can't access tape drive in RH8.0 :(
 

Hello,

I have RH8.0. I need to take backup in tape and when I try to access the tape drive it says

#mt rewind
/dev/tape: No such file or directory

There is tape-d and tape-reset in /dev directory. How to access it? The hardware is detected.

Please need help.

Thanks.

please help!!

if module is loaded correctly the tape will be

/dev/qft* or /dev/st* pls check for this dev according to h/w type.
pls check and post.
With regards
Mahesh

What kind of tape drive are you using?

Well, how to check which tape drive i am using? In the /dev directory, the qft* and st* are available. I tried to do lsmod to find whether the module is loaded. The lsmod displayed the following

Module Size Used by Not tainted
nls_iso8859-1 3516 0 (autoclean)
ide-cd 33608 0 (autoclean)
cdrom 33696 0 (autoclean) [ide-cd]
es1370 29100 1 (autoclean)
gameport 3396 0 (autoclean) [es1370]
soundcore 6532 4 (autoclean) [es1370]
mga 107584 0
agpgart 43072 1
nfsd 79920 8 (autoclean)
autofs 13348 0 (autoclean) (unused)
nfs 82564 4 (autoclean)
lockd 58064 1 (autoclean) [nfsd nfs]
sunrpc 79324 1 (autoclean) [nfsd nfs lockd]
tulip 43552 1
iptable_filter 2412 0 (autoclean) (unused)
ip_tables 14936 1 [iptable_filter]
st 30768 0 (unused)
mousedev 5524 0
keybdev 2976 0 (unused)
hid 22244 0 (unused)
input 5888 0 [mousedev keybdev hid]
usb-uhci 26188 0 (unused)
usbcore 77024 1 [hid usb-uhci]
ext3 70368 3
jbd 52212 3 [ext3]
ncr53c8xx 61868 0 (unused)
sd_mod 13552 0 (unused)
scsi_mod 107144 3 [st ncr53c8xx sd_mod]

what should i do further?

I was looking for make and model internal, external and maybe a interface type like IDE, SCSI or parallel.

You can try the following commands:

cat /proc/scsi/scsi

mt -f /dev/st0 status

#cat /proc/scsi/scsi
Attached devices:
Host: scsi0 Channel: 00 Id: 03 Lun: 00
Vendor: HP Model: C1533A Rev: A708
Type: Sequential-Access ANSI SCSI revision: 02

# mt -f /dev/st0 status
SCSI 2 tape drive:
File number=-1, block number=-1, partition=0.
Tape block size 0 bytes. Density code 0x0 (default).
Soft error count since last status=0
General status bits on (50000):
DR_OPEN IM_REP_EN

Hope it is detecting the device right? What should i do to access it?

Michael,

I tried
# mt -f /dev/st0 rewind and
#mt -f /dev/st0 offline.. these commands are working but
# tar -tvf /dev/st0 is giving the following error

tar: /dev/st0: Cannot read: Input/output error
tar: At beginning of tape, quitting now
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now

How to see the archive and take the backup in tape?

Hello,

Still I am facing this problem to take backup. The command,

#mt -f /dev/st0 seek
/dev/st0: Input/output error

gives the above error. Any help?

:( anyone is there to help me?

Are you trying to create a tar backup or restore? Do you know that a valid tar file exists on tape?

To create a tar backup to tape example:
tar -cvf /dev/st0 /home/user/

To test backup:
create a temp backup directory
mkdir /home/user/restore
cd /home/user/restore
tar -xvf /dev/st0

Replace user a valid user on your system.

yes, both 'tar'ing and extracting from the tar is working fine. how to see only the contents of the tar file which is in tape without extracting them? could u please help me to know what command is that?
thanks

tar -tvf /dev/st0

should do use -ztvf if it is a compressed archive

Nope!! it's not working.. :(

]# tar -tvf /dev/st0
tar: /dev/st0: Cannot read: No medium found
tar: At beginning of tape, quitting now
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now

]# tar -ztvf /dev/st0
tar (child): /dev/st0: Cannot read: No medium found
tar (child): At beginning of tape, quitting now
tar (child): Error is not recoverable: exiting now

gzip: stdin: unexpected end of file
tar: Child returned status 2
tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors

these are the errors...

The actual device depends on what kind of tape drive you have.
Mine is scsi and I use /dev/st0 for rewinding and /dev/nst0 for not rewinding.