Force Re-Label of Tapes

[Seth_E]

Hi there,

We are using a lot of tapes (scratch) from an old backup system (TSM) to our new Netbackup environment. Checkin of tapes is not a problem, but, sometimes media gets frozen as internal label does not match external label. I can manually run label and this fixes the issue, but, is there a way to get Netbackup to force re-label upon import of media?

[Raghav_tv]

You may try selecting all Media at one go and select Label Option.

[RiaanBadenhorst · Accepted solution]

You can use bplabel

http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO43667

Also tick the media overwrite options

http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO14633

[Marianne]

Are you sure it is because of internal/external label mismatch? Not maybe because of different format on the tape (e.g. ANSI, TAR, CPIO, etc.)?

To force-overwrite these media types, go to Host Properties -> Media Server -> Media.
In Allow media overwrite property, select all of these media types.
Do this for all media servers.

If issue is really with external/internal label mismatch, the only way to force-relabel is to do it manually (GUI or in a script).

[Seth_E]

Yes, force overwrite is already enabled under media server properties, so, I'm sure it's because these tapes belonged to TSM. Relabelling them manually seems to do the trick.

[Seth_E]

Yeah, bplabel seems to be an option, but, it would be great if Netbackup would overwrite the label upon import. Anyway, thanks!

[Marianne]

Please show us Job Details of an instance where such a tape is FROZEN?

[SymTerry]

Yes please post the detailed status of a failing job. 

FYI: The following Status Codes can cause, or be a result of frozen media: 

Status Code	Reason
84 - Media Write Error	If the tape unit can not read or write to the tape correctly, this status code can occur when media are frozen
86 - Media Position Error	If the tape unit can not read or write to the tape correctly, this status code can occur when media are frozen
96 - Unable to allocate new media	If media continue to become frozen, the backup job may end in a Status 96, because no more media available to mount.