MSL6060 Drive fetch failure

[Ilya P]

Merry Christmas to all of you!

Got the same problem with MSL6060 after upgrading to FW 5.13 from 5.07

See thread: http://forums.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/bizsupport/questionanswer.do?threadId=978224

HP Engineer replaced drive 0 - not a solution though. Got the same message after 3 backup cycles.
Library with 2 LTO2 SCSI tapes - direct attach.
OS: Windows 2003, backup software: BrightStor r11.5

As ever,
Ilya

[Vallo Kallaste]

David, Ilya

It's been 7 peaceful days with firmware 4.30 since downgrade. It's not proof, of course, but something to consider by the engineering people. As I gather from the scattered posts the problem seems always to be with drive 0, as it was in our case, too.
--
Vallo

[Ilya P]

Dear Vallo,

it looks like downgrade to 5.07 in my case solved the problem. It's more likely to be a firmware issue. HP Russia changed drive 0 in my MSL6060 and it has been proven not to be a solution. Drive 0 was still timing out causing all sorts of problems for my backup software.

Merry X-Mas,
Ilya

[David Ruska]

GFH/Vallo/Ilya,

I wanted to give you all an engineering update. We did extensive testing on all our 10U (60 slot) units in our lab and could not duplicate this problem. However we now have a returned customer unit that fails fairly regularly when unloading tapes from drive 0. It looks like the picker is too high when the tape ejects and does not consistently engage the griper arm in the notch on the lower left side of the tape, which then causes the fetch to fail. This unit failed with 5.13 firmware, and also fail similarly with 4.30. This unit was returned to us for a different problem, so we are not 100% sure if it matches exactly the 3 units having problems on the forums.

However we have one more unit in the states with the 3013 issue identified that is being returned to the division for analysis. We hope from that unit, videos from the current unit, and the support ticket logs from the units on the forums, that the firmware engineers will be able to identify the root cause(s) and provide firmware that will properly address it. We suspect that there may be some mechanical variations between units currently manufactured and earlier units, and the positioning algorithms in the later firmware may not work as well in a few earlier units, although we are not sure at this point where the variation might be (if that is the case).

For any customer having issues with the MSL6060 and cartridge fetches (like error 3013), we suggest downgrading to either 5.07 or 4.30 (they are each slightly different) to see if the problem goes away.

Also, ensure that you have a support case opened with HP, and that they elevate that case to tier 3 (engineering) so that it can be officially tracked, and they will ensure that whatever the final resolution is (perhaps firmware change), that it addresses your specific failures.

Note: Most of engineering is out over the holidays, so it will be early January before the firmware team will be able to fully investigate this, so we appreciate your patience.

Dave
HP StorageWorks
Sustaining Engineering

[Ilya P]

Dear Dave,

thank you so much for your efforts on resolving this issue.

I'm sure that both GFH and Vallo will agree that we're all suffering from an inconvenience caused by this issue -- once again thanks for sorting us out. However in my particular case HP Russia does not take a lot of efforts in resolving the situation. I have no idea how many of MSL6060 units were supplied here [Russia] but our HP service have a very brute force approach to problems. In my particular case this resulted in usless piece of hardware [MSL6060] an me being unavailable to perform a scheduled system backup. :-(((( That's what bothers....

Once again thanks for your efforts and have a vacations.

Cheers,
Ilya

[SGrab]

Hello.

In Case 1209787883 we had also same issue.
Since downgrade to 5.07 version all works fine.

regards

[David Ruska]

SGrab,

Thanks for letting us know. Can you ask your case owner to elevate your issue to tier 3? For your region, they may need to first elevate to a tier 2 storage solutions team.

[David Ruska]

All,

Just wanted to give you a few updates on the MSL6060 issues.

First, I believe at least two of the customers here now have tier 3 elevations open to engineering. Please make sure all of you have your cases elevated to the division engineering team, as we want to make sure any fixes will address all the issues you are seeing.

Second, one customer unit was damaged in shipment to us (improperly packaged), and we were not able to do failure analysis on it. However, we have now received another customer unit and duplicates FSC 3013 drive fetch errors.

However, we are not sure if this unit matches excactly with the forum cases, since the unit also fails with 4.30 and 5.07 firmware.

That unit should be in the hands of the firmware team by next week, and hopefully will be able to identify root cause.

In the mean time, please ensure that your cases are elevated to division engineering. And if anyone else on the forum is having issues with the latest MSL firmware, please add a reply here so I can track it.

Dave
HP StorageWorks Engineering

[Brian P. Kelly]

dave,

I have the same problem today with my msl6060 tape library, which is fiber attached to my openvms cluster using abs/mdms. "Fault Code: 3013 (Soft) Drive fetch failure".

It seems the fetch errors are when the tapes are being picked from the magazine slots between 0-15. This is the second time i had the Fetch error in 3 months.

My firmware version is 4.30.

I logged a call with support, Case # 3213524149.

Bkelly

[David Ruska]

Brian,

Thanks for your post. Although the same fault code, it may be a differnt cause since you have having this on the old 4.30 firmware. Most of the folks here have the problem when updating to 5.13, and the issue clears up if the downgrade to 5.07 or 4.30.

There is another forum case (for a 6030) where updating to 5.13 resolved their fetch issues. Have you tried the 5.13 firmware? It sounds like your failure rate is very infrequent, if I understood your description correctly.

I noticed in the case notes that they requested you install LTT and collect a support ticket (and calibrate the library). Did they also suggest updating firmware to 5.13?