Media server decommissioning on Netbackup 7 environment

[antonello]

Hi

In the next days i'll decommission two media servers ,

( NetBackup 7.1 Enterprise server, wiht media and master server running  on Linux REd Hat AS 4 U4 x86-64 and media server to be dismissed running on Solaris 9  ) .

and the procedure seems clear to me:

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH62119

Since devices attached to the media server contain NetBackup media i'm planning to use the detailed procedure depicted in the above web page

from Symantec;

My question cover the point 2) of the procedure :

"2. Use the NetBackup Administration Console to move the tapes in the robots that are attached to <old_server> to non-robotic status (standalone).  Select each robot that is attached to <old_server>. Select all of the tapes and move them to standalone (select Actions > Move)."

when i run the GUI i've no possibilities to move the tapes to non-robotic status, or standalone , because of the standalone option is not present in the robot pull down menu .... 

Could you help me to know how to do it ?

Feel free to ask for any further detail.

Thanks a lot

Regards

Antonello

[Mark_Solutions]

you should have this - you must be in the Robot Section to do this and have right clicked and then selected "Move"

[antonello]

Hi Mark

That's what i expected , but i cannot see the option Standalone in my pull down menu :

[Mark_Solutions]

If you uncheck the box that says "volume is in a robotic library" what does that do?

[antonello]

In that case all the subsequent options are grayed out , no way to select anything ...

i was wondering if i could use vmchange from command line to move the volumes in standalone ...

[Mark_Solutions]

So if you uncheck the box and click the OK button does it move that one out of the library?

If not vmchange should be able to do it - ill get back to you with the command

[antonello]

At the moment i cannot move that tape, it's still in use , but soon i'll try to do it.

Ok, i'll wait for your indication , thanks a lot

[Mark_Solutions]

In use .... best not to do anything just yet then!

Of course once you are ready the easiest way is to go and take the tapes out of the library and run an inventory at which point they will all go to standalone residence.

The command you need is below - media type needs to be lower case and is similar to hcart3, the volume group will be one that is not in your library. This may be --- (that is three minus's)

vmchange -res -m <media_id> -mt <media_type> -v <volume_group>

[Omar_Villa]

If the GUI doesnt help you can tpconfig -delete the drive and if you realy need it Standalone use tpconfig -add but add it without the robot parameters that will make it stand alone.

[Marianne · Accepted solution]

DO NOT MOVE MEDIA TO STANDALONE!

The following:
"move the tapes in the robots that are attached to <old_server> to non-robotic status"
is ONLY applicable if the media server to be decommisioned is the robot control host, i.e. robot is SCSI or SAN attached to the media server and 'tpconfig -l' on this media server shows a local device name (/dev/....) for the robot.

Your robot is ACS, therefore no media server is the robot control host.

You can therefore skip this step and carry on with the the rest of the steps.

ONE MORE THING:

TECH62119 applies to 6.5 and 7.0 without nbdecommission.

Use nbdecommission as per this TN: http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO43775

For more info about this command, read http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH125192 

(Do not download the tool at the bottom - 7.1 already has a new, updated version of nbdecommission.)

[antonello]

Hi All

I thank you all very much for the hints

I think Marianne suggested the proper way to decommission the old media servers,

i missed that Howto when searching for a solution.

As i'll be ready to proceed i'll report to you results of the process

Since this decommission will be done in some days , i'll keep you up-to-date.

Regards

[antonello]

Hi

nbdecommission made his job perfectly,

media server are now dismissed and removed from environment.

All tape images owned by old media servers have been moved automatically to new media server.

Thanks to you all,

i'll mark Marianne suggestion as solution.

Best regards

Antonello