After Ken Paul's horror story, and Ken Sletten's response, I started
thinking about our situation.  All we have is a DDS drive, so we're
stuck with using it for backups.  Way back on MPE/V I used the
VALIDATE program (in TELESUP, IIRC) to validate that a reel-to-reel
tape was okay.  But I think it just verified that the tape was readable,
it didn't do a bit-by-bit comparison to the corresponding disk files.
A quick check of the STORE command reveals no COMPARE option.  The VSTORE
command looks like the old VALIDATE (it just "Verifies that the data on
a backup media are valid (for example, there are no media errors), and
reports errors incurred by STORE when writing the tape.").

So, seeing as how my PC tape backup utilities all provide for a COMPARE
option, why doesn't HP provide it?  Does anyone else provide a backup
program with the COMPARE option?  How can I be sure my backups are correct
and readable?

Jim Phillips                            Manager of Information Systems
E-Mail: [log in to unmask]      Therm-O-Link, Inc.
Phone: (330) 527-2124                   P. O. Box 285
  Fax: (330) 527-2123                   Garrettsville, Ohio  44231