Re: IBM 3583 Library question.
Neil, As long as we're discussing the 3583, I'll share my experiences. TSM 4.1.5 on AIX 4.3.3; 3583-L72 w/ 4 drives; HVDS. Collocated data for 14 nodes. After about a month of operation, the picker and picker controller failed. Left two tapes stuck in drives. IBM HW Support replaced the picker and controller, then upped the firmware - it WAS a month old - and library worked AOK for about 3 months. Last week we again had the "tape stuck in drive" problem. IBM HW Support replaced the drive, but when we loaded the formerly stuck tape in the drive, it jammed so bad that we couldn't remove it even if we disassembled the drive. IBM put the old drive back in and took the no-longer-new drive with stuck tape with them. Whoever thought up the idea for the "copypool" deserves a raise. I restored 1/3 million files totalling 70 GB from DLT in 7 hours. Two days later another tape stuck in old drive which stuck the "gone" tape. IBM HW Support replaced the drive and this time I pulled the tape rather than risk another jam. Restored 40K files / 100 GB from DLT in 10 hours simulaneous to weekly TSM maintenance (expiration, etc.). When we put in the new drive, its firware differed from the other three so we got lots of library errors. We had already updated the library firmware so we tried just updating the drive firmware via AIX. Note that library firmware is updated via RS-232 while drive firmware is updated via SCSI from server. Eventually updated the library firmware again only to find that the firmware for the "drive sled" is included in the library firmware, but not the drive firmware. System has been working AOK for about a week now. We have all four drives on one HV Diff SCSI adapter. IBM always gets that pained look when we tell them that. We see consistent througput of 16 MB/s. I know we're supposed to spread the load but my F50 has all its slots in use. Maybe this year a bigger server. We run four parallel processes to the DLT library when backing up to the copypool. Both the 3583 and the HP 4/40 top out at about 16 MB/s regardless of source or direction of data transfer. Oh, and we average 165 GB per tape. While at Dell's facility, they showed an LTO library that looked exactly like a 3583, only it had "Dell" in place of the IBM nametag. Just sharing... Tab Trepagnier TSM Administrator Laitram Corporation Neil Sharp <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>@VM.MARIST.EDU> on 02/07/2002 05:03:29 AM Please respond to "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent by: "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] cc: Subject: Re: IBM 3583 Library question. Just a word of warning. We had a very unsuccessful install of a 3583 with TSM on a AIX box. The library turned out to be very unreliable to the point where every component was replaced but still it did not function correctly. In the end IBM held their hands up and admitted that there where issues with this model. We are now running on a 3584 which is much better. Good luck. Neil Sharp Dyadic Systems Limited Tel : 01256-811125 E-mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Seay, Paul" cc: Sent by: "ADSM: Subject: Re: IBM 3583 Library question. Dist Stor Manager" <[EMAIL PROTECTED] T.EDU> 07/02/2002 06:11 Please respond to "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" Generally, you want to use *stcbn if it is available. The reason is the drive will stay at the point between closes and reports the location block on open. Remember these are smart drives like Magstar and can skip to a block as requested. Typically, a backup product does that. However, I will defer to rest if they have a better answer. -Original Message- From: bbullock [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, February 06, 2002 4:16 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: IBM 3583 Library question. We are hooking a new IBM 3583 tape library up to a Solaris host to be a remote site TSM server. The Ultrium drives have various /dev/?st... devices through which we can access them. The no-brainer was to use the driver that tells the drive to compress the data, but I'm not sure between these 2 options: /dev/rmt/*stc <- compression and "Rewind on Close" /dev/rmt/*stcn <- compression but "No Rewind on Close" I can't find anything in the TSM or library documents on which to use. Does TSM get confused if a tape were to be mounted and it was not at the beginning? Kind of seems like we would reduce tape and drive wear by using the "no rewind" device drives, and writes mig
Re: IBM 3583 Library question.
Ben, use the *st or *stc device. There is a section on how to configure 3583/Solaris/TSM in the Using IBM LTO Ultrium with Open Systems redbook SG24-6502, see page 158. You will find this redbook very helpful. _ William Mansfield Senior Consultant Solution Technology, Inc bbullock cc: Sent by: "ADSM: Subject: IBM 3583 Library question. Dist Stor Manager" <[EMAIL PROTECTED] .EDU> 02/06/2002 03:15 PM Please respond to "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" We are hooking a new IBM 3583 tape library up to a Solaris host to be a remote site TSM server. The Ultrium drives have various /dev/?st... devices through which we can access them. The no-brainer was to use the driver that tells the drive to compress the data, but I'm not sure between these 2 options: /dev/rmt/*stc <- compression and "Rewind on Close" /dev/rmt/*stcn <- compression but "No Rewind on Close" I can't find anything in the TSM or library documents on which to use. Does TSM get confused if a tape were to be mounted and it was not at the beginning? Kind of seems like we would reduce tape and drive wear by using the "no rewind" device drives, and writes might happen quicker it the tape is not rewound... Any suggestions would be helpful. (the listserv archive site is currently inaccessible.) Thanks, Ben Micron Technology Inc.
Re: IBM 3583 Library question.
Just a word of warning. We had a very unsuccessful install of a 3583 with TSM on a AIX box. The library turned out to be very unreliable to the point where every component was replaced but still it did not function correctly. In the end IBM held their hands up and admitted that there where issues with this model. We are now running on a 3584 which is much better. Good luck. Neil Sharp Dyadic Systems Limited Tel : 01256-811125 E-mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Seay, Paul" cc: Sent by: "ADSM: Subject: Re: IBM 3583 Library question. Dist Stor Manager" <[EMAIL PROTECTED] T.EDU> 07/02/2002 06:11 Please respond to "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" Generally, you want to use *stcbn if it is available. The reason is the drive will stay at the point between closes and reports the location block on open. Remember these are smart drives like Magstar and can skip to a block as requested. Typically, a backup product does that. However, I will defer to rest if they have a better answer. -Original Message- From: bbullock [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, February 06, 2002 4:16 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: IBM 3583 Library question. We are hooking a new IBM 3583 tape library up to a Solaris host to be a remote site TSM server. The Ultrium drives have various /dev/?st... devices through which we can access them. The no-brainer was to use the driver that tells the drive to compress the data, but I'm not sure between these 2 options: /dev/rmt/*stc <- compression and "Rewind on Close" /dev/rmt/*stcn <- compression but "No Rewind on Close" I can't find anything in the TSM or library documents on which to use. Does TSM get confused if a tape were to be mounted and it was not at the beginning? Kind of seems like we would reduce tape and drive wear by using the "no rewind" device drives, and writes might happen quicker it the tape is not rewound... Any suggestions would be helpful. (the listserv archive site is currently inaccessible.) Thanks, Ben Micron Technology Inc.
Re: IBM 3583 Library question.
Generally, you want to use *stcbn if it is available. The reason is the drive will stay at the point between closes and reports the location block on open. Remember these are smart drives like Magstar and can skip to a block as requested. Typically, a backup product does that. However, I will defer to rest if they have a better answer. -Original Message- From: bbullock [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, February 06, 2002 4:16 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: IBM 3583 Library question. We are hooking a new IBM 3583 tape library up to a Solaris host to be a remote site TSM server. The Ultrium drives have various /dev/?st... devices through which we can access them. The no-brainer was to use the driver that tells the drive to compress the data, but I'm not sure between these 2 options: /dev/rmt/*stc <- compression and "Rewind on Close" /dev/rmt/*stcn <- compression but "No Rewind on Close" I can't find anything in the TSM or library documents on which to use. Does TSM get confused if a tape were to be mounted and it was not at the beginning? Kind of seems like we would reduce tape and drive wear by using the "no rewind" device drives, and writes might happen quicker it the tape is not rewound... Any suggestions would be helpful. (the listserv archive site is currently inaccessible.) Thanks, Ben Micron Technology Inc.
