Mixing LTO 5 and LTO 6 tapes in a tapelibrary

[DV1UBY]

Currently we are using LTO 5 tapes in Dell POwerVault TL2000 tape library. We are planning to have LTO 6 tapes for monthly and yearly backup/duplications. Is it good to have a mixed LTO 5/LTO 6 tapes in a library? By the way we will use LTO 5 in daily and weekly backups and duplications. Please advise thanks.

We are Symantec NBU 7.5.0.6 user.

[Nicolai · Accepted solution]

I would say it quite normal to have many types of LTO in a robot over time. It is important you get bar codes that reflect LTO6 tapes and that the barcode range is uniquely identifiable for LTO6.

Eg. 

LTO5 : A10000
LTO6 : B10000

Please be advised you need to seperate the LTO tapes into diffrent volumes pools. Use the "override volume pool" in the schedules. For the daily and weekly use the volume pool defined for the policy. But for the monthly and yearly schedules, configure it to override the policy pool and use the pool defined for LTO6.

http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO34701

[Marianne]

I agree with Nicolai. As long as your tape library supports multiple drive types, all is good.

Just be sure to config different drive types (densities) in NBU for each type, e.g.
LTO5 - hcart2
LTO6 - hcart3
(NBU defaults)

Most important is to provide matching densities for media.

Although these drive types can write to the same media, this is not possible in NBU.
You will need hcart2 media for hcart2 drives and hcart3 media for hcart3 drives,

Add barcode rules to ensure that the tapes for each drive type automatically goes to correct pool and density.