IDE TAPE DRIVE BACKUPS FOR SCO OPEN SERVER 5.0

[SLICKYBOY]

Hello:<br>

<br>

Yes I am a rookie in the use of SCO Open Server 5.0. The company I just started with is still using the version that came out in 1980's. They want to update their systems to IDE, currently using SCSI (50pin, due to legacy equipment failure. The systems they are running only need half a gig for backup, so I'm looking for smaller tape backups, not the huge 14 ~ 20 gig monsters.<br>

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I have looked on the SCO hardware compatability list to no avail. <br>

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MY QUESTION:<br>

Does anyone know of a IDE tape drive that works with this OS? <br>

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I haven't tried them yet but I wonder if the IOMEGA 250 mb zip drives will work. <br>

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Any help, hints, comments gladly accepted.<br>

Thanks.

 

[AndyBo]

Hmmm, not sure of the advantage of &quot;upgrading&quot; to an IDE based system, as SCSI gives much better performance.<br>
<br>
When you say they are updating their systems, are they actually buying a whole new box? If so, then your best bet would be to just get a box that uses SCSI. Specify that you'll be running SCO OS 5.0 and let the vendor worry about speccing the tape drive ;^) I think that most SCSI based tape drives should work OK.<br>
<br>
Not sure about the Zip drives, and whether they'd be supported by SCO OS. If it's not on the SCO hardware list, then I'd give it a miss.

 

[jhupe]

I am currently testing a new product for tape backup. The company I work for has several tape backup products that work on SCO, but we are not listed on their compatibility yet. As for IDE, I have to agree about not going that route. SCSI is much better and SCO is a very stable platform when properly set up and maintained. As for small tape backups, I am unaware of any. You might try the Tavan, or Exabyte Mammoth. I know they are listed in the SCO compatibility. Other than that I don't know. I work for Onstream, but I wouldn't use our drive till it has been fully tested and verified by SCO.

 

[timsr]

We have had success with Seagate Travan 4 tape drives. 4 gig capacity usually configured as secondary slave.

 

[ransim]

We had a machine in Wilmington that was a Compaq Prosignia and we where trying the HP Colorado 4GB Travan drive for the SCO open server 5.0. I did not have gray hair when I started but I do now. As far IDE Tape drives I would not recommend trying the HP travan.

 

[edfair]

Understand about the unavailability of product to replace the failed drive.<br>I use 150 and 525 mb wangteks which haven't been manufactured for years.<br>I would suggest that you look into EZsystems on the web, they sell used, <br>repaired drives at reasonable prices.&nbsp;&nbsp;And don't be caught without a viable<br>backup drive the next time one fails.&nbsp;&nbsp;At the speed things are changing you<br>have to buy two to be safe.

 

[TommyP]

We have customers who use Tandberg Data SLR4 tape drives and they get along just fine.&nbsp;&nbsp;These tape drives are 2.5 gig.&nbsp;&nbsp;Or you can get the SLR5 which is a 4/8 gig drive.&nbsp;&nbsp;Both of these are SCSI and run on different releases of SCO.

 

[arizonasco]

I have had conditional luck with the IDE Travan drives such as the Seagate 8gig unit. I would discourage you from using any HP/Colorado IDE Tape drive. They are pure JUNK!!

By &quot;conditional luck&quot; I mean these drives will work with TAR or CPIO but, I have found they do not usually play well with Unix backup software such as Lone-tar, Ctar, or Backup Edge. If you use these drives with CPIO or TAR, you will not be able to compress the data on the tape. This means that if you use an 8gig travan, the drive will only backup 4 gigs to the tape.

My suggestion, Stick to SCSI tape drives.

 

[josel]

If budget is an issue, look into Colorado Backup Drivers (now known as HP). They worked fine for me some years ago - although I think that was XENIX but they just might work OK for UNIX if your version is as old as you say!

Finding the driver for your binaries may just be a totally different animal.

Good luck!

Jose Lerebours If you have the knowledge, consult and educate those who need it! - Jose Lerebours

 

[arizonasco]

If memory serves me, Colorado only made 2 releases of thier driver for Xenix. I tried to get them to work on a 3.2v4.2 system once and Unix would not load it. Another draw back is that they only worked with the Jumbo 150 and 250 drives. I have a copy of the driver in my dusty archive somewhere.

Thanks;
Mike

 

[edfair]

They made Jumbo for 3.2.0 but it was operative on later releases.

I've furnished copies for several years for people using it but this isn't the way to go.

I assume that this thread is pretty much useless now, since the original post was over 2 years ago. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[Royt]

If your current backup requirement is ~500mB then it is likely to increase in size - that's computer nature!
I would definitely go for a scsi dat drive - 4Gb would give you plenty of slack. We have had odd problems with HP drives and always choose Seagate if possible, although immediate delivery on Seagate dat drives in the UK has sometimes been a problem.

Roy Thomas

 

[aseidas]

We ship all of our servers with seagate tr-5 ide drives. They are inexpensive and reliable. We use Microlite backup edge and recover edge 2 for our backups and we are very pleased with both products.

 

[pcunix]

Lately I have been using DVDRAM wherever I can. The original install is just a little more expensive than tape, but the media should last long enough to make up for that difference in a few years.

The disadvantage is that backups are only about 3gb per hour- normally that's not a probablem for overnight backups, but in some places this could be a problem.

Restores (using Microlite on indexed media) are simply incredible because this is a random access device- so give the command, press enter, and zap! it's done!

More at

http://pcunix.com/Reviews/dvdram.html

Tony Lawrence
SCO Unix/Linux Resources

http://pcunix.com

tony@pcunix.com