If the "hold down eject button for a minute or so" trick doesn't work,
there is another alternative - although I would not advise the
weak-of-heart to try it - but here goes.

The only other solution to this problem is to cycle power on the DDS drive.
This CAN be done without re-booting the system.

To do so requires you to simply remove the power cable from the device and
re-attach it. The hard part of this excercise is accessing the power cable.

In most cases, the dds drive is embedded in the a card cage behind the
front cover panel of the CPU. You can remove the front cover by simply
unscrewing the two screws at the bottom of the cover with a T10 screwdriver
and lifting the front over the 2 tabs that support it.

After that, 2 more T10 screws need to be removed and the card cage
containing the tape drive (and perhaps also one or more disk drives and
perhaps a CD-ROM drive) can be delicately pulled forward to expose the
power cable attached to the tape drive. Now simply detach then re-attach
the cable.

Then reverse the above steps to secure the drives and front panel. Voila.
The tape should eject very easily by now.

Incidentally, I would also DOWN the dds ldev before doing this.

I don't think HP or your hardware support provider would necessarily
approve this method - but if you cannot afford to reboot - this is your
only alternative.

I've done this exercise twice and am still here to speak about it - so it
does work.

But, you need to be very careful not to disturb any of the other WORKING
peripherals.

Hope this helps - but if not, please don't shoot the messenger.




At 09:45 AM 98/08/28 +0300, you wrote:
>The tape appears to have been raised out of it's "cradle" so it's lined up
>with the slot, but yet won't come out. We've tried poking and prodding it
>and repeatedly pressing eject and issuing ABORTIO and dummy RESTORE
>commands. Something has definitely still got a firm hold on it. This had
>happened before, on a different machine and tape drive, but on that occasion
>the tape was still "lowered" in the drive.
>HP suggests we shut down and restart, so I'd like to hear any advice or
>things we could try before we get that far ...
>
>Costas Anastassiades,
>Intracom SA
>Athens-Greece
>
>
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gilles Schipper
GSA Inc.
HP3000 & HP9000 System Administration Specialists
300 John Street, Box 87651   Thornhill, ON Canada L3T 7R4
Voice: 905.889.3000     Fax: 905.889.3001
Internet:  [log in to unmask]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------