VTL and physical tape library get stuck at mounting

[jinxnbu]

Hi I have a new setup

with a physical tape library 4048 and a VTL emulated as ESL E-series and jobs to both get stuck at "mounting"

Netbackup 7.6.0.1 (windows 2012)

Below is the output I get from various commands before I configure the storage devices. 

c:\Program Files\Veritas\Volmgr\bin>tpautoconf.exe -t
TPAC60 HP      Ultrium 6-SCSI  23CW HU1338YDY9 1 0 0 0 Tape0 - -
TPAC60 HP      Ultrium 6-SCSI  23CW HU1338YDW8 1 0 1 0 Tape1 - -
TPAC60 HP      Ultrium 5-SCSI  ED51 CZ134309V4 1 0 20 0 Tape2 - -
TPAC60 HP      Ultrium 5-SCSI  ED51 CZ134309V2 1 0 21 0 Tape3 - -
TPAC60 HP      Ultrium 5-SCSI  ED51 CZ134309V3 1 0 22 0 Tape4 - -
TPAC60 HP      Ultrium 5-SCSI  ED51 CZ134309V5 1 0 23 0 Tape5 - -

c:\Program Files\Veritas\Volmgr\bin>tpautoconf.exe -r
TPAC60 HP      MSL G3 Series   8.60 MXA343Z0SD 1 0 1 1 Changer0 - -
TPAC60 HP      ESL E-Series    EL51 CZ13430B00 1 0 8 0 - - -

Output of scan

------------------------------------------------------------
Device Name  : "Changer0"
Passthru Name: "Changer0"
Volume Header: ""
Port: 1; Bus: 0; Target: 1; LUN: 1
Inquiry    : "HP      MSL G3 Series   8.60"
Vendor ID  : "HP      "
Product ID : "MSL G3 Series   "
Product Rev: "8.60"
Serial Number: "MXA343Z0SD"
WWN          : ""
WWN Id Type  : 0
Device Identifier: "HP      MSL G3 Series   MXA343Z0SD"
Device Type    : SDT_CHANGER
NetBackup Robot Type: 8
Removable      : Yes
Device Supports: SCSI-5
Number of Drives : 3
Number of Slots  : 48
Number of Media Access Ports: 0
Drive 1 Serial Number      : "HU1338YDW8"
Drive 2 Serial Number      : "HU1338YDY9"
Drive 3 Serial Number      : "HU1338YDY9"
Flags : 0x0
Reason: 0x0
------------------------------------------------------------
Device Name  : ""
Passthru Name: ""
Volume Header: ""
Port: 1; Bus: 0; Target: 8; LUN: 0
Inquiry    : "HP      ESL E-Series    EL51"
Vendor ID  : "HP      "
Product ID : "ESL E-Series    "
Product Rev: "EL51"
Serial Number: "CZ13430B00"
WWN          : ""
WWN Id Type  : 0
Device Identifier: "HP      ESL E-Series    CZ13430B00"
Device Type    : SDT_CHANGER
NetBackup Robot Type: 8
Removable      : Yes
Device Supports: SCSI-3
Number of Drives : 4
Number of Slots  : 96
Number of Media Access Ports: 1
Flags : 0x0
Reason: 0x0

Issue I am having is that while configuring devices the drives dont show as attached to the tape library and lists as standalone.I manually try and add the drives to each robot and seems to work only that during the backup test the job is stuck at mounting for VTL and MSL library. 

Couple of things I noticed.. 

1) In the above output of scan the 2nd changer (VTL) doesnt show any device name or pass thru name.. 

Under device manager this shows up as unknown medium changer even though the drivers are installed and i cant seem to get it to change.

2) While configuring the MSL 4048 library using the device config wizrd in the box where it shows "review the devices netbackup has found" the MSL has an red X sign stating unusable. When i check the properties it shows "Illegal drive type in robot."

But this is a standard MSL 4048 HP tape library with LTO6 tape drives . 

I dont see any hardware related errors in event logs. 

Any suggestions..for both these issues ?

Thanks

[Marianne]

No drivers are needed for robot/library, only for the tape drives. So, both physical and VTL should show up as Unknown Medium Changer in Device Manager. Definitely looks like something is wrong with VTL config. You will notice that scan output says there are 4 drives, but none are listed. Use robtest to test mount/unmount of tapes in physical robot. Once scan shows correct output for VTL, reconfig in NBU and also test mounts with robtest. (Curious to know why people are still using VTL... NBU knows how to properly use disk without needing it to look like tape.)

[jinxnbu]

Hi Marianne,

Sorry about mentioning two issues in 1 post. 

I will talk only about VTL in this one.. 

Since i thought it was an issue with drivers I managed to update them anyways and now scan shows the 4 drives associated to the VTL changer. 

------------------------------------------------------------
Device Name  : "Changer1"
Passthru Name: "Changer1"
Volume Header: ""
Port: 1; Bus: 0; Target: 8; LUN: 0
Inquiry    : "HP      ESL E-Series    EL51"
Vendor ID  : "HP      "
Product ID : "ESL E-Series    "
Product Rev: "EL51"
Serial Number: "CZ13430B00"
WWN          : ""
WWN Id Type  : 0
Device Identifier: "HP      ESL E-Series    CZ13430B00"
Device Type    : SDT_CHANGER
NetBackup Robot Type: 8
Removable      : Yes
Device Supports: SCSI-3
Number of Drives : 4
Number of Slots  : 96
Number of Media Access Ports: 1
Flags : 0x0
Reason: 0x0

However i still have to manually attach the drives to the robot and running a backup gives the same result. just hangs there at mounting. Just updated the device mapping files as well but no luck.

[jinxnbu]

Since both VTL and physical library are behaving the same way.. (stuck at mounting) i am wondering if there is something else in the conifguration i am missing ?

[Marianne · Accepted solution]

I also feel that you should concentrate on one of them. Still a problem with scan output. VTL says 4 drives but lists nothing. It should report drives like this section of physical library output: Number of Drives : 3 Number of Slots : 48 Number of Media Access Ports: 0 Drive 1 Serial Number : "HU1338YDW8" Drive 2 Serial Number : "HU1338YDY9" Drive 3 Serial Number : "HU1338YDY9" It seems to me like VTL config issue. Even above output seems suspect as drive 2 and 3 shows same serial number. This should not be possible. Get NBU out of the picture. Test mounts and dismount with robtest.

[jinxnbu]

For the VTL now the scan shows the correct output with the 4 drives 

I can do robtest mount and unmount on each of the those drives successfully

Device Name  : "Changer1"
Passthru Name: "Changer1"
Volume Header: ""
Port: 1; Bus: 0; Target: 8; LUN: 0
Inquiry    : "HP      ESL E-Series    EL51"
Vendor ID  : "HP      "
Product ID : "ESL E-Series    "
Product Rev: "EL51"
Serial Number: "CZ13430B00"
WWN          : ""
WWN Id Type  : 0
Device Identifier: "HP      ESL E-Series    CZ13430B00"
Device Type    : SDT_CHANGER
NetBackup Robot Type: 8
Removable      : Yes
Device Supports: SCSI-3
Number of Drives : 4
Number of Slots  : 96
Number of Media Access Ports: 1
Flags : 0x0
Reason: 0x0

[Marianne]

Nope. Still not listing each of the 4 drives with their serial numbers. And physical robot shows 2 drives with same serial numbers. What does 's d' in robtest show for the 2 robots?

[jinxnbu]

Sorry Marianne, I understood what you were pointing at about the 4 drives and their serial nos. 

I have only configured the VTL now and heres the s d result for robtest. 

Opening {1,0,8,0}
MODE_SENSE complete
Enter tld commands (? returns help information)
s d
drive 1 (addr 4096) access = 1 Contains Cartridge = no
drive 2 (addr 4097) access = 1 Contains Cartridge = no
drive 3 (addr 4098) access = 1 Contains Cartridge = no
drive 4 (addr 4099) access = 1 Contains Cartridge = no
READ_ELEMENT_STATUS complete

I just got 1 job to complete. I let the job jsut be in mounting state and stepped away for awhile and it seems like it tried mounting the tape on a couple of drives and finally mounted it on drive 4. and completed writing a single in about 20 mins. 

Thinking of downing the other 3 drives and running a job directly to drive 4 to narrow it down further. 

[jinxnbu]

Well downing the 3 drives and running job to 4th drive behaved wierdly. Backup didnt start.. No drives available .. which is strange cos the 4th drive is showing empty with no tapes in it. 

[mph999]

Power cycle everything, including VTL, just occasionally it fixes this sort of issue. 

[Marianne]

Add VERBOSE entry to vm.conf and restart NBU Device Manager service. Device errors will be logged in Event Viewer System and Application logs. Curious to know how devices are attached. Same or different hba?

[jinxnbu]

I had the storage guy recreate the VTL and drives and was able to configure it in NBU successfully.