Topic: Backup system not wworking affter 2 good years

[vesnick]

Hi Guys,
I have a scsi 20x40 backup internal sony tape unit.
It has been working realy well for 2 years on esmith 5.5
Then it stopped backing up.
I put the unit with its scsi card into a winxp box and with ntbackup was able to backup and restore some data.
I then placed it into a sme v7 server and am receiving the same error as the error in the original 5.5 system.

Anyone with ideas as to whats going wrong?

I've included the logs for  flex backup on the 5.5 system and v7

esmith 5.5 flexbackup log

----------------------------------------------

flexbackup version 0.9.8 <flexbackup@home.com>

/etc/flexbackup.conf syntax OK

|------------------------------------------------

| Doing level 0 backup of all using dump

| Retensioning tape...

| Rewinding & erasing tape...

| Creating index key 200607242101.17

| Tape #0

| Filesystems = / /boot

|------------------------------------------------

At block 0.

|------------------------------------------------

| File number 1, index key 200607242101.17

| Backup of: /

| Date of this level 0 backup: Mon Jul 24 21:01:17 2006

| Date of last level 0 backup: the epoch

|------------------------------------------------

| (dump -0 -b 10 -a -f - / | gzip -4) | buffer -m 3m -s 10k -u 100 -t -p 75 -B \

| -o /dev/nst0

|------------------------------------------------

DUMP: Date of this level 0 dump: Mon Jul 24 21:01:18 2006

DUMP: Dumping /dev/hda6 (/) to standard output

DUMP: Added inode 7 to exclude list (resize inode)

DUMP: Label: /

DUMP: mapping (Pass I) [regular files]

DUMP: mapping (Pass II) [directories]

DUMP: estimated 23508730 tape blocks.

DUMP: Volume 1 started with block 1 at: Mon Jul 24 21:05:22 2006

DUMP: dumping (Pass III) [directories]

buffer (writer): write of data failed: Input/output error

bytes to write=10240, bytes written=-1, total written 10K

DUMP: Broken pipe

DUMP: The ENTIRE dump is aborted.

|------------------------------------------------

sme v7  flexbackup log
------------------------------------------------
| Doing level 0 backup of set all using tar
| All sets = full (1 tapes)
| Rewinding & erasing tape...
| Creating index key 200607271246
| Backup set "full" (/)
| Tape #0
|------------------------------------------------------------
SCSI 2 tape drive:
File number=1, block number=0, partition=0.
Tape block size 0 bytes. Density code 0x26 (DDS-4 or QIC-4GB).
Soft error count since last status=0
General status bits on (81010000):
 EOF ONLINE IM_REP_EN
|------------------------------------------------------------
| File number 1, tape index 200607271246
| Backup of: /
| Date of this level 0 backup: Thu Jul 27 12:46:17 2006
| Date of last level 0 backup: the epoch
|------------------------------------------------------------
| cd "/" && /tmp/collectexit.3748.sh find . -depth -xdev ! -type s ! -regex \
|   "news/articles" ! -regex ".*~"$ -print0 | /tmp/collectexit.3748.sh tar \
|   --create --null --files-from=- --ignore-failed-read --same-permissions \
|   --no-recursion --totals --label "level 0 / Thu Jul 27 12:46:17 2006 \
|   tar+gzip from smartserver" --sparse --atime-preserve -b 64 --file - | \
|   /tmp/collectexit.3748.sh gzip -4 | /tmp/collectexit.3748.sh buffer -m \
|   20m -p 75 -s 32k -t -u 100 -B -o "/dev/nst0"
| [ ! -e /tmp/exitstatus.3748 ]
|------------------------------------------------------------
buffer (writer): write of data failed: Input/output error
bytes to write=32768, bytes written=-1, total written    1067840K
ERROR: non-zero exit from:
buffer -m 20m -p 75 -s 32k -t -u 100 -B -o /dev/nst0
gzip -4
tar --create --null --files-from=- --ignore-failed-read --same-permissions --no-recursion --totals --label level 0 / Thu Jul 27 12:46:17 2006 tar+gzip from smartserver --sparse --atime-preserve -b 64 --file -
find . -depth -xdev ! -type s ! -regex news/articles ! -regex .*~$ -print0
ERROR: exiting
|------------------------------------------------------------
| Backup start: Thu Jul 27 12:46:17 2006
| Backup end:   Thu Jul 27 12:56:34 2006
|------------------------------------------------------------
/dev/nst0: Input/output error
|------------------------------------------------------------



thanks in advance

[vesnick]

Hi again

Just to clear a few things up.
After the error first appeared I cleaned the heads and them used  2 x new tapes in all the tests in win xp and sme.

Thanks
nick

[vesnick]

Hi Again

Another log file after another attempt to backup on the
sme v7 with a new tape.


Nick

|------------------------------------------------------------
| Doing level 0 backup of set all using tar
| All sets = full (1 tapes)
| Rewinding & erasing tape...
| Creating index key 200607271425
| Backup set "full" (/)
| Tape #0
|------------------------------------------------------------
SCSI 2 tape drive:
File number=1, block number=0, partition=0.
Tape block size 0 bytes. Density code 0x26 (DDS-4 or QIC-4GB).
Soft error count since last status=0
General status bits on (81010000):
 EOF ONLINE IM_REP_EN
|------------------------------------------------------------
| File number 1, tape index 200607271425
| Backup of: /
| Date of this level 0 backup: Thu Jul 27 14:25:08 2006
| Date of last level 0 backup: the epoch
|------------------------------------------------------------
| cd "/" && /tmp/collectexit.4772.sh find . -depth -xdev ! -type s ! -regex \
|   "news/articles" ! -regex ".*~"$ -print0 | /tmp/collectexit.4772.sh tar \
|   --create --null --files-from=- --ignore-failed-read --same-permissions \
|   --no-recursion --totals --label "level 0 / Thu Jul 27 14:25:08 2006 \
|   tar+gzip from smartserver" --sparse --atime-preserve -b 64 --file - | \
|   /tmp/collectexit.4772.sh gzip -4 | /tmp/collectexit.4772.sh buffer -m \
|   20m -p 75 -s 32k -t -u 100 -B -o "/dev/nst0"
| [ ! -e /tmp/exitstatus.4772 ]
|------------------------------------------------------------
buffer (writer): write of data failed: No space left on device
bytes to write=32768, bytes written=-1, total written   11435296K
ERROR: non-zero exit from:
buffer -m 20m -p 75 -s 32k -t -u 100 -B -o /dev/nst0
gzip -4
tar --create --null --files-from=- --ignore-failed-read --same-permissions --no-recursion --totals --label level 0 / Thu Jul 27 14:25:08 2006 tar+gzip from smartserver --sparse --atime-preserve -b 64 --file -
find . -depth -xdev ! -type s ! -regex news/articles ! -regex .*~$ -print0
ERROR: exiting
|------------------------------------------------------------
| Backup start: Thu Jul 27 14:25:08 2006
| Backup end:   Thu Jul 27 17:17:49 2006
|------------------------------------------------------------
SCSI 2 tape drive:
File number=2, block number=0, partition=0.
Tape block size 0 bytes. Density code 0x26 (DDS-4 or QIC-4GB).
Soft error count since last status=0
General status bits on (81010000):
 EOF ONLINE IM_REP_EN
|------------------------------------------------------------
| Rewinding...

[vesnick]

Hi Again,
An update to what I have tried.
First  Error was

" buffer (writer): write of data failed: Input/output error "

I had a feeling it was hardware related.
Changed the scsi card and was getting the same error.
" buffer (writer): write of data failed: Input/output error "

Then,
Stripped the scsi tape unit to the bones and with meticulous attention to detail cleaned the heads and anything else I could get my hands on.

After another test backup I did not notice the error log had changed as ( silly me !)
 "buffer (writer): write of data failed: No space left on device"

My v7 test server had way too much data on it to backup.

I removed most data and did a test backup with the original scsi card and the now cleaned tape unit and presto !!! all working again.
After 3 tests still all ok. I think I got lucky with the windows test..? it should not have worked?

Hope this helps someone else.