waldorfm Posted October 26, 2005 Report Share Posted October 26, 2005 IBM Ultrium 3584 tape library. Emulex LP9002, 3.90a7 Windows 2k latest updates Multiserver 7.0.326, Driver update 7.0.8.103 I had some trouble using this tape library in the first place, but sorted things out by settings of the Emulex fiber card and creating logical libraries. So I had one server using drive #1 with 20 tapes assigned, and another server using drive #2 with also 20 tapes assigned. The split of the library into logical libraries is done inside the configuration of the IBM Ultrium device. Regarding the settings of the Emulex card it was necessary to set it to auto-configure LUN and delete inactive or previous devices seen. Without the above configuration Retrospect would be confused about which drive is in use, or it is not possible to move any tapes into the drives. Moving tapes to the i/o slots works though. So far everything went ok, until we had additional 4 drives installed, so that it has a total of 6 drives now. The symptom is that I cannot use Retrospect to utilize any more drives. It would see the drive, e.g. drive #3, and the library, but it would not allow me to move any tapes into the drive. I spend quite some time trying to troubleshoot this issue, including drive and Emulex firmware, rearranging drive library assignments and using different Windows device drivers for use with ASPI instead of NT Passthrough, clean Retrospect configurations, etc., but no luck. My findings are that Retrospect does not work with the tape library if any physical slots above 40 are used, although the logical tape library sees only it's assigned part. IBM told me that there is only a difference in size regarding the Ultrium 3580 - 3583, for which Retrospect has support according to the compatibility listing. With NT Passthrough I see only the drive, and not the library at all, which uses the same SCSI ID, but LUN 1 - LUN 0 is the drive, and this cannot be changed. Is there any chance to get Retrospect to fully support the 3584 soon? I would have never purchased such a monster, because for the cost of just one drive it is possible to buy muliple smaller units. Anyway I will be forced to change to a different backup product, which I would prefer not to do. Please help. Best regards, Markus Waldorf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
natew Posted October 27, 2005 Report Share Posted October 27, 2005 Hi Do you have the Retrospect advanced tape support option installed? To clarify, if no backups are running in Retropsect you still cannot move a tape into a drive? Make sure the windows drivers for the tape drive and library are disabled. Thanks nate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted November 1, 2005 Author Report Share Posted November 1, 2005 Hi Nate, I had similar issues a while ago and discussed it in the Dantz server forum - I already went through several steps of troubleshooting, including NT passthrough vs. ASPI, and possible scsi issues. ASPI does not see the library or drive. The only solution at that time was to partition the unit into logical tape libraries - which one would do anyway, and a drive firmware upgrade. Yes, the windows drivers are disabled. The symptom is that if I want to move a tape from the library to the empty drive it let's me select the tape, but won't highlight the drive to drop it onto. Using the toolbar instead to move a tape into the drive has no affect. I can move tapes to the i/o slots and between slots though. It seems to affect any logical library that utilizes slots beyond the first 40 drive slots of the whole unit. The logical libraries are setup inside the IBM library, which has it's own configuration to propagate it's drives and logical libraries. Best regards, Markus Waldorf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
natew Posted November 3, 2005 Report Share Posted November 3, 2005 Hi Type CTRL + ALT + P + P at any screen in Retrospect and set devices logging to 7. Then attempt to moce the tape as you described. Your Retrospect log will be full of SCSI commands but may have some errors that will be helpful. Can you post the last 30 or so lines of that log? Thanks Nate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted November 4, 2005 Author Report Share Posted November 4, 2005 Hi Nate, Unfortunately the problem is solved, and I have no idea what did it. I setup a test computer to experiment with the utilization of the 3rd drive and tape slots. I installed the latest Retrospect driver update from a few days ago, and moving tapes to the drive was working fine. I thought it would be the Retrospect driver update, so I put the previous back in to verify, but it still worked. I started to analyze the differences between the machines. The difference with one other computer is the fiber channel driver. Instead of the SCSIMiniport SCSI driver I used the emulex FC Port driver for SCSI only or concurrent SCSI and IP on single or multiple HBA's. One computer is using the SCSIMiniport driver, one the FC Port driver 2.3, and the test machine FC Port dirver 2.4. All emulex firmware, and Windows is the same. To see if it's a driver issue I installed the the older drivers on the test computer, but it still works. Is it a problem with the Retrospect configuration file? But when I had this problem before I already recreated the configuration from scratch, asking for license number, which did not solve the problem. There were also several restarts of the computer. Is Retrospect storing the device configuration anywhere else than the configuration file? Btw, I noticed that the FC port driver 2.3 on the old machine showed some strange characters in the name. Maybe the driver installation was currupted. Could this have been why I had so many troubles with it due to Retrospect frequent crashing? Anyway, it was not the issue with the inability to move the tape to the drive since the same problem was on another machine, albeit a different FC driver. It's all strange and confusing. I will do the Ctrl-Alt-PP thing when the problem occurs again. At the moment I cannot reproduce the issue. And don't have time or intend to mess around with it for now - glad it's working! How is Retrospect dealing with device/tape name caching? Best regards, Markus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
natew Posted November 8, 2005 Report Share Posted November 8, 2005 Hi This is good news. I have my doubts that this is a Retrospect only problem. It really sounds like commands were not accurately reaching the library. That would point to FC drivers but it is hard to say. The strange characters are definitely something of concern. There is no reason they should display improperly unless you have a Japanese version of the driver or something... Thanks Nate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted November 10, 2005 Author Report Share Posted November 10, 2005 If I look at this issue in "retrospect" I would come to the following conclusion: All test servers were using the same hardware, same firmware, same version of windows and patches, same configuration of FC driver, etc. The assigned tapes were all the same firmware, albeit different scsi ID's. Using a different FC driver was to key to fix the problem with communicating with the 3rd tape drive and up on one computer, but it was not possible to cross-check to isolate the problem with FC driver versions. There was no problem with servers were Retrospect was installed for the first time, regardless of the used FC driver. Deleting the Retrospect config file did not solve the issue. I would say the problem looks like a Windows or FC driver chaching or refresh issue, unless Retrospect caches some stuff too which is not in the config file. Best regards, Markus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted June 17, 2006 Author Report Share Posted June 17, 2006 I'm back again with the same issue. This time I have connected the 5th drive of the library. I verified all firmware, FC HBA settings and drivers with an installation where it's working and cannot see any difference. The windows drivers for the tape changer and drive are disabled. The library is setup with logical libraries so in Retrospect I see only one drive and appropriate library slots. Everything looks good so far. The symptom is the same: I can see the tape drive and the tape library, including the import/export slots. I can move tapes around in the library and import/export slots, but cannot move any tape to the empty drive. Tried dragging as well as right click to erase and move the tape - nothing happens. I also deleted the retrospect configuration and started from scratch, asking me for registration number. I also changed the SCSI target id from 0 to 4. No luck. I set device debug logging to 7. It's constantly building up logs regarding the library slots and barcodes. Nothing appears when I try to move a tape to the drive. It's like the drive does not exist. The only thing in the log that may have something to do with the problem is when retrospect starts: SCSI 7:4:0: .... has devIdentifier "IBM ULT350-TD2 1110306764" SCSI 7:4:0: ... [58 bytes].. scsiPvNTGetNCNDevice: tape255 err 2 addr 0x4 ScsiNTSetMCN: addr 0x4 disable 1 failed, couldn't get handle Any more ideas? Best regards, Markus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted June 20, 2006 Author Report Share Posted June 20, 2006 Changed the pci slot and card. Reinstalled all drivers, etc. Still no luck. Compared to a working device list I notice the following: when it works is shows IBM Ultrium 3484 with the Tape and Library as sub-devices. In the configuration where it doesn't, the Tape and Library appear as devices on their own. That would explain why I cannot move any tape from the library into the tape drive as they appear not connected. Why, I don't know. Lun mapping is configured the same way as it is with the other working configurations. I also deleted and set it manually, but no change. I don't see any problem. Any ideas please? Best regards, Markus Waldorf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted June 20, 2006 Author Report Share Posted June 20, 2006 Problem just fixed.... I replaced the rdu driver from a different server and everything seems running fine now. I downloaded the latest driver update from the support website, and it seems now that this was the problem. The driver update I use now is 7.0.5.102. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waldorfm Posted February 1, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 1, 2007 Ran into the same issue again today. This time I solved it by deleting all drives in the device mapping in Emulex config. Disabled automatic lun and scsi mapping, and added the drive and lun mapping manually. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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