multiple tapes reported as "erased"

[sampleheads]

hello - I've been a Retrospect customer for more than 13 years... I've NEVER lost a byte of data -- now this problem:

 

I always backup in pairs. I run an "A" and "B" set - "1-archive-setA, etc...; 1-archive-setB, etc... Time consuming, maybe. is it likely that 2 pieces of backup media will fail in the same spot? HIGHLY unlikely.

 

I use DDS-4 ultra scsi

 

retro is reporting for a project archived in 2002 that BOTH 1-archive-setA, and 1-archive-setB are 'erased' -- the tapes are write protected. Neither tape has been accessed in almost 2 years.

 

I've been through the troubleshooting -- cleaned the heads more than a few times. changed the scsi chain and termination. moved to a different mac (was on a OSX server 10.2.8 - moved to a G4/500 running OS9.2.2) - removed all other scsi devices. Changed the scsi terminator.

 

No change.

 

What are my solutions here? obviously, i'm trying to find a dds-4 machine nearby to pop the tape(s) into and see if they will recognize.

 

What if they don't? - how can 2 tapes get 'erased' while write protected?

 

If they read on an alternate machine (good for my retrieved data), then what do I do with my current dds-4? is it trash? what about the hundreds of tapes this machine has made for me? are all my tapes at risk? what kind of redundancy does the DDS format have?

 

All advice is appreciated.

 

thanks,

 

Jeremy

212-531-4913

[natew]

Hi

 

Proceed with caution when you test these things - a hardware failure on the drive could damage your tapes.

 

If you do a new backup to a blank or erased tape can the drive read the tape? Does this happen with every tape you put in the drive?

 

Over time read and write heads can get out of allignement or break. It may be that the read head is just off enough so it can't read the data on the tape- hence the erased message.

 

Do you know anywone else with a similar tape drive so you could test one of your tapes in a different drive?

 

Thanks

Nate