LTO tape usage (modern tape drives)

[cncjerry]

1) Anyone ever get amanda working with LTO under windows native? 
2) I had heard quantum or maybe an ultrium site has the windows LTfS code for free download?  I would like to try it under windows native.  I looked and didn't find anything that didn't require a support password.
3) as in 2, above, is there native backup software under windows that support LTO for free?  I've tried zdatdump but it is non-standard.  I want something i can run under windows or linux.

I've been using cygwin/tar under windows and tar under linux on my cloud.  It works but I would like to get to incremental backups instead of full dumps to LTO tape.  I also want to test LTFS.  I need to cut my power consumption on my cloud server.  I have 46TB of mostly 3TB sas drives spinning and my power for the server and 10gb network is over $100 per month. I've not been able to justify any other storage options to cut power other than tape.

thx, jerry

[Hogwild]

1) Anyone ever get amanda working with LTO under windows native? 
2) I had heard quantum or maybe an ultrium site has the windows LTfS code for free download?  I would like to try it under windows native.  I looked and didn't find anything that didn't require a support password.
3) as in 2, above, is there native backup software under windows that support LTO for free?  I've tried zdatdump but it is non-standard.  I want something i can run under windows or linux.
thx, jerry

Which LTFS code are you talking about? Are you talking about the drivers? I'm guessing the drivers are built into LTFS (AKA Spectrum Archive) Single Drive Edition.

https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/spectrum-archive-le?topic=system-downloading-ltfs-tools-windows

https://www.ibm.com/support/fixcentral/swg/downloadFixes?parent=Tape%20drivers%20and%20software&product=ibm/Storage_Tape/Long+Term+File+System+LTFS&release=2.4&platform=Windows&function=fixId&fixids=IBM_LTFS_Single_Drive_Edition_for_Windows_2.4.5.1_10503&includeRequisites=1&includeSupersedes=0&downloadMethod=http

In case you want to use IBM's Spectrum Archive backup software, here are some good Docs:
https://www.spectrumscaleug.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/SSUG19UK-Day-2-B05-Tiering-to-tape-with-IBM-Spectrum-Archive.pdf

This video shows you how to get LTFS SE source code:



And, more importantly, here's a pic. of a full height drive with see through case cover (giggle)


At first I thought it was kind of frivolous, but when you think about it, it could actually help you to see what's going on in the drive for troubleshooting purposes.

[cncjerry]

thanks for the  links.  I'll see if I can get spectrum running. 

Interesting approach to tape case.  I keep wondering about filtered air because the drives need some movement.  On my tandberg changers, the air comes in the back and exits the front, same as on the LTO5 in my deskside.  I see some dust in there but don't get any errors.  Can your PC feed the LTO6 at full-speed?  I can feed LTO5 as long as the blocksize is greater than about -b 700 with tar

I see you went to LTO6, Hogwild, I was thinking about upgrading one of the drives in a changer to LTO6 but the tapes are pricey.  It takes three LTO5 to backup my primary ZFS raid I call 'bucket' but it is unattended as it unloads and reloads the next tape in the sequential slots. 

thanks again.

[Hogwild]

Nah, I'm just an NPC (non-player character) at the moment. The last drive I had was an LTO-3, and that was years ago.

Right now, I'm hunting for a used drive, possibly one of the mlogic MTape models with Thunderbolt 2 or 3. I don't need blinding speed, as I only need to backup a couple of simple desktop PCs.

I never buy tapes retail. I buy them at very reduced prices on eBay or at a corporate IT surplus place not too far from me.

[cncjerry]

I think the best LTO value is LTO-5 because it has LTFS and decent capacity of 1.5TB native.  I buy the tapes new for $68 for a pack of 10.  I've bought 10 new Quantum tapes for $5 per recently.  The last LTO-5 drive I bought was like new for $125 including shipping.  I was able to slip it into a Dell T-410 I have as a primary workstation.  It's old but has dual processors about 24 cores.  The server is a Dell now but I used DL380s until the electric bill ran up.  The biggest power hog I have is the 10Gig switch as I ran fibre between my primary work areas.  It sucks 120w and that works out to $32 in power a month for switching.

I tried downloading Spectrum from IBM but I had to make an account as even though I worked for them for 25yrs, my old ID was retired I guess.  The verification email never came thru so I'll have to keep trying.

thx again,

Jerry

[cncjerry]

I was able to get LTFS working with one of my LTO-5 drives.  Interesting, and I'll admit I am a tape person, or would that be a tape-nut?  If anyone else tries it, you need to install with administrator privileges.  That took a while to figure out.

Also saw an article recently on the Exabytes of LTO tape sold world-wide last year proving that it is still going strong:

A record 152.9 exabytes of total compressed tape capacity shipped in the fourth quarter of 2023, an increase of 3.14 percent over 2022. The figures were released by the LTO Program Technology Provider Companies (TPCs), a group comprising of HPE, IBM, and Quantum.

Granted, most of that was shipped to me, it seems.

I was never able to get the IBM version working, maybe had I installed with admin priv's.

Jerry

[Hogwild]

Using the instructions I linked to, or with another method?

I believe the right term is "tapehead". Or at least, that would make sense, don't you think?

[cncjerry]

Mr. Hogwild,
I tried the instructions you linked for IBM Spectrum and it installed, but I got the same error that I had later with the HPE version.  It has something to do with privileges so when you do the install, you have to "run as administrator'.  That fixed the later problem with HPE but I haven't tried the IBM Spectrum software again.  I'm testing the HPE and once done, I'll try starting Spectrum again.

It's a cool way to do backups as it looks like a disk drive.  Previously, I was using tar under linux and tar under cygwin Windows.  Both ran the tape at full speed, sometimes over 200MB/sec. LTFS seems to pause now and then and when it hits a large file, say 100GB, it stops updating the transfer window.

I can still use tar on unformatted LTFS tape.

The economics and security are pretty good.  I bought QTY 10, 1.5TB tapes for $68, so that's 15TB of native storage and with drive compression it could be 2X or higher.  I use 3TB SAS drives that consume about 7W per, so backing off to tape saves $18.64 per month in power @ .37kw/h (mirrored) with a breakeven of 3.5 months, better with compression.  I take my important stuff and keep it in the car and the pictures and things are in a grab bag.  We had 10,000 homes destroyed about 40 miles north of us, so it happens.  Two years ago, we had planes dropping fire retardant on the hill above us after something caught fire.  They say people dragging chains cause a lot of fires along the highway.  Tapes are good for 30yrs, DVDs less than 10, CDs about the same.

Thanks

Jerry

[jh15]

Glad to see this is coming alive.

[alan.bain]

I've been using a second hand HP LTO-6 tape drive for backups for some time but have been a bit frustrated by the (lack-of) software support.  To test it out I used Veeam backup which does support basic tape use on windows for the free version, but it is really a box imaging solution and is vastly overkill for my needs (with also an added worry about its meta-data storage and backing that up as it is very "black-box" like i.e. when it goes wrong the diagnostics about what it is doing are very limited).

The free version only supports the file-by-file back up to tape (the non-free ones will write machine/VM backup images to tape) which does work for backing my NAS (but comes with a warning about slowness as the number of files increses).  I was originally planning to look at Bacula, but on careful reading the small print, the windows version is agent only and relies on the server (and tape management) running on unix.

I've used so many OS-es over the years (from AT&T v7 onwards)  that I'd be happy to use unix, but I'd rather not add anorther server to the mix just to run unix and do backups (and sadly most of the applications I need to use are windows only, or I only have windows licenses for them, but I do use cygwin).

Suggestions of better programs to try would be very welcome from me as well.  And yes like others I use tape because of issues with RAID and data loss in the past.  Tapes can easily be stored off site...

[cncjerry]

I use LTFS now and it works great under Win10.  I was using tar under cygwin, have you tried it?  I tried Bacula but it is too complex for my needs.