Twice in the last 10 days I've had to take a memory dump due to a system
hang. Both times I got the following message on the console:
...
Please hit carriage return when tape is ready.
6250 BPI not supported on this tape drive
1650 BPI density set on tape drive
Tape is ready
Begin dump of processor internal memory
...
...
While I don't take memory dumps very often the above message was never
issued prior to 10 days ago. The above message seems to indicate that the
first attempt of writing to the date drive was issued at 6250 BPI. Why
such a message would be issued? every time I'd issue the command "showdev
tape" the density column would show '1600'. Was there some patch released
that changed the default characteristics for those tape drives.
I have a tendency to believe the later since it seems that all four of my
DDS2 drives began to 'act-up' at about the same time. While our backups
are done using DDS3 drives, I did have a couple of the DDS2 drives
configured to be used in case the DDS3 tape filled up. I had to abandon
that 'set-up', however, when my backups began hanging. The backup utility
(BackPack) tries to open all the drives specified in the 'store' statement
and when it could not open the 'overflow' drives it would hang. While
trying to diagnose the problem, I found out that I had problems with all
four of the DDS2 drives. So I decided to change my backup methodology and
utilize only the DDS3 drives.
Regards
Paul Christidis
HP-3000 Systems Discussion <[log in to unmask]> wrote on 05/13/2004
06:39:44 PM:
> These are DDS-3 units. We have an external on our N series, been fine for
2+
> years now, with a back up every day plus sundries. I find it hard to
believe
> two refurb unit will only last such short times before dying, without
there
> being some other underlying problem. The system is on a UPS which should
> produce pretty clean power, and if it was power, I would expect other
> symptoms before a tape drive gave up, or as well as this problem, but
> nothing is reported.
> jp
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jay Maynard" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Friday, May 14, 2004 10:13 AM
> Subject: Re: [HP3000-L] 928 and dds drives failing
>
>
> > On Fri, May 14, 2004 at 09:25:26AM +1000, John Pitman wrote:
> > > Recently posted re a misconfigured DDS drive stopping a boot - wrong
> address
> > > setup. Got over that.
> > > Under neath this problem......Used 928 shipped to remote site in
China.
> DDS
> > > drive lasts 6 months doing 5 backups a week, dies with a low level
error
> > > (-44 IIRC). Get another refurb unit. Last about 10 days, simialr low
> level
> > > error. Get another refurb from supplier under warranty....lasts 2
> backups,
> > > another low level error.
> > > Is there something else broken at another level here? Anybody seen
> similar
> > > things before please? It is a long way from any HP office, and it may
> have
> > > to come home to Oz to be sure of proper technical capability....
> >
> > DDS-1/2 drives suck, especially now. I'd only trust new ones, and then
> only
> > for a short while. I've never had much luck with them, even when they
were
> > current technology; it was 50/50 at best whether I'd be able to read a
> tape
> > I'd written on the same drive.
> >
> > Throw it out the window and get an 8mm. You and your customer will be
much
> > happier. Get a new int he box DDS-2 to read existing backups, but do
all
> new
> > ones on the 8mm.
> >
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> > * etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *
>
> * To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, *
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