B&R 7 P4 not recognising tape library partitions

[rskinner]

CASE #00583299

Following an upgrade to B&R 7 P4 many of our tape backups have failed. Firstly, I upgraded the firmware on the library and drives and upgraded the drivers for the library and drives too as they were both old. The library is a Quantum Scalar i80.

The physical library is partitioned into two libraries, one for Backup Exec on a separate server with three drives and one library for Veeam with one drive. On the Veeam server, within Device Manager I can see two tape libraries and four tape drives. However, within Veeam only one library is shown. Prior to upgrading to P4 and updating drivers etc. Veeam correctly showed both libraries with the correct number of drives in each. Oddly, for the one library that Veeam can see the number of drives shown flicks between 4 and 1 every few minutes.

Has anyone else had similar issues since upgrading to P4?

[veremin]

Is it possible to downgrade the library to old firmware and drivers in order to exclude these factors out of list of potential suspects? Thanks.

[rskinner]

Unfortunately, downgrading the drivers made no difference. Downgrading a firmware would have to be a last resort and it factory resets the library. Tape tools logs have been sent to support, so I'll wait for their response.

Thanks

[veremin]

The tape logic hasn't been changed in the latest patch, so I still suspect firmware. Also, I do remember the case when released drivers/firmware made tape drive return incorrect tape capacity to backup console. Anyway, let the support team investigate it directly. Thanks.

[rskinner]

I thought I'd follow up with the case resolution.

When I opened Device Manager and chose to see hidden devices, a third, hidden tape library appeared. I have no idea where this hidden library came from, but maybe it's related to the firmware update on the library. As soon as I deleted this hidden device things were a lot better. Veeam saw the tape library with the correct number of drives and the correct number of slots.

When testing the tape backups 1 job out of ~20 failed with the error:
Loading tape 000650 from Slot 6 to Drive 2 (Tape2) Error: WinApi function 'DeviceIoControl(ChangerGetElementStatus)' failed, code '1162', message 'The indicated element does not exist'
No media in drive

This is an error we've always had and only happens with 1 or 2 jobs each week and the job that on which it occurs varies. Having sent the logs to support they confirmed that for some reason Veeam was still trying to use the 2nd tape library, rather than what I'd configured within the backup job settings. In order to fix this I opened Device Manager and disabled the library that I didn't want use. I also disabled the three tape drives that I didn't want to use. The result is that the only tape library and tape drives that are enabled within Device Manger are the ones I want to use. So far this has worked and there've been no further errors.

[veremin]

Hi, Richard, thank you for coming back and updating the topic with the found resolution. Your input is highly appreciated.