On Fri, Jun 06, 2003 at 03:03:00PM +0100, reply AT teaparty DOT net wrote:
> Jun  6 13:05:53 bunker kernel: Additional sense indicates Scsi parity error
> 
> I'd be inclined to suspect hardware

That's what it looks like to me -- specifically, data getting
corrupted on the SCSI bus.

> except that I can reliably and 
> repeatably dd many gigs of junk from /dev/urandom to the tape (after 
> having "mt fsf"'ed over the amanda header) without getting any write 
> errors at all.

Your test is only giving the SCSI subsystem half the workout that
amflush does.  Try dd'ing from a disk on the same SCSI bus as the
tape drive, instead of from /dev/urandom.  I don't know if it
matters whether you dd from files, e.g. the stuff still sitting
in your holding disk, or from the device itself -- /dev/whatever.
Couldn't hurt to try it both ways :-)

--

|  | /\
|-_|/  >   Eric Siegerman, Toronto, Ont.        erics AT telepres DOT com
|  |  /
When I came back around from the dark side, there in front of me would
be the landing area where the crew was, and the Earth, all in the view
of my window. I couldn't help but think that there in front of me was
all of humanity, except me.
        - Michael Collins, Apollo 11 Command Module Pilot