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#1 (**permalink**) 01-12-2008, 05:27 AM

Are there any commands/utilities/scripts available that can be used to
check how the tapedrives are performing?

It will be very helpful to know:

1 How many recoverable write errors occur, when we write to the tape.
2 How many recoverable read errors occur, when we read to the tape

Thanks,

Chirag

#2 (**permalink**) 01-12-2008, 05:27 AM

Chirag wrote:

> Are there any commands/utilities/scripts available that can be used to
> check how the tapedrives are performing?
>
> It will be very helpful to know:
>
> 1 How many recoverable write errors occur, when we write to the tape.
> 2 How many recoverable read errors occur, when we read to the tape
>
> Thanks,
>
> Chirag

Some form of the iostat command should do this.

Here is what I get from 'iostat -En' on a Solaris 8 system with some
AIT2 tape drives:

Vendor: SONY Product: SDX-500C Revision: 010E Serial No:
rmt/11 Soft Errors: 0 Hard Errors: 0 Transport Errors: 0

Not sure if any of the options will give you more detail such as
read/write erros, your backup software may have to provide that info.

-Chuck

#3 (**permalink**) 01-12-2008, 05:27 AM

In article <a3d5f7e5.0309021117.7cca755d@posting.google.com >,
shroff@noao.edu (Chirag) wrote:

> Are there any commands/utilities/scripts available that can be used to
> check how the tapedrives are performing?
>
> It will be very helpful to know:
>
> 1 How many recoverable write errors occur, when we write to the tape.
> 2 How many recoverable read errors occur, when we read to the tape

It was my understanding that the error recovery stuff is a function of
the backup program you're using. I seem to recall that the device just
"does it's thing" when the st driver writes to it. There's no embedded
intelligence to ask the drive "How many read errors did you get?" or
tell the drive "Reset your error count".

The only error checking I've seen and done is to select a random tape
from the pile and see if I could read it and restore a file from it with
ufsrestore.

If your PHB is asking for this, just turn their laptop over to reboot
it...

--
DeeDee, don't press that button! DeeDee! NO! Dee...

#4 (**permalink**) 01-12-2008, 05:27 AM

Chirag wrote:
> Are there any commands/utilities/scripts available that can be used to
> check how the tapedrives are performing?
>
> It will be very helpful to know:
>
> 1 How many recoverable write errors occur, when we write to the tape.
> 2 How many recoverable read errors occur, when we read to the tape
>
> Thanks,
>
> Chirag

Once upon a time in a former life I had a Exabyte tape test
program that measured the number of read/write errors on a given tape.

The Idea was that if you got large amount of Errors on a NEW tape
you could suspect that the drive unit had a problem.

The repair shop got lots of GOOD tape units in for repair because users
neglegted to discard old tapes.

Basically : DO NOT keep tapes in production use for more than
50-100 backupp runs. Use a tape Once week for a Year , then junk it.

--
================================================== ======
Lars Tunkrans
smtp: lars dot tunkrans at bredband dot net
--------------------------------------------------------

#5 (**permalink**) 01-12-2008, 05:28 AM

Lars Tunkrans <sral.snarknut.mapson@bredband.net> wrote:
> The repair shop got lots of GOOD tape units in for repair because users
> neglegted to discard old tapes.
>
> Basically : DO NOT keep tapes in production use for more than
> 50-100 backupp runs. Use a tape Once week for a Year , then junk it.

This should not be an issue with DLT.

DLT Tape has a life of over 30 years, and is rated for over 1 million head
passes (which equates to over 1000 uses of the tape).

I'm not saying that DLT tapes don't occasionally go bad with age/use,
just that it happens very rarely unless there are external factors at
play (bad storage, being dropped, etc).

Scott

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