[comp.sys.hp] Using an 8mm Exabyte Drive on a 400s

eric@yoda.eecs.wsu.edu (Eric Schneider) (04/30/91)

Hi -

	I'm trying to get our 8mm Exabyte drive to function optimally on
a HP/Apollo 400s.  The problem is that using rdump(1) seems to give a lot
less capacity than the rated values for this drive.  Can somebody give me
a clue as to why this is?  The exabyte writes 1K blocks on the tape and
puts an 8K gap when the buffer runs out of data.  Is /etc/rmt somehow
responsible for writing 512 byte blocks to this device?  I'd be very
interested in hearing from people who have seen near-capacity storage
on this type of drive using rdump.

	I'd also entertain suggestions for alternative backup programs.
Rdump provides a very straightforware means for restoring files (as in
restore ivf) and that is why I would like to use it.

		Thanks in advance for all your help,

		Eric Schneider


-- 
*------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Eric Schneider, Software Engineer                                            |
| Advanced Hardware Architectures                                              |
| "Any sufficiently rigged demo is indistinguishable from advanced technology".|

smith@wallaby.mrc.uidaho.edu (05/03/91)

In article <1991Apr30.161540.10889@serval.net.wsu.edu> eric@yoda.eecs.wsu.edu (Eric Schneider) writes:
>Hi -
>
>	I'm trying to get our 8mm Exabyte drive to function optimally on
>a HP/Apollo 400s.  The problem is that using rdump(1) seems to give a lot
>less capacity than the rated values for this drive.  Can somebody give me
>a clue as to why this is?  The exabyte writes 1K blocks on the tape and
>puts an 8K gap when the buffer runs out of data.  Is /etc/rmt somehow
>responsible for writing 512 byte blocks to this device?  I'd be very
>interested in hearing from people who have seen near-capacity storage
>on this type of drive using rdump.

  I believe that dump is responsible for the small block sizes.  The drive
is most efficient (both in speed and space) when block sizes which are
multiples of 8K are used.

>
>	I'd also entertain suggestions for alternative backup programs.
>Rdump provides a very straightforware means for restoring files (as in
>restore ivf) and that is why I would like to use it.

  Try ftio.  That seems to be the most efficient.   It allows you to set
the block size to just about anything.

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William Smith                            |. |  
Microelectronics Research Center         \  | 
University of Idaho                      /   \ 
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