>I've a simple question for the group, we are using a mixture of IBM and
>FujiFilm LTO1 tapes in a IBM3584 library.  Does anyone have a policy (or
>your thoughts) on retiring tapes, i.e. after X number of read/writes or X
>years service?

The problem with perennially new technologies is that we often don't have
enough time to gain full experience with them to know what their life may
be: we just go on to the next advance.  You'll find numbers at the various
tape vendor sites, such as:
 http://www.storagetek.com/products/product_page48.html

Of course, tapes vary in manufacturing quality according to the day of
week they were made, plant, batch, and all that; so the life expectancy
of any given tape may wildly vary from the others in your library.  And
a problem reading a tape 3 years after it was created may owe to the
drive and microcode which wrote it, rather than to the inherencies of the
media.

In short, with such media I don't think there can be any simple answer.

   Richard Sims