adrianw Posted August 16, 2006 Report Share Posted August 16, 2006 Hello. Our current setup: Retrospect 6.1.126, Device Access Version 1.0.107, Driver Update Version 6.1.6.100 on a Power Macintosh G4 (AGP Graphics) running 10.4.7. An ATTO ExpressPCI UL4S (single-channel Ultra320 SCSI) controller with ATTO driver version 3.6.0 and flash version 1.5.0 card is connected to an OnStream ADR2 SCSI tape drive. OS X and ATTO's configuration tool (version 3.06) recognize both the SCSI controller and tape drive. However, Retrospect only sometimes recognizes the tape drive. In fact, a transfer of a backup set was successfully performed within the past 24 hours from a file set to a tape set using this SCSI controller and tape drive. A few hours after this successfully job, a scheduled job was configured to backup to the tape drive using a tape set. However, this failed with a an error message, "Can't find any tape storage devices." Within Retrospect viewing the devices (or "Storage Devices") the window reports "No backup devices found", yet under "Device Status..." the tape drive is listed under the "Currently visible devices..." at SCSI ID 3. This is both frustrating and confusing. Why does the tape drive intermittently appear and work sometimes but not at other times? Is there a Retrospect configuration file that can reset or rebuilt which might resolve this issue? Thank you, -Adrian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted August 16, 2006 Report Share Posted August 16, 2006 Sounds like you might have SCSI issues. Good cables? Short cables? Good terminators? Is the tape drive on the same circuit (UPS) as the server so that you don't have ground loop issues? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adrianw Posted August 16, 2006 Author Report Share Posted August 16, 2006 Quote: Sounds like you might have SCSI issues. Good cables? Short cables? Good terminators? Is the tape drive on the same circuit (UPS) as the server so that you don't have ground loop issues? The cable is brand new so I would hope it is good. The cable is 3 feet in length. As far as I know the terminators are fine. The tape drive is on the same circuit as the server. What confuses me is the fact that the OS and ATTO configuration tool seems to be able to recognize (or at least display the name of) the tape drive. Additionally, the device was working fine in the past 24 hours but since and before than it has not been recognized. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nekr0phage Posted August 30, 2006 Report Share Posted August 30, 2006 Hi Adrian, 'New' should not be equated with 'good'. I haven't gone through a lot of SCSI hardware personally, but I have had motherboards, hard drives, and RAM dead out of the box. You should take a careful look at this hardware before you assume it is working correctly. It is reasonable for the device to be recognized, after all, you say Retrospect technically sees it (in Device Status), it simply can't establish a connection with the drive in order to back up to it. When the drive is not showing in Configure>Devices, but is showing in Device Status, do you see a driver loaded for the tape drive in the Device Status window? As far as rebuilding Retrospect files, the only one that might have any effect would be the configuration file. You can find this at /Library/Preferences/Retrospect/Retro.Config (6.0). Quit Retrospect and remove this, then have your license code ready, as this file contains *all* your settings in Retrospect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adrianw Posted September 7, 2006 Author Report Share Posted September 7, 2006 Thank you for the reply. Having tried different cables, SCSI terminators, SCSI ID settings, and updating the Retrospect Driver Update Version to 6.1.7.101, the device is now listed in the Storage Devices window. Unfortunately, I do not know which one of the above changes caused the device to display (as I was not available to view and record the process of these changes). Now, having resolved this problem, there is an issue with backups to tapes not completing successfully. It seems that the backups will indefinitely wait after backing up and before verifying (with status such as rewinding). During these times, the Operations Log reports "Decompression failed due to corrupt input data" at the "Comparing" (verification) stage of a backup. Different media will be tried and disabling data compression. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
macmechanic Posted October 14, 2006 Report Share Posted October 14, 2006 I have had a very similar issue which has stumped me. I too am using the same ATTO SCSI card as above on a G5 with an HP StorageWorks Ultrium tape drive, which is ostensibly supported. At first, Retrospect could see the drive, but wrote data to it incredibly slowly. Now Retrospect cannot see the drive at all. Here are some of the things I've tried to resolve the issue, but to no avail: 1. Updated OS to 10.4.8 2. Updated Retrospect to most current version. 3. Updated firmware on ATTO card and updated driver for it. 4. Had the firmware on the tape drive updated (on a PC - no Mac tool to do this) 5. Cleaned the tape drive. 6. Removed and restored preferences, except for removing the config file which carries the serial number. 7. Purchased a more recent version of the ATTO card. 8. Zapped PRAM. 9. Reset motherboard 10. Created new user. 11. Tested tape drive and SCSI cable on a PC successfully. 12. Put card and tape drive in another G5 with the same result. In spite of all this, Retrospect still can't see the tape drive even though the ATTO card and the Mac System Profiler do. Is there anything I haven't tried that might be helpful? Any suggestions would be appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted October 15, 2006 Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 This sounds really odd. Are you saying that the drive is not seen in Configure > Devices and Configure > Devices > Device Status ? Russ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
macmechanic Posted October 15, 2006 Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 No the device isn't seen there either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phimac Posted November 9, 2006 Report Share Posted November 9, 2006 Did you already have a solution for this problem, because i've got the same problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted November 9, 2006 Report Share Posted November 9, 2006 Quote: Did you already have a solution for this problem, because i've got the same problem. Do you have EXACTLY the same hardware, software, firmware, driver versions as the original poster? What is shown in System Profiler? If you've got EXACTLY the same firmware and driver as the original poster, there is a more recent firmware and driver for the ATTO cards from ATTO; have you updated? You may have the same symptom but not the same problem, and you have not provided any facts so that we might try to assist. russ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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