Tape capacity incorrect

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

I searched the forum and found a bunch of info...but no answers. I'm running BE 10d on Windows 2003 server. I've got a Certance LTO3 Ultrium drive amd I'm using Maxell LTO3 tapes.

Every few days or so BE asks for a second tape for my backups. It doesn't happen every job, just about once a week or so...

Last night, as a test, I inventoried the tape and performed a *quick erase*. I should've checked the available tape capacity, but forgot (duh). This morning, I had to put in another tape because the LTO3 claimed to be full after only 289GB of data - capacity is 400GB (native). I just put in a new tape, and did an inventory and it appeared as , and had no statistics. I labeled the media (instead of doing a "quick erase") and the tape shows 400GB capacity.

Anyone run into anything similar? I have yet to break the 400GB mark on my tape backups...usually they're around 300GB.

Thanks much!

[Keith_Langmead]

Have you tried turning off compression to see what effect that has? Should help determine if the problem is with the data being written to the tape, or there is a problem with the compression such that you're getting a negative compression ratio somehow.

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

Thanks for reply...I will try that tonight.

I would assume an issue with compression would be consistent, and not sporadic, as in my case.

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

Turning off compression did not work... Tape capacity showed 401GB available, however, when backup to tape job kicked off it asked for a new tape after only 255GB written...

Anyone?

[Ken_Putnam]

I seem to remember something similar with LTO2 in the early v10 days

As I recall the "solution" was to use the manufacturer utility to initialize/format the tapes before letting BackupExec touch them


Certainly worth a try :)

[Bin_Fang_2]

Base on Symantec, the issue might be related to the drivers and device firmware used. For more details, see Document ID: 255054

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

It would appear I'm getting negative compression - 0.6:1 or lower at times. Any thoughts to what might be causing this? I've updated the Veritas tape driver - a bit leery to upgrade firmware as I use a Certance drive, which is now owned by Quantum...
Appreciate the help...

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

I've upgraded the drive firmware, but still have the issue. Seems I'm not the only one as there are two other recent threads with the same issue.

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

IT WAS THE TAPES!!!!

[Dr__Phil_Leonar]

After much troubleshooting, it turned out to be the tape...