Re: [Bacula-users] advice about tape drives

[Josh Fisher via Bacula-users]

Why not migrate the LTO-2 volumes to disk, then install whatever version 
of tape drive you wish and migrate the disk volumes to the new LTO tapes?



On 4/22/24 11:29, Gary R. Schmidt wrote:

On 23/04/2024 00:58, Alan Polinsky wrote:
I have used Bacula for many years, since version 5. In the past, I 
have mentioned my two Nas's along with various Windows and Linux 
machines get backed up on a nightly basis to tape. Currently that 
tape drive is an LTO3 based drive. Some of the older backups are on 
LTO2 tapes. My tape drive is starting to show its age, and within a 
period of time it will have to be replaced. (Since I am a retired 
programmer on a fixed income, cost, as always becomes an issue.) I 
need to understand the backward capabilities of more recent drives. 
How high could I go with LTO based machines while still maintaining 
the ability to read (and hopefully write) those old LTO2 tapes?



Thank you everyone for your help.



All anyone could ever want to know about LTO tapes: 
.


The rule of thumb is read two back, and write one, but that changed 
with LTO-8.  Sort of.  Sigh.  Read the wikipedia page.


Cheers,
    Gary    B-)


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Re: [Bacula-users] advice about tape drives

[Sebastian Suchanek]

Am 22.04.2024 um 16:58 schrieb Alan Polinsky:

[...]
I need to understand the backward capabilities of more recent drives.


As a rule of thumb, LTO drives can write to one previous generation of 
tapes and read from two previous generations of tapes. (There are some 
exceptions for LTO8 and LTO9.)



How high could I go with LTO based
machines while still maintaining the ability to read (and hopefully
write) those old LTO2 tapes?


LTO2 tapes can be read by LTO2, LTO3 and LTO4 drives and written by LTO2 
and LTO3 drives.



HTH,

Sebastian



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Re: [Bacula-users] advice about tape drives

[Gary R. Schmidt]

On 23/04/2024 00:58, Alan Polinsky wrote:
I have used Bacula for many years, since version 5. In the past, I have 
mentioned my two Nas's along with various Windows and Linux machines get 
backed up on a nightly basis to tape. Currently that tape drive is an 
LTO3 based drive. Some of the older backups are on LTO2 tapes. My tape 
drive is starting to show its age, and within a period of time it will 
have to be replaced. (Since I am a retired programmer on a fixed income, 
cost, as always becomes an issue.) I need to understand the backward 
capabilities of more recent drives. How high could I go with LTO based 
machines while still maintaining the ability to read (and hopefully 
write) those old LTO2 tapes?



Thank you everyone for your help.



All anyone could ever want to know about LTO tapes: 
.


The rule of thumb is read two back, and write one, but that changed with 
LTO-8.  Sort of.  Sigh.  Read the wikipedia page.


Cheers,
GaryB-)


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Re: [Bacula-users] advice about tape drives

[Rob Gerber]

Alan,

>From the Wikipedia article on LTO:


   - Up to and including LTO-7, an Ultrium drive *can read* data from a
   cartridge in its own generation and the two prior generations. LTO-8 drives
   can read LTO-7 and LTO-8 tape, but not LTO-6 tape.[29]
   
   [30]
   

   [31]
   

   - An Ultrium drive *can write* data to a cartridge in its own generation
   and to a cartridge from the one prior generation *in the prior
   generation's format*.
   - Some LTO-8 drives may write previously unused LTO-7 tapes with an
   increased, uncompressed capacity of 9 TB (*Type M (M8)*).[32]
    Only
   new, unused LTO-7 cartridges may be initialized as LTO-7 Type M. Once a
   cartridge is initialized as Type M it may not be changed back to a 6 TB
   LTO-7 cartridge. LTO-7 Type M cartridges are only initialized to Type M in
   an LTO-8 drive. LTO-7 drives are not capable of reading LTO-7 Type M
   cartridges.[33]
   
   - An Ultrium drive *cannot make any use* of a cartridge from a more
   recent generation. For example, an LTO-2 cartridge can never be used by an
   LTO-1 drive; and even though it can be used in an LTO-3 drive, it performs
   as if it were in an LTO-2 drive.

So based on that, I'd guess that LTO 4 is the highest version of LTO
technology you could make use of with your requirement to be able to read
LTO 2 media.

I do have an alternative suggestion however: what if you purchased a drive
newer than LTO 4, and either used your LTO 3 drive to read any LTO 2 media
as needed, OR used migrate jobs to migrate the backups off those LTO 2
tapes to the newer media type?

Just fyi, a migrate or copy job type requires two devices be simultaneously
available, a read device and a write device. So you'd have to have the
ability to connect two LTO drives at once to your system, or maybe would
have to migrate tape data to a file volume, them migrate the file volumes
to the new LTO standard. I don't know how complex it would be to migrate
LTO volumes to disk volumes, then migrate those disk volumes back to the
newer LTO tapes. I think it should be feasible in theory.

I don't have practical experience with migrate / copy jobs, or LTO variants
below 8. Just fyi. Others here may be able to provide more information
about migrate / copy jobs, or about your choice of hardware.

However
Robert Gerber
402-237-8692
r...@craeon.net

On Mon, Apr 22, 2024, 10:00 AM Alan Polinsky 
wrote:

> I have used Bacula for many years, since version 5. In the past, I have
> mentioned my two Nas's along with various Windows and Linux machines get
> backed up on a nightly basis to tape. Currently that tape drive is an
> LTO3 based drive. Some of the older backups are on LTO2 tapes. My tape
> drive is starting to show its age, and within a period of time it will
> have to be replaced. (Since I am a retired programmer on a fixed income,
> cost, as always becomes an issue.) I need to understand the backward
> capabilities of more recent drives. How high could I go with LTO based
> machines while still maintaining the ability to read (and hopefully
> write) those old LTO2 tapes?
>
>
> Thank you everyone for your help.
>
>
> Alan
>
>
>
> ___
> Bacula-users mailing list
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[Bacula-users] advice about tape drives

[Alan Polinsky]

I have used Bacula for many years, since version 5. In the past, I have 
mentioned my two Nas's along with various Windows and Linux machines get 
backed up on a nightly basis to tape. Currently that tape drive is an 
LTO3 based drive. Some of the older backups are on LTO2 tapes. My tape 
drive is starting to show its age, and within a period of time it will 
have to be replaced. (Since I am a retired programmer on a fixed income, 
cost, as always becomes an issue.) I need to understand the backward 
capabilities of more recent drives. How high could I go with LTO based 
machines while still maintaining the ability to read (and hopefully 
write) those old LTO2 tapes?



Thank you everyone for your help.


Alan



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