Kernel panic with Retrospect

[ginnyp]

I've been successfully running Retrospect 6.1.126 on a G4 400 running 10.3.9 to backup 5 users. The tape drive is a Quantum DAT72, and the SCSI card is an Adaptec 2906. I'm trying to move this to a newer G4 1.25 running 10.4.11. I updated to Retrospect 6.1.230 on this newer computer.

 

On the G4 1.25, in "About This Mac," the SCSI card and tape drive both appear. When I boot the computer in native OS9 to run an old SCSI scanner, there are no communication problems (confirming that the SCSI card does work). (This is the same set-up that's been used on the G4 400 since early 2007.)

 

However, when I try to even access the tape drive with Retrospect in OS X, I get a kernel panic when I quit Retrospect, if not before. I don't have any other OS X programs that access anything through the SCSI drive to test with.

 

Based on the reading I've done, it appears that this SCSI card isn't compatible with Tiger? However, how come it shows up in "About This Mac" and only crashes when I access the drive through Retrospect? Otherwise, it can sit there and run all day with no crashes.

 

I'm just looking for thoughts before I give up and reconfigure this newer computer back to 10.3.9.

 

Thanks for any input!

 

Ginny

[rhwalker]

Adaptec abandoned Mac OS X as of 10.3.9. There is no driver for 10.4.x or above for that card.

 

Based on the reading I've done, it appears that this SCSI card isn't compatible with Tiger

Yep, see above.

 

However, how come it shows up in "About This Mac" and only crashes when I access the drive through Retrospect? Otherwise, it can sit there and run all day with no crashes.

Um, I guess you've never written a Unix driver, right?

 

"About this Mac" (really, Apple System Profiler) just shows the device tree that was built during boot by interrogating the devices. That's before the drivers get loaded.

 

If you want to do SCSI on Macintosh 4.x and above, get an ATTO SCSI card. For your G4 and 10.4.11, the right card would be an ATTO UL4D. It works, is supported, etc. Been there, done that.

 

Oh, by the way, update your Retrospect to 6.1.230. And update your RDU. But get an ATTO card first.

 

Russ

[ginnyp]

Russ,

 

Thanks for your reply confirming my suspicions, and explaining the situation better. It's strange that 10.4 even includes the Adaptec extensions if they don't work! (If they hadn't been there at all, it might have been my "red flag" that it wouldn't work in 10.4!)

 

Based on the cost of the ATTO card, and the fact that I'll probably have to upgrade the whole backup system in a year or two due to capacity, I'll just reconfigure this G4 1.25 to 10.3.9 for now. (Think it came with 10.2.) All that runs on it is the backup system, an old scanner in native OS9, and a shared external drive we store stuff on for general use which is attached to it. When I do upgrade the backup system, hopefully other connections will have evolved to be useful instead of SCSI.

 

(Why was I determined to use 10.4? I wanted to have as new of OS on the computer as I felt was good, and I always liked Tiger! Didn't really like Leopard, and hate Snow Leopard, but two new computers have dictated it!)

 

I assume in 10.3.9, Retrospect 6.1.230 will be good to use? No problems with backing up computers running Leopard and Snow Leopard? (It's been working on the G4 400 running 10.3.9 with Retrospect 6.1.126.) Guess I'll update the various computers being backed up to the newest client version? Also, don't know if I'm having brain freeze, but what does RDU stand for?

 

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

Ginny

[rhwalker]

Internally (and to drivers), 10.4 is a very different animal than 10.3.x.

 

You can get a used ATTO UL4D (dual channel) or UL4S (single channel, just missing some parts) on eBay for very reasonable price. The drivers / firmware can be downloaded for free from ATTO's web site. Be sure to update your firmware and driver if you get an ATTO card.

 

Russ

[ginnyp]

Think I'll just set the newer computer to run on 10.3.9. Will Retrospect 6.1.230 work OK with 10.3.9, or should I stay with 6.1.126, as I've been using on the older computer I want to take out of service?

 

Thanks,

Ginny

[rhwalker]

yes, no.

[ginnyp]

Thanks. I really appreciate the help. Getting Retrospect to work right all the time has puzzled me quite a few times.

 

Earlier you mentioned updating the RDU. I finally figured out what that meant by digging into the Retrospect manual! I then found a (new) Retrospect driver (version 6116100) under version 6.1 for MAC in the Retrospect website, but I’m puzzled as to whether I should use it.

 

Currently, on the computer that is successfully running Retrospect, when viewed through Retrospect Device Status, my Quantum tape drive shows a driver called “Seagate DAT DDS-DC (5.03)â€. (I know Quantum acquired Seagate.) To update the Retrospect driver, the instructions say if there is a file in the Retrospect folder called “Retrospect 6.x Driver Update†to trash it and replace it with the new one from the mounted disk image. I do not have this file in the Retrospect folder (or anywhere else).

With this type of tape drive, should I stay with the driver that must have come with the tape drive instead of switching to the Retrospect version? Or, does the RDU I downloaded from Retrospect affect something else entirely? (I checked the Quantum website to see if they offered anything new for this drive on a MAC, and they don’t.)

 

This driver issue seems to be the last issue I don’t quite understand as I attempt to set this newer computer up to run Retrospect. Again, I do appreciate the guidance.

 

Thanks,

Ginny

[rhwalker]

Our DAT drive (now retired, on a shelf) used the same driver.

 

Retrospect comes with some drivers internally. The RDU provides updated drivers and also is a patch mechanism to fix some bugs in Retrospect itself.

 

Here is the RDU version history, showing the changes with each version:

RDU version history

 

The RDU version history has links to older RDU versions; the latest (well, last, in the case of Retrospect 6.x) RDU is available on the Retrospect updates page:

Retrospect 6.x Updates

 

Assuming you installed Retrospect into the standard place, the RDU file goes into:

/Applications/Retrospect 6.1/

 

And is named "Retrospect 6.1 Driver Update" (must be named exactly that, because Retrospect looks for that file).

 

If you don't have an RDU, then perhaps you are using the drivers inside Retrospect, without any RDU. The way to tell is to look in your Retrospect log, which will print the version of Retrospect and RDU each time it launches.

 

To install the RDU, just quit Retrospect and drag the RDU file (see above, downloaded) into the same folder as Retrospect itself. The next time Retrospect launches, it will find the file and print the necessary message in the log.

 

A caution - if you read through the RDU version history, you will see that a bit of EMC programmer error caused some RDUs to have issues with some types of optical media when other (tape) bugs were fixed.

 

Of course, you can always revert to an older version of Retrospect and an older RDU. That's why I provided the links above.

 

Because you are already on Retrospect 6.1, you don't have a reversion problem. Once Retrospect 6.1.x uses a backup set, it converts the format of the backup set from the different format used by Retrospect 6.0.x. But you won't see that issue when you update to Retrospect 6.1.230.

 

You might want to review the Retrospect 6.1 release notes to see the changes for the various Retrospect 6.1 releases. See:

Retrospect 6.1 Read Me

 

Hope this helps.

 

Russ

[ginnyp]

Thanks, Russ . . .

 

That gives me some idea what has been/is going on. Must be using an internal Retrospect driver. I'll check the RDU histories before I take the "leap." I'm a little skittish of updating internal stuff that I don't fully understand and that seems to be working!

 

You've been very helpful. Have a great weekend!

 

Ginny

[rhwalker]

Yea, but you want to get the latest bugs!

 

Rss

[ginnyp]

Well . . . I'm happy!!!

 

Reconfigured the G4 1.25 to 10.3.9, updated anything Retrospect 6 that I could update, and all is well. Got everything moved to this computer and backup ran correctly the first time I tried!

 

Also got the scanner operating correctly on this computer in Native 9, and our "server" drive which contains our brochures and photos and is connected to this computer is accessible by all from their computers!

 

 

I love working on these computers, but I got really tired of the issues I encountered with what I was trying to do on this move! Happy this one is OVER!

 

Hopefully the next time I need to expand our backup system I won't have to deal with a SCSI device!

 

Thanks for your help, Russ!

 

Ginny