Veritas bck exec 9.0 and HP ESL 712 Tape Library?

[RSXVMS]

We are using Veritas bck exec 9.0 on a new HP ESL-E Tape Library (712 slots 8 Ultrium drives).
My expertise is not on Veritas/Windows , but have used different backup solution for over 30 years.
Background:
The ESL-E library has been partition into 2 logical partition, one partition for Windows/ Veritas slot 300-712 and 4 of the 8 drives. The other partition for future use with another OS.
? Does Veritas support partition libraries?

Initiating a backup:
(1) Veritas picks a free tape from the free pool and loads it into a free drive (ex slot 20)
(2) After the backup completes the tape is ejected from the drive and placed in a different
Slot (ex slot 250).

Is this a feature of Veritas? if so how do I turn it off.. If this is not a feature any ideas on why this is happening. In our testing , it’s consistently NOT returning the tapes to its original slot. Interesting observation: it’s putting the completed tapes in new adjacent slots.

Thanks
RSXVMS

 

[justin2000]

Shouldn't be doing that - BE always puts the tape back in the slot it came from - there is no where to specify to use a different slot.

This may not make a difference - but I would suggest upgrading to 9.1 with the latest driver set.

Does BE see the slots as 300-712? or 1-413 or 0-412?
Just wondering if it is getting confused in where the slots are.
BE most probably thinks there should be 712 slots there, but only seeing 413.
Are you able to do some testing..

1. Take the partitioning off - so BE see every slot and every drive.
2. Update to 9.1 and driver set.

If all else fails I would suggest logging a call with Veritas - not via email, but phone support. There could be issues with the Veritas drivers for the loader.

 

[RSXVMS]

Thanks justin2000.
New development I found out from my windows people that they are using NetBackup v5.1.
Does anyone know if v5.1 can work with a 2 partition HP ESL-E tape library? Veritas people are saying that the problem is in the ESL-Library; but there is no indication that the ESL is at fault here. The problem happens sometimes not all the time.
This week-end I will delet the partition and see if that fixes the problem.

Thanks:
RSXVMS

 

[justin2000]

I was gonna say, don't know of many people who use BE with a loader of that size.

From what I know about Netbackup and it ain't much - you shouldn't have any issues with 2 partitions - just as long as it is configured correctly.