Saturated media on backup exec (11d) job

[siff]

Hi everyone,

I've got a problem with my backup jobs.

I use LTO 4 tape to backup a file server and a folder where my VM's are stored (backup with quest Vranger pro dpp).

I run a full backup every night.

The problem is when the tape is filled with about 750GB of data, backup exec stop the night job and ask for another tape. The tape and policy are configured to allow rewriting on these tapes. So I've to cancel the night job and reintroduce the tape to run normally. the total amount of data to backup is about 350GB.

Is it possible that backup exec check this amount of data for the job before starting it ? So it would erase the tape before and start with the empty tape ?

The rotation is mond, tues, wen, thu, frid1, frid2, frid3, frid4, frid5 and 1 tape/month.

I hope you understand my bad english ! Thank you.

[AmolB]

The problem is when the tape is filled with about 750GB of data, backup exec stop the night job and ask for another tape. The tape and policy are configured to allow rewriting on these tapes. So I've to cancel the night job and reintroduce the tape to run normally. the total amount of data to backup is about 350GB.

Once the tape is full BE will prompt for an overwritable media, so instead of cancelling the job you 

may continuce the same job by inserting an overwriatable media. If you want entire 350GB on the

same tape then instead of appending you need to configure backups jobs to overwrit.

Also configure media set with proper overwrite protection so that overwritable tapes are available at the 

time of backups.

[CraigV]

Hi,

You can do a pre-scan on the job itself, but this just adds time to the backup window.

The job might be configured to overwirte the tapes, but if your Append/OPP settings on your media set are incorrect, then the tapes won't be overwritten. For example, the OPP (overwrite protection period) might be set too high...if so, the tape doesn't become overwritable/scratch causing your backup to ask for a new tape.

If you're writing 750GB to the tape, then your tapes are probably set to append, which might be overriding the OPP settings.

Check those, make the necessary changes, and try again.

Thanks!

[Colin_Weaver · Accepted solution]

Basic answer to you question is you can't get backup exec to work out if the next backup will fit on the remaining space on a tape for you.

As such if you think you can get 2 backups on one tape, then manage you media to allow for this (i.e. only allow 1 day of append) and then when the media is reused (after whatever overwrite protection you want) it will be overwritten at the start of a job and therefore not completely fill up and ask for another tape 

If you can't quite get 2 backups on 1 tape then set the append to 0 days and only keep one backup on a tape.

Other option is use a tape library and multiple tapes.