From owner-freebsd-questions Thu Jan 8 23:28:49 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id XAA24348 for questions-outgoing; Thu, 8 Jan 1998 23:28:49 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-questions) Received: from allegro.lemis.com (allegro.lemis.com [192.109.197.134]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id XAA24330; Thu, 8 Jan 1998 23:28:27 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from grog@lemis.com) Received: from freebie.lemis.com (freebie.lemis.com [192.109.197.137]) by allegro.lemis.com (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA28368; Fri, 9 Jan 1998 17:47:22 +1030 (CST) Received: (from grog@localhost) by freebie.lemis.com (8.8.8/8.8.7) id RAA06150; Fri, 9 Jan 1998 17:47:22 +1030 (CST) (envelope-from grog) Message-ID: <19980109174722.63760@lemis.com> Date: Fri, 9 Jan 1998 17:47:22 +1030 From: Greg Lehey To: Steven Ames Cc: wilko@yedi.iaf.nl, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG, freebsd-scsi@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: SCSI/Tape problem? References: <199801090157.UAA00259@news.cioe.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.84e In-Reply-To: <199801090157.UAA00259@news.cioe.com>; from Steven Ames on Thu, Jan 08, 1998 at 08:57:03PM -0500 Organisation: LEMIS, PO Box 460, Echunga SA 5153, Australia Phone: +61-8-8388-8286 Fax: +61-8-8388-8725 Mobile: +61-41-739-7062 WWW-Home-Page: http://www.lemis.com/~grog Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Thu, Jan 08, 1998 at 08:57:03PM -0500, Steven Ames wrote: >>> I'm encountering a problem that I just can't seem to solve. >>> I have a FreeBSD system that I've been using to backup my >>> network for quite a while. It is using an Adaptec 2940 card >>> and an Exabyte 8205 tape backup. I'm using 'amanda' to do >>> the backups onto 160M tapes. Alrighty... >>> >>> A while back the system started to lock up during the backup >>> process. Also the command 'mt erase' would never terminate. >> >> You might run into some timeout situation. I have an (admittedly >> somewhat older) 8200 drive and it takes ages to do an erase. >> >> Why not omit the 'mt erase' altogether? The drive will erase your >> tape anyhow when you start writing to it from BOT. > > Hrm... I was unclear. The 'mt erase' is obviously only a > symptom. The backup process still causes my machine to lockup... FWIW, I have an 8505XL on a 2940UW (also an Archive DDS changer). I don't have any trouble with them. Admittedly, I'm a diehard tar user, but I can't imagine that's the problem. Are you 100% sure your termination is OK? I've found the 2940 to be very particular. For example, I *could not* get it to work with specific combinations of disks, though I'm sure that there is nothing wrong with the disks. I now have two 2940s in my machine, with some disks on each, and it works fine like that. Greg