Failed to export tape: no free I/E port found

[wortontech]

Hi there.

I am having an issue with some tapes when exporting the job.

The first tape exports ok, but all subsequent (2,3,4 etc) display this error.

The version of software is 7.0.0.871 I am running. I downloaded the ISO and installed this patch straight to this. All I have done is put the tapes in, created the media pool and ran the first backup job and set the pool to export the media.

Any ideas ?

[veremin]

Hi Kevin, what is your support ticket ID for this issue (it's requested when you click New Topic)? Without the ticket number the topic will be removed by moderators eventually. Thanks.

[wortontech]

Oh sorry.

I will log a support call now and update with the ticket number

[wortontech]

This is a trial product however and we are due to purchase this over the next few weeks. It seems I cannot log a support call as we dont currently have any paid support as we have not purchased the licenses yet. What I may do is disable export for this media and then when we have support then we can recreate the export media.

[veremin]

According to our policy, customers with evaluation license are eligible for support. So, feel free to open support case. Thanks.

[wortontech]

Ok the case ID is 00607950

I did not zip up the jobs as these are not needed really. I did see that there was a patch release for this in later releases too.

[foggy]

Kevin, how many I/E ports do you have?

[wortontech]

Hi.

The loader is a Dell TL2000. It is only configured for 1 IE port. The loader has the remaining 23 configured as slots.

Hope this helps.

[foggy]

Then it is expected that if this port is already used by the first exported tape, you get the mentioned error for the other tapes.

[wortontech]

Ok, so I understand this:

Tape one goes in does the backup
Tape two goes in, finishes the backup
Tape one goes in does the export ok
Tape two is expected to go in at the same time and run the export ?

I was under the impression that the library would rotate the tapes in turn to export the jobs.

[Dima P.]

Kevin,
If export slot is already loaded with tape media – system would always generate IE slot error. Generally, once system exports tape you need to manually unload it from the IE slot.

If you want to automate the process, you can increase number of IE slots. The best practice for such libraries would be 3-4 IE slots, then based on you tape usage you can schedule the specific time when you need to unload written tape media and load new tapes.

[wortontech]

Ok no worries.

I thought this my be the case. I think the limitation is with the TL2000 library as it only has 1 IE slot available.

Anyway, I have marked the jobs as not to export to prevent this happening.

I think the call can be closed now as Ill use this as a workaround.

Thank you for the feedback anyway its much appreciated.

[Dima P.]

You are welcome!

I've looked across TL2000 user guide and that is true - only one IE slot by design. However, based on notes in the same user guide you can try to update the library firmware to 3.90 and above, since this firmware changes on the slot configuration become available. Before doing that, please, double check it with Dell support.

Cheers!