BrightStor with Dell PV-122T Tape Library

[ITfromZX81]

Hi guys,

I'm a tech at a local site.

We have a new Dell PV-122T 12 slot LTO tape library. We were previously using a single DLT drive which died.(we really don't need a tape library but this is what we were sent by the backup department).

We are using BrightStor Arcserv 11.

Our backup scheme is to do differential Friday to Wednesday to tape #1(which then gets put in the safe for 6 weeks), and Thursday do a Full backup to tape #2(which then gets transported offsite).

Now with our tape library we have all kinds of problems. If we do a scheduled backup it seems to fail - keeps saying that it cannot find any media. It worked manually the first day(probably because I loaded a tape into the drive from the carosel manually directly from the buttons on the drive itself). If I look at device, the two tapes are in the carosel and no tapes are appearing in the tape drive. What we would like is to put in two tapes each friday, erase them, and have the tape in slot 1 be used for daily backup(tape #1) and the tape in slot 2 be used for Weekly backup(tape #2). The Library should automatically flip to the correct tape depending on the day needed.

The backup department is saying that Brightstor should automatically select the correct tapes(which I don't buy - inless someone puts into the schedule or pool which tape is which, how does it know when to switch them?). I've told them that there must be some way to tell the system to select which tape, etc. but they say it should work automatically. Backup is still failing. I think they left the schedule exactly as it was when we had a single tape drive.

Also, when I look at the media pool, under Min. # of Media in Save Set, it says 5. Is that correct if we use only 2 tapes?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[davidmichel]

need to run the ARCserve Device Configuration utility to setup ARCserve to use the library.

 

[grinstb]

You need to set up groups and put the appropriate slots in the appropriate groups the configure you jobs to use the appropriate groups. If you configure your protection scheme correctly you will not need to erase you tapes manually.

Also for you differential you may have to do two jobs.. the Friday job set as overwrite and sat-wed set to append.

You may need a license for the tape library option also not positive about this.

 

[Cyklops]

as long as you only have one tape drive (which is mostly the case with an autolader) you don't need to purchase a separate Tape Library Option.

For your situation use the following scheme:

choose a standard 5-day or 7-day weekly rotation from the 'use rotation scheme' menu in the schedule tab of the backup job. Select the 'append' button that appears above the rotation rules. Adjust the Diff backup on Thursday to Full and rename the tapename to WLY-FULL. Adjust the Full backup on Friday to Diff and rename the tapename to DLY-DIFF (this should cause all other scheme days to change the tapename to DIFF). Erase the two tape cartridges and let the scheme do the rest. This works as long as both the Full one one side and ALL Differentials on the other side fit on just one tape cartridge.

Hope I'm clear

regards