Direct Tape Access

[Lonely Raven]

I'm going to ask the Ars Technica guys, but I thought I'd start
with the people I know first. Sorry this isn't completely SETI
related, but it is part of my SETI Farm so...

I have this killer 40GB 4mm Tape Backup, and I'd like to do
scheduled Ghost backups of each of my machines over my
home network.

I've got everything figured out except WHERE TO PUT ALL THOSE
MULTI GIG GHOST IMAGES!

I used to have a program from Seagate called Direct Tape
Access, which basically gave my Tape Drive a drive letter and
allows me use my 40GB tape drive as...well, a BIG ASSED FLOPPY!
And since my 4mm Tape Drive is Ultra2Wide, speed is not an
issue!

Does anyone know of a nice Direct Tape Access program that will
assign a drive letter to my tape drive under Windows 2000?
The Seagate Direct Tape Access is no longer supported about
the same time that Win2k Was released. And the version of
Tape Backup in Win2k doesn't support this.

Any help would be GREATLY apprecaited. Especially since I'm
tired of reinstalling windows after some hard core crashes!

 

[SpeeDj]

The way I would go about this would be the following share that tape drive on whatever machine you have it connected to and map a network drive, that will add another drive letter to which you should be able to point the tape backup to in order to save. That is how I run all my backups to dual 30GB Drives, I map the drives and give them a letter and Voila attached storage.

J - Let me know if you need anymore help with that.

 

[bbdd]

i understand what SpeeDj is saying, but it's a chicken and egg thing. i don't think you can share a drive to map it to another system unless you can access it via a drive letter first, which is raven's problem.

i also use ghost for backups, but i dont know how you can do scheduled backups with it. it requires booting to dos and running a command line program, then rebooting back into windows. i'm not sure how you are going to do that automatically, but if you can, let me know how you are doing it. i would be interested.

when i run ghost, i use the -split and -auto parameters to break the file into chunks i can fit onto cd-r. i run the images to a second partition (since you cant save the image files on the drive you are trying to image), then reboot into windows and burn the files to cd-r for storage.

instead of ghost, you may want to look for a "real" backup program that supports backups over a network. at work we use retrospect. we can back up any machine in the building to a central tape drive from a central console over the network.

personally, as far as tape is concerned, i am moving off it myself. hard drives are big enough and cheap enough now to just get an external one for backups. external, so you can take it with you or move it from machine to machine. and with usb 2.0 or firewire, they are finally fast enough. i just bought an external usb 2.0 7200 rpm 100 gb drive from buslink that i will start using for backups on my machines. i can plug it into my new computer that i am building, which will have usb 2.0, or even into some of my older ones that have usb 1.1. or, just share it over the network.

my $.02...

 

[Lonely Raven]

Thanx bbdd, you nailed it.

How can I map a drive that I don't have?

As for how I do scheduled Ghost backups. I use Ghost
Enterprise that work bought for me at one of my previous
jobs. The company went under so I kept the software.
With it, you can do a remote client install, and from the master
console you can tell the machine to Ghost and it will warn the
"user" that it will shut down in 15 seconds, reboot, and start
Ghosting to a designated drive, local or mapped. All this and more
can be scheduled, plus it's got features for making a SysPrepped
Windows install so if I build a new machine, I can have it up
and running Windows with all my utilities and SETI and stuff
in about 30 mins.

Which is why I want to give my tape drive a drive letter. So I can
setup my Ghost Server to Ghost a machine each night onto an 8GB tape (one tape for each machine compliments of my work
after they upgraded to a DLT Tape setup). Or I can just use the
80GB tape and pile each machine onto the "drive" and start
over every Sunday.

I was thinking about a USB hard drive, but unless each machine
has USB 2.0 or firewire (added expenses and less chance of
MAD overclocking), but I already have the tape drive, and as of
yesterday I now have a PILE of tapes, with more on the way
if work can remember where they dumped them!

 

[SpeeDj]

If the drive physically installs into a machine you can assign it a drive letter. You have to share the drive, by right clicking on in it in my computer and going to sharing and defining how you want to share it. Then you need to map it as a network drive from the rest of your machines, mapping it will assign it what ever drive letter you choose, you can also tell it to reconnect on startup which as long as the computer with the tape drive is booted first so they can all initialize to it you will be fine. You can Network drive anything from floppies to cd-roms to tape drives to physical hard drives, as long as it is installed in a main machine that is attached to the network. For instance I have my mp3 drive listed as Network drive X when in reality it is drive H in my server. Mapping a network drive is the viable and quick solution and remedy to your dilema.

J - My two cents

 

[Lonely Raven]

ERRRG!!!

J man, I love you as a team member and all, but lay off the crack
for a sec.


IF THE TAPE DRIVE DOESN'T HAVE A DRIVE LETTER THEN I CAN'T MAP IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[SpeeDj]

Alright then clarify to me please, I am not really understanding what you are saying you have a Tape backup drive, but how does it connect to something? If you could explain to me how it is working I would appreciate it. Or is it that when you install it the os doesn't see it as a Drive? Without software?

Please fill me in, sorry if I seem like I am on crack

J

 

[Lonely Raven]

You *know* I'm just messing with you bro. Crack is for Mac
Addicts, not SETI Addics...sheesh.

Anywho.

I have a tape drive. It's a 4mm 40/80.
I use Win2k Pro on this Dualie Machine.
I tried to get Win2k Server on the machine, but either my copy
is bad, or I need to find the matching PII 400 Processor that
I posted about earlier (probably the latter)

Being that it is a tape drive, it doesn't get assigned a drive letter.
(unless it does in Win2k Server, but not Pro)

It can be accessed with Tape Backup Software such as
Varitas or whatever flavour backup software floats your boat.

But it doesn't have a drive letter.

It can be seen in the Device Mangler, er Device Manager, and
has properties, but nothing to set it as "Removable Drive" or
"Assign Drive Letter"

Oh, and it doesn't have a drive letter.

The tape drive is fully functional. I've backed up files locally
and from across the network. And even restored them just for
grins.

Lately I've just been using it to back up the SETI Driver folder and
all my WUs late at night when I'm sleeping. But my ultimate goal
is to use Ghost Enterprise to remote backup full hard drive
images, so when I trash them while pushing an overclock, I can
have it back up and running in less then 30 mins (most of that
spent finding the damnn tape!), rather then rebuilding it by
hand in 4 hours!

As I said in my previous post. Seagate, who I believe makes
the Varitas backup software that's part of Win2k, used to make
a software (part of Varitas I think) that assigned a drive letter
to your tape drive, allowing you to use it as a giant floppy drive.
This rocked back in the Win95 days when I had a 4GB tape
backup and I was "archiving" CDs. Heh. But they never
supported NT or Windows 2000. As a matter of fact, they dropped
the Direct Disk Access software about the same time as Win2k
was released.

I do apprecaite your help. Maybe if your using Win2k Server and
it does assign a drive letter to any tape drive without special
software, that is where you don't get where I'm coming from.

I *was* just kidding before.....LOL