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Tape backup

  • June 15, 2005 at 12:29 pm

    #164972

    Hi everyone,

    I've got a question about your backups. Are you all using tapes backup?? One of my client asked me my feedback about how to get rid of their backups problems.

    They bought a tape backup 9 months after going throught a lot of trouble with their old one. It cost about 6000 can$ (about 4850 us$) + the tapes. But now we face the same trouble than with the last one: the tape stopped working, saying errors like "can't write to tape", can't access device, etc. Never the same errors (ie.: the tape backup is broken).

    Quantum shipped us another one this week... but still the same problem, still doesn't work.

    So the director of IT asked me to give him some advices on how to make it work and be sure the next one last for a couple of year! (I think it's the third or fourth tape backup that break in the last 4 years)

    Their a relatively small company of about 60-70 employees with about 240gig of data to backup each day (including my SQL data).

    I'm not a server guy, I'm developping their software with Sql as back-end, so I wasn't sure what to suggest him and how to help him with his problem. Does anyone have suggestion? Has anyone faced the same situation?

    Thanks you very much,

    Erik

    Note: I hate tape backup

     

  • June 15, 2005 at 12:49 pm

    #565837

    What kind of tape? DLT, LTO, 8mm?

    What software are they using for the backup? Windows NT, Veritas???

    Is the tape drive connected to the server via SCSI, Ethernet, USB?

    What does Quantum say when they call technical support? Have they tried to escalate the problem within Quantum?

    I have used Quantum DLT tape drives in the past and have had a few problems, but not many...the problems were mostly related to power issues (whether the drive was on before/after I turned the server on, if we had a power surge that the UPS didn't handle well, etc).

    Now I use IBM LTO tape library, and I haven't had any problems with that.



    Michelle

  • June 15, 2005 at 1:18 pm

    #565857

    Quantum DLT sdlt320 (scsi) on Win2k server with Veritas as the backup software.

    We sent them the tape backup and send another one... which cause the same problem. Now they'll try tonight to change the cables, etc. But they don't have any parts to test except for new cables (!).

    Are DLT tapes good? We had so much problems in the past with them... Should we use another technology to be sure our backup will work fine in the future?

    Thanks,

    Erik

  • June 15, 2005 at 1:26 pm

    #565863

    DLT is fine...It has been around for years and is usually very dependable.

    Has anyone tried to erase/reinitialize (not sure of the terminology on your drive/software) a tape and then try again?

    Are multiple tapes being used or just 1 or 2?

    I would definately check the cable. Has the SCSI board in the server ever been replaced? Could you move the SCSI board to a different PCI slot and try that? Could you put the drive on a different server and try that?

    In Microsoft OS, there is a basic backup that you can try to see if maybe the problem is in Veritas' detection of the drive. Shutdown any running Veritas processes and then go to system tools-->backup.

    These are things I would try.



    Michelle

  • June 15, 2005 at 1:29 pm

    #565866

    I've been using DLT tapes for a long time and haven't had too many problems with them - they're pretty much rock solid as long as you use them as intended. Occasionally you have problems if you take a backup from one server/tape drive and try to restore it on another server with a different tape drive. It doesn't sound like this is what you are expereincing, so I would definitely lean on Quamtum and/or Veritas tech support to figure out what is wrong.

  • June 16, 2005 at 1:14 am

    #565985

    Use the VERITAS web site or Help for drive trouble shooting, I have had to use their tape utility to remove and add the DLT tape device 3 times in the last year. If the drive is external to the server, make sure it is powered up before booting the server, SCSI is not PnP.

    I use Tape and External Hard Drives.

    I backup (1 Full DB and hourly log to the same file) to External 1394 (Firewire) HD during the day, and have 3 HD in rotation.

    I backup (Full DB) to tape nightly, and have 30 DLT tapes in rotation.

    When I need this week's data the External HD is MUCH faster and when I need the older data the Tapes are cheaper.

    Tape drives have been short lived and probably will be until replaced by a non-mechanical device. Just check out the MTBF numbers. And how many of us only find bad tapes when we want to restore from that day's tape?

    The External HD is a pain to rotate. When I get the budget, I plan to have 3 online instead of my current 1.

    With the cost of 500GB external HD falling, it will not take long for me to justify replacing the tapes, yea!

    BTW, I think that I have found a 16GB file size problem with Windows 2003, I see the old NT4 "Delayed Write failure" Events when SQL backup writes to a 1GB Network connected HD or attempts to copy (xcopy or move) the local sql backup file. As long as the file is < 16GB no problems. Anyone else seen this?

    Andy

  • June 16, 2005 at 8:16 am

    #566111

    Tape is fine and most people still use it. It's one of the cheapest ways to get a backup offsite (you do take backups offsite, right?)

    I've had this same issue, and here's what happens. Someone sends back a tape drive to Quantum/Compaq/HP/IBM/whoever. They send a new one. Everything's great.

    Now, you send yours back with an issue. They've "repaired" the other drive someone else sent back and they turn that one around to you, not a new one and they fix yours. But maybe they didn't get it completely tested or fixed right, so you get another bum tape drive. You send that back, they send another one, and hopefully it works.

    I did this once and the 2nd one I get sent was the first one I sent back!!! I had a nice, long, screaming match on the phone with my account rep over that one.

    Eventually I got to talk to some techs and they explained that they get busy and their inventory control isn't the best. Sometimes if they don't have one ready, they just send one back that hasn't been tested or maybe not even repaired.

    If you've tried different tapes in the drive, then send it back until Quantum gets it right. DLT wokrs great, but Quantum is the only company that makes them.

  • June 16, 2005 at 8:55 am

    #566137

    Thanks everyone for your answers. It finally works today (first time in 3 weeks...

    They called an external company to test the drive onsite. He did exactly what the network admin did yesterday!?! (change the cable, terminator, etc) Not the first time I've seen this kind of situation

    Hope the backups will stay fine for a long time now!

    And yes Steve we do take backups offsite. We use a rotation of 10 tapes for each day of the week on 2 weeks + 12 tapes for a montly full backup that we keep in a safe. So everyday of the year there is at least 2 tapes offsite : one for yesterday and one for last month backup. That, of course, when the backups are working!

    Thanks again,

    Erik

  • June 16, 2005 at 10:07 am

    #566184

    Thanks for the followup and good luck with the unit.

    Steve

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