Recommend a tape drive for use with Ignite-UX

[bill_allen]

I would like to make ignite images of my servers, but need a new tape drive. Can anyone recommend a scsi external tape drive with capacity well over 4GB?

[A. Clay Stephenson]

It matters somewhat about the choice of tape drive because not all tape drives are bootable --- especially if you also have to support older boxes. Just about anything will boot from a DDS3 drive which feature a native capacity of 12GiB and a compressed capacity of 24GiB. They are relatively slow drives compared to an Ultrium or DLT but essentially any box PA-RISC box will boot from a DDS drive.

[Tim Nelson]

DDS3
DDS4
DLT8000
Ultrium2

Other options will have to be investigated as supported boot devices.

[bill_allen]

DAT tape was what I was looking at. My current systems are PA-RISC, but my new system will be a RX6600 Itanium. Assuming this still holds true for the Itanium, do you have some models you could recomend? I am looking for scsi rather than USB models.

Thanks

[Sp4admin]

Hi Bill,

We have a 6600 and the DAT drive is a DDS4 model number C7438A. We also run ignite tape and have booted off of the tape with no problems.

sp,

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom Bill,

I had a support call with HP on this for one of my customers. Only the HP tape drives and recommended tapes receive full support from HP. The customer in question had a drive from another maker. The response center rep informed me that the drive had been successfully used to boot an HP-UX server however was not certified and therefore the level of support to be given was different.

I've had excellent success with the Ultrium series of tape drives. Pay attention to the type of SCSI card they need and don't put any other SCSI devices on the same scsi chain.

The moral of this story is to precisely follow HP recommendations for the highest level of support. There could hardly be a more important piece of equipment in your installation.

SEP

[bill_allen]

Steven,

Good point. The drive I am considering now is the Q1523B. 72GB SCSI DAT. I think it will work so long as it is good for booting both my PA-RISC system and the new RX660 I am getting. Any experience with this tape drive?

[bill_allen]

Thanks to everyone for the helpful advice. :-)

[Torsten. · Accepted solution]

Look up the matrix for supported drives for your server:

http://www.hp.com/products1/storage/compatibility/tapebackup/IPF/13-9999-0005.html#matrixtable

Be aware you will see USB drives too, but read the notes! They are not compatible with HP-UX.

[bill_allen]

Torsten,

Excellent reference! Thanks much. :-)