DPM 2010 tape backups failing

The technical support forum for Firestreamer (the virtual tape library).
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Dru
Posts: 2
Joined: 08 Feb 2013, 18:17

Post by Dru »

We're currently using DPM2010 with Firestreamer 4.0.0 backing up to a TS-879U-RP QNAP for our "long term" tape backups. We use this identical configuration successfully in offices around the world.

Everything had been working fine, and just recently we noticed that the long term backups were failing. DPM says:
DPM failed to use the tape in Slot 3 because it appears to be a cleaning tape that is identified incorrectly as a backup tape. (ID 25016 Details: Internal error code: 0x80990C20)

The Firestreamer activity log says:
02/08/2013 09:37:54 | Error | E025 | L1T003 | Unable to insert the medium [file://\\xxxxxx.xxxxxxxxx.net\xxxxxx\xxxxxx\xxxxxxxxxx\DPM\servers\VTL12\T22HHCRK82E_BV_10000000003.fsrm*83968] into a tape drive: The system cannot find the file specified [C0000034] | file://\\xxxxxx.xxxxxxxxxx.net\xxxxxx\xxxxxx\xxxxxxxxx\DPM\servers\VTL12\T22HHCRK82E_BV_10000000003.fsrm *83968 | T22HHCRK82E_BV_10000000003

Looking at the QNAP, I can see that T22HHCRK82E_BV_10000000003.fsrm does not exist. Though numerically, the files before and after it, exist. The log shows other examples of files it cannot find, and they are also missing from the QNAP. It's like specific files were deleted and others were left alone. I'm not aware of any person or process that could have removed the files.

Is it possible to determine how the files disappeared? Can they be recreated? Do they need to be recreated?

Bottom line, I just want to get the long term backups going again without disturbing the existing backup data.
Thanks...

Dru
jsf
Cristalink Support
Posts: 300
Joined: 29 Aug 2010, 09:03

Post by jsf »

Firestreamer does not delete files. In theory, the file could disappear if QNAP say rebooted when the file was being written, the underlying disk structure of the file became corrupted, and the QNAP file system deleted the file during the start-up check. There might be logs on QNAP which could tell what happened. Check the old DPM alerts to see if there was a problem writing to the tape when the tape existed. Check what DPM says about the missing tape content.

I wouldn't worry unless the problem happens frequently. I am not sure how exactly DPM behaves if it founds an unusable tape, but I'd expect it to use the next available tape instead of failing the backup. Are you sure your backup failed? If so, did you have other free tapes available? If not, make sure you have sufficient number of free tapes.

>>Do they need to be recreated?

If a virtual tape file gets lost, the effect is the same as if you lost a physical tape cartridge. Firestreamer doesn't care. You don't need to recreate the file (i.e to create a new zero-length file), and in fact you probably should not. Just update the media layout to remove the missing file, and add new files if needed. If you recreate the file, the effect is the same as if you found and erased the physical tape.

From the backup perspective, It depends on the data the tape contained. The safest way is to perform a full backup, but it may not be necessary if the tape contained some older backups or was empty. You may want to ask Microsoft Support about it.
Best regards,
John Smith
Cristalink Support
Dru
Posts: 2
Joined: 08 Feb 2013, 18:17

Post by Dru »

I removed T22HHCRK82E_BV_10000000003.fsrm, '05Y.fsrm, and '05Z.fsrm from the media layout, and re-ran the tape backup jobs. The two failed jobs completed successfully.
I'm not sure what caused the three tapes to disappear. I'll just recreate the media and move on.

Thanks for the speedy (and accurate) reply.

Dru
jsf
Cristalink Support
Posts: 300
Joined: 29 Aug 2010, 09:03

Post by jsf »

Thank you for the update.
Best regards,
John Smith
Cristalink Support
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