ReneGarneau Posted December 6, 2007 Report Share Posted December 6, 2007 Mac OS 10.4.11, Retrospect 6.1.138 I'm trying to back-up to a tape called "1-THURSDAY", but the tape is full, so I get the message to put in a new tape and it will be named "2-THURSDAY" – So, I eject the "1-THURSDAY" and I put in a new blank tape; it loads (and I see "empty" where the tape name should be, in the dialog window) and then it unloads the tape, without backing up anything. Can someone tell me what's happening here and how to solve it? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twickland Posted December 7, 2007 Report Share Posted December 7, 2007 If the drive reports "Empty" after you insert the tape cartridge, there may be a problem with the tape itself. Have you tried inserting another blank tape? If this doesn't work, please report back with more information about your system, including the Retrospect application and RDU versions, the backup computer's hardware and OS, the type of tape drive you're using and its manufacturer, and how the drive is connected to your computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 7, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 7, 2007 Another blank tape did the same thing. G4 466 MHz, Mac OS 10.4.11, Retrospect 6.1.138, Driver Update Version: 6.1.13.101 (is that RDU version?) Tape Drive: Exabyte VXA-2 210D, Firewire Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twickland Posted December 7, 2007 Report Share Posted December 7, 2007 If you go to Configure> Devices without a tape in the drive, it should display as "Empty." If you then insert one of the tested blank tapes, does the drive now accept the tape, and does it show the tape as "Erased?" If you insert other tapes in the drive that you were previously able to write data to, does the drive accept each tape and display the correct name of the tape? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 10, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 10, 2007 Quote: If you go to Configure> Devices without a tape in the drive, it should display as "Empty." If you then insert one of the tested blank tapes, does the drive now accept the tape, and does it show the tape as "Erased?" It rejects the blank tape. If I put a tape that I previously wrote data to it, it loads and displays the correct name of the tape. What does that mean? René Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twickland Posted December 11, 2007 Report Share Posted December 11, 2007 Your testing shows that the problem is not with Retrospect, but is either with the tapes or the tape drive. The fact that the tape ejects upon loading suggests either that the tape is defective or that it is incompatible with your drive (or at least the drive thinks that is the case). These new blank tapes that you're trying to use-- are they exactly the same brand, capacity and product number that you used successfully before? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 11, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 11, 2007 Thanks for your answer. They are exactly the same capacity and product number. As far as the Brand, well the new ones don't have the company name on the front, and the company name and their address are not on the back. That's the only difference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 12, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 12, 2007 Sure enough, I found a blank tape that had the company name on the front (Exabyte) and this one loads fine. Exabyte was bought by Tandberg and, since then, they took out Exabyte logo from the Packaging and those are the ones that don't work. Huh! Thanks. That narrows it down. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted December 12, 2007 Report Share Posted December 12, 2007 Simply FYI, I had a batch of bad VXA-2 tapes from Exabyte last year. It happens. Hard to diagnose. However, you may be having a different thing happening. Exabyte (uh, Tandberg) may be formatting the tapes for VXA-3 (a/k/a/ VXA-320) - there is a different header put on the tapes for VXA-320. If that's the case, you need to force the drive to lay down the VXA-2 (a/k/a/ VXA-172) header first. Not sure how to make that happen, but I think you can do it from vxatool if you quit Retrospect first and do things from the front panel of the autoloader. Russ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 13, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2007 Quote: However, you may be having a different thing happening. Exabyte (uh, Tandberg) may be formatting the tapes for VXA-3 (a/k/a/ VXA-320) - there is a different header put on the tapes for VXA-320. If that's the case, you need to force the drive to lay down the VXA-2 (a/k/a/ VXA-172) header first. Not sure how to make that happen, but I think you can do it from vxatool if you quit Retrospect first and do things from the front panel of the autoloader. Russ I did some more troubleshooting, and I updated the Firmware; but the tapes still don't load. I think you maybe right in saying that these tapes are probably formatted for VXA-3 – I'm having our purchase department looking into replacing them. Our drive doesn't have the autoloader. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted December 13, 2007 Report Share Posted December 13, 2007 Quote: I think you maybe right in saying that these tapes are probably formatted for VXA-3 – I'm having our purchase department looking into replacing them. Interesting, because some people have been complaining that they weren't getting full VXA-3 (VXA-320) capacity out of their drives, and investigation revealed that it was because the tapes were being manufactured with VXA-2 headers; erasing them with the VXA-3 (VXA-320) prior to first use fixed this. Confusion at Exabyte / Tandberg may have caused them to start making the tapes with VXA-3 (VXA-320) headers in response, which would obviously cause problems for the VXA-2 people. Except for the batch of bad (marginal) X23 tapes last year, all recent X23 tapes I have received have been fine in the past year. The correct Exabyte part numbers for VXA-2 tapes are: X23 (230 meters) 111.00221 (80 GB uncomressed, 160 GB compressed - we see about 115 GB with our data) X10 (124 meters) 111.00206 (40 GB / 80 GB) X6 (62 meters) 111.00200 (20 GB / 40 GB) VXA-3 (VXA-320) data capacity is twice the VXA-2 amount on the same tapes. Russ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 13, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2007 Quote: Quote: The correct Exabyte part numbers for VXA-2 tapes are: X23 (230 meters) 111.00221 Russ Yes, that's the part number I have for those bad tapes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted December 14, 2007 Report Share Posted December 14, 2007 Then it sounds like you've got a bad batch of tapes. It happens. You might also try a cleaning cycle with a cleaning tape to make sure that it's not a batch of marginal tapes whose headers can't be read because of dirty heads. I've seen that happen, too. Russ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReneGarneau Posted December 14, 2007 Author Report Share Posted December 14, 2007 Quote: Then it sounds like you've got a bad batch of tapes. It happens. You might also try a cleaning cycle with a cleaning tape to make sure that it's not a batch of marginal tapes whose headers can't be read because of dirty heads. I've seen that happen, too. Russ Yes, I tried that; cleaned it twice. One time with the current cleaning tape and once with a brand new tape. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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