like to extend partition 1 (manually, when i see that its needed I will manually go in and add tapes to the partition) with 1 more tape at a time. It would make the managing of the tapes a bit more dynamic, even if i have to do it manually.

So I would like to use the partition table above and then exten the first partition with tape 41 so partition 1 would be:

tape 1 - 20 + tape 41  (and then set the third partition to tape 42 - 100)

Right now i have no use of assigning 40 tapes to one partition. I would rather have the option to create more partitions if the need arises.

But as I said, you probably answeded my question with the line  "These partitions are not dynamic in any way.".

Marcus

[Colin_Weaver]

Sorry but as well as not being dynamic (so you can't hot add an extra slot into a partition), partitions also have to be contiguous

[Marcus-Ki]

Ok, then I know. I had hoped that Backup exec could do it with the software, but i guess that was to much to hope for.

Thank you for the information.

BR

Marcus