SGI: Hardware

Hello,

I was wondering if anyone had any luck with LTO drives and Irix boxes. I'm considering getting one but I don't want to spend a lot of money on one if I can't make it work.

Regards

I do have one, but it's hooked up (internally) to my main swerver. I do have some downtime scheduled in the future so I could take it out and hook it up to the octane if none else steps up. It will easily be weeks before that happens though (waiting on shipment of RAM from Australia).

Scratch that, I don't have an internal-to-external connector for 68p...

HP published a Unix Configuration Manual that included a IRIX kernel configuration file for their LTO/Ultrium drives. The trick is/was finding a copy. The current <commonly available> version is Edition 5, from which HP unfortunately dropped IRIX.

After playing word games with google for a while I managed to find a copy of Edition 1 of the HP Ultrium Tape Drives Unix Configuration Guide - which does indeed include an IRIX 6.5 kernel configuration guide <and a few other gone-with-the-wind unix flavors>.

Seeing as it's an Edition 1 manual, it probably deals with earlier model HP LTO/Ultrium drives. The manual is still publicly available on one of HP's semi-obscure servers: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w ... 1g&cad=rja
As long as it's still available I'd recommend downloading a copy - HP gives some advice on user changeable block sizes to tune the the drive for specific uses, as well as a run down on specific commands to use

Here's the kernel configuration file <watch for erroneous word wrap>:
For anyone who's not certain what to do with the kernel config file, there's a neko-wiki that gives the run-down on where to put the file and how to get the kernel to recognize it .

Excellent! I'll archive a copy as well.

Oh, that manual was interesting to read:

MTCAN value Capability Enabled
APPEND Append to existing tape data
BSF Backspace file
BSR Backspace record
CHKRDY Determine if a tape cartridge is present
CHTYPEANY Change density and/or fixed to variable at points other than
beginning of tape
COMPRESS Compression
PREV Prevent media removal
SEEK Seek to a particular block
SETSZ Fixed block size can be set
SILI Suppress illegal length indicators
SPEOD Space to EOD (end of data)
SYNC Synchronous mode SCSI
VAR Variable block sizes

Constant Description
40 Transfer time-out in “inverse ticks”
5*60 Minimum time-out in seconds for any command
20*60 Space command time-out in seconds
20*60 Time-out in seconds for long operations (such as rewinds)
512 Default block size in bytes for fixed block size mode
64*512 or
512*512
Recommended blocking factor in bytes for the upper limit of read/
write commands

As a follow up, I had a couple of Dell (oem'd HP) LTO-1 drives on-hand, and moved one to an external case to test compatibility with the HP provided kernel configuration file.

After the initial power up, as expected the drive appeared as "unknown" to both an hinv -vm and "mt status". The good news is that the drive has standard HP firmware, so no modifications will be needed to the device identification string in the HP provided kernel configuration file.

After adding the HP kernel config file to /var/sysgen/master.d/scsi I updated the kernel <with autoconfig> and rebooted. After the reboot, the drive was correctly recognized by an hinv and mt status:


After using a 75 GB DLT drive, the 200GB capacity of the Ultrium/LTO-1 is nice. I've got a full system backup running now - I'll update this post when its done.

Update: I used the IRIX provided GUI <for cpio> to run a full system back up - and after the backup completed was able to read the contents of the tape and restore selected files.

The LTO-1 drive was connected to a LSI 21320 Ultra320 controller <according to the hinv as an LVD device>. The full system backup was 60.71 GB. From start to finish it took 33 minutes, 30 seconds - a significant improvement considering the DEC DLT7000 35/70GB drive < the same one used when I wrote the tape drive wiki > needed several hours/usually overnight to make a similar sized backup of back up of my Octane <connected to the Octane's native single-ended UltraSCSI bus>.

Here are a few more kernel configuration files for tape drives that are larger/newer than those included in with IRIX. These are compliments of a web search and I don't have the specific tape drives to test with, so no guarantees.

In an attempt to consolidate, the last four were recopied from videobrat's 2005 nekochan post .

In a follow up to videobrat's original post, LoWeN mentions that an additional piece of <licensed> IRIX software is required to allow the use of tape drives larger than a DLT IV. The additional software mentioned by LoWeN is an asynchronous personality daemon, or APD. Here's a forum post by videobrat where he describes problems with a Quantum LTO-3 drive used without APD - and a follow up post where he mentions that an HP LTO-3 drive he got as a replacement for the Quantum LTO-3 worked without APD .

VideoBrat's initial problems with the Quantum LTO-3 drive may have been the result of a typographical error in the kernel configuration file he used, rather than the lack of APD software. The first line of the IRIX kernel config file he used read:

{ DATTAPE, TPDAT, 8, 7 , "CERTANCE", " ULTRIUM 3 ", 0, 0, {0},

- the fourth field in that line "7", should reflect the total number of spaces in the fifth field ("ULTRIUM 3"), which is actually 9 spaces. To comply with SGI's guidelines, it should have read

{ DATTAPE, TPDAT, 8, 9 , "CERTANCE", " ULTRIUM 3 ", 0, 0, {0},

(the copy quoted below is the edited version).

I don't have the APD software, and so far that hasn't been a problem with backups and partial restores using the non-APD HP LTO-1 I tested with. In the absence of the APD software, the best practice may be to test a non-APD backup *before* a critical system back up is done. ( UPDATE : the list of successfully tested drives larger than DLT IV now includes an IBM LTO-2, a Quantum (Certance) LTO-2HH, and a Quantum SDLT320 - follow the thread for additional details).

There's not much in TechPubs on APD beyond some <similar> customer letters < scroll down to see the list >, and an indirect mention in the IRIX 6.5.30 Release Announcement that certain drives <that need the APD software> would appear in "mt status" as an "Async Personality Device".

I suspect that <among other things> the IRIX asynchronous personality daemon *might* provide for faster read/write performance, but was also intended as a marketing device to guide customers contemplating the purchase of a tape drive back to SGI. One source that might shed additional light on the subject is Sony's Unix Configuration Guide v2.24 . In that manual Sony recommends using APD v2.7 for their AIT-3 and SAIT-1 drives, but also provides a IRIX kernel configuration file to allow "testing without APD" <perhaps Sony's way of backdooring APD when Sony's potential customers balked at having to purchase an APD license just to test Sony's drives> . Sony's inclusion of a 'test' kernel driver at least suggests some drives will function without the addition of the APD software, and might hint that not using APD doesn't result in a performance hit - it would hardly behoove Sony to provide a method to test their drives that resulted degraded performance. In either case, the ability to use any of the drives listed below could still offer backup capacities greater than DDS4 or DLT IV.

So if anyone does try one and have success, please post a follow up note.
HP Ultrium 1 / LTO-1
IBM LTO2
IBM LTO3
Quantum SuperDLT-1
HP Ultrium-3/LTO-3 <originally provided by videobrat in this nekochan post >
Quantum (Certance) LTO-2
Quantum (Certance) LTO3
HP LTO-4 (Model 1760) - provided by hhoffman in this nekochan topic.
The following were also provided by videobrat < in this original post >:
Quantum SDLT 220
Quantum SDLT 320
Quantum SDLT 600
Sony DTF-2
If any one has additional <or alternative> examples, please post them.

Brilliant Recondas,

I suggest we had this to the wiki with due credits as soon as the hardware aggregators pages are in place.

Thanks.

If anyone wants a cheap SDLT220, I have a couple spares. I also have a couple SDLT600's, but those I need to get the mid-$xxx range for.

Chris

magellan wrote: Brilliant Recondas,

I suggest we had this to the wiki with due credits as soon as the hardware aggregators pages are in place.

Thanks.

I only have a DDS-2 and a 21Gb S-VHS Tape back up .. So not speaking from experience but I am consolidating what I read:
http://www.nekochan.net/wiki/LTO

R.

As a follow up note, I just added an IBM LTO2/Ultrium-TD2 tape drive that works with the following definition file:
That IBM LTO-2 drive completed a 12.4GB full system backup (using the IRIX gui for cpio) in a hair over 10 minutes.

There's a How-To post in the neko_wiki that describes where to place the definition file and how to configure your system to use it (and the tape drive): http://www.nekochan.net/wiki/Tape_Drive ... r_IRIX_6.5

Another LTO tape drive tested and confirmed working with IRIX. This one is a Certance (Quantum) LTO 2HH (half-height) drive, model CL1001. I couldn't find a Quantum supplied kernel configuration file, so I modified the IBM LTO-2 / Ultrium-TD2 config file so it would work with the Quantum/Certance drive (see the Identifing Non-Standard Tape Drives under IRIX 6.5 article in the neko-wiki for more on modifying tape drive kernel config files).

After the modified config file was added (and the kernel rebuilt) the drive was recognized by IRIX:

and here's the modified configuration file: Using the IRIX GUI for cpio, the half-height Certance/Quantum LTO 2 drive completed a 12.4GB full system backup in 9 minutes 43 seconds.

EDIT: Managed to find an original Quantum/Certance kernel config file for this drive in the Certance On-Line User's Guide for LTO-1/LTO-2 Tape Drives (see page 63). There doesn't seem to be much difference between the two, but here it is for posterities sake:

Another report of success - this time with a Quantum SDLT320. using the kernel configuration file listed a few posts back:
Same 12.4GB full system backup took 13 minutes, 3 seconds.

I have a DELL Powervault 128T with LTO-1 drives and room for 20 tapes that I would like to put on an IRIX machine.
The drives will probably work with one of the configuration settings here, but how about the changer.

Any software recommendation? Amanda? I don't think cpio or tar will can handle the automatic changer.

/Bjorn

bjornl wrote: I have a DELL Powervault 128T with LTO-1 drives and room for 20 tapes that I would like to put on an IRIX machine.

I have a Dell LTO-1 that uses standard HP LTO-1 firmware. If you connect the drive you should be able to get the details on what the tape drive firmware reports to IRIX. My Dell LTO-1 isn't an autoloader, but if the mechanism is the same there's a copy of the kernel configuration file I used a few posts back . If your LTO Autoloader uses a different mechanism, there are several elsewhere in this topic (and more in/var/sysgen/master.d/scsi), or we can try tweaking one to fit.

If you've previously run MAKEDEV tape on a different tape drive you'll probably want to clear the old configuration before you run MAKEDEV on this one. Running "ls -l /dev/tape " and "ls -l /dev/nrtape" will tell if there's an existing tape configuration (/dev/tape and /dev/nrtape are symbolic links to /hw/tape - by way of /dev/rmt/tape and /dev/rmt/nrtape). If either invocation of ls -l returned a link to a device, you'll probably want to remove /dev/tape and /dev/nrtape before running MAKEDEV on the new drive.

bjornl wrote: The drives will probably work with one of the configuration settings here, but how about the changer.

Jan-jaap mentioned using a script (under linux) to cycle the loader in this post - perhaps he'll catch this and offer his opinion on doing the feasibility of doing the same under IRIX. If all else fails you could manually cycle the loader - if you can get anywhere near the LTO-1 max theoretical capacity of 200GB you shouldn't have to manually load too often. The IRIX man page for xfsdump actually looks very similar to the linux version I looked at, both make mention of spanning tapes, provide for an option that will notify you when the tape needs changed, and mentions you can preform a multi-stream dump to both of the drives in your changer:

the xfsdump man page wrote: To perform a level 0, multi-stream dump to two locally mounted tape drives:

Code: Select all

# xfsdump -L session_2 -f /dev/rmt/tps4d6v -M tape_1 \
-f /dev/rmt/tps5d6v -M tape_2 /

BTW - if you do want to use compression you'll have to update /dev/tape (and /dev/nrtape) so the sym links point at the correct device. While it did create a device that can provide for compression, IRIX didn't set up any of the drives I've tried to use that device configuration. All of the initially created device links pointed at the variable block size device (without compression), "tps6d6 v " and tps6d6nr v ("man tps" will give you the info needed to decipher those device strings). After looking at the contents of /hw/tape ("ls -l /hw/tape), I relinked to the devices that provided both varible block size *and* compression - "tps6d6 vc " and "tps6d6nr vc ". Both of those examples are for the SDLT I currently have connected, they may be somewhat different in the case of your LTO-1.

bjornl wrote: Any software recommendation? Amanda? I don't think cpio or tar will can handle the automatic changer.

So far I've only used the backup choices provided by IRIX. I was able to restore a system with a "full system backup" tape created using the IRIX GUI for cpio - booted to an IRIX install CD and used the PROM "system recovery" tool.