vxdump: "End of tape"

[Don Habegger]

I am using vxdump to write daily/weekly/monthly backups to an HP Surestore DLT40. Everything runs fine until one day when doing a complete dump, vxdump will hit the end of the tape and request another volume. This is the second time I have encountered this situation. The previous solution was to use a different tape drive. It does not matter what I do, vxdump keeps asking for the second tape. I have approximately 4gb of data to back up, the drive is set to compress and 20gb. I have tried different tapes to no avail. I have tried to overwrite density. Anyone encountered this before? One more item which may lead to the problem. "mt -f /dev/rmt/0m rew" does nothing or at least the tape drive does not attempt to rewind the tape. Thank you, a hairless 47yo man :)

[Robert-Jan Goossens]

Hello Don,

Dump and vxdump have no mechanism to detect EOT (end of tape) and for this
reason, they need to be told how much data can be stored on each tape media to
determine when to ask the operator to load the next media.

check this document for more information.

Document description: Ultrium 230 density and tape length parms for the dump command
Document id: KBRC00012673

Europe
http://www4.itrc.hp.com/service/cki/docDisplay.do?docLocale=en_US&docId=200000070865419

US
http://www4.itrc.hp.com/service/cki/docDisplay.do?docLocale=en_US&docId=200000070865419

Regards,
Robert-Jan

[Geoff Wild]

Trying setting the tape size high with the -s ption:

-s 1000000

Rgds...Geoff

[Don Habegger]

I thank you for the answers. The document with help for the command line was helpful. My problem was 2 bad tapes. Just an unfortunate incident or occurence.

[Alzhy]

On the contrary, dump and its derivatives (ie. vxdump) completely undertands physical EOT (End of Tape) and will ask for the next tape if data being dumped will not fit in a single tape. I have never experienced/heard of tape spanning problems with vxdumps/dumps except if there are drive or media errors. If media errors or EOT problems -- try reformatting the tape or erasing it so all EOF's are effectively erased and EOT is reached and tested. But 99.9% of the time - it simply means you've a defective tape.