Problem restoring backup taken in higher VMS version

[Steven Schweda]

As usual, showing actual commands with actual
output might be more informative than vague
descriptions. I don't know what "Mounting
the tape didn't recognize the tape label nor
the saveset" means. I don't know exactly
what you did, nor exactly what happened when
you did it.

> The tape driver could not find the
> start-of-tape [...]

Assuming that "driver" was actually "drive",
this may tell you something about the
hardware.

[Hoff]

In addition to the previous request for the DCL commands and the text of any errors reported, the particular models of DLT involved would be quite useful here.

Are these TK50 and TZ30 drives, or is this involving one of the other (common) DLT drives?

A TZ30 that cannot read a DLT cartridge is exactly normal and expected behavior -- if the source drive that recorded the contents is of an incompatible DLT format.

A successful INITIALIZE zonks tape contents. Period. (Well, except for the DLT alignment burst, a consideration when dealing with drives of this vintage. Only the drive or a degauss pass can zap that mark.) What OpenVMS can read from the media will be overwritten by the INITIALIZE. Unlike nine track mag, DLT drives won't let OpenVMS skate past the EOT marker, either.