backup

[Ayman Altounji]

i have RedHat 6.2 installed on a Proliant ML330 with an AIT 35 LVD tape drive. The system sees the tape drive as /dev/st0, and i am able to erase, retension, etc. when i attempt to backup with a tar command, i alwas get "cannot write: Input/output" errors. I have tried a few different tapes and cleaned the drive. what could the problem be?????

[Ayman Altounji]

I would make sure the ait drive you are trying is not a hot pluggable tape drive, and that it's alone on its scsi bus. You can also check the status of the tape drive with #mt -f /dev/tape status . If possible for further troubleshooting, could you reply with the commands you are trying which are working, and which ones aren't working.

[Ayman Altounji]

it is not hot swappable and it is alone on the scsi chain
when i typed the status command, i got the following..

SCSI 2 tape drive:
file number=0, block number=0, partition=0
tape blocksize 0 bytes, density code=0x30(unknown to this mt)
soft error count since last status=0
general status bits on (41010000)
BOT ONLINE IM_REP_EN

I was able to use mt commands to format the tape, and was able to accomplish this with the KMD GUI, but when i used tar to backup OR the KMD GUI, I get the "cannot write" error.

any ideas would be appreciated

[Ayman Altounji]

According to redhat's website this tape drive (SDX-400C) is supported under 6.2, and the ease of install is supposed to be easy. Would you be able to try this drive on a different server or different operating system to see if the drive itself may be failed. You can also make sure the firmware is up to date on the ait with diskette 3 from http://www.compaq.com/support/files/server/us/download/14913.html