Yow. With that kind of failure rate, I'd suspect something in the
storage area for those tapes. Are they stored in your regular
tape vault area? The 8mm and 4mm tapes are _really_ sensitive to
environmentals, especially humidity. It's something about the
glue used to hold the oxide coating on -- humidity causes it to
flake off.

Also, how old are these tapes? The 8mm and 4mm media are
generally only usable for about 3-4 months before you have to
replace them. I've found the genuine HP 4mm media to be the best,
but it's still only good for a very limited time (compared to a
3480).

Good luck with this one. It sounds nasty.

-- db
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