We use a Sepaton S2100-ES2 without problems. Vicki's advice is sound:
make sure the vendor's product is TSM certified; make the vendor supply
an evaluation system and test thoroughly.
A VTL should faithfully emulate a particular physical ATL and particular
physical drives. It should not require any drivers or patches unique to
the VTL. Keep in mind the following points:
1) If you configure your VTL to be out of specs with the physical ATL
you are emulating, your backup application, i.e. TSM, may have a
problem. For example if the physical ATL has a max of 800 slots and you
configure 1500 slots TSM may complain.
2) The VTL is a software/hardware product. All software has bugs and
you may get bit, but then you may get bit by a software bug with a
physical ATL also. The important thing is how responsive is the vendor
when an issue does arise? This is where interviews with present
customers is important. Insist on speaking to customers that have
experienced problems. If the vendor can not or refuses to provide as a
customer reference someone that had a problem that was successfully &
promptly resolved then look for a different vendor. Also remember that
with a physical ATL you will always be subject to failures caused by
wear to mechanical parts. The only mechanical parts in a VTL are fans
and drives, and redundancy protects you against those failures. Overall
you should expect a quality VTL to be more reliable then a physical ATL,
at least this has been my experience.
Good luck, I am glad I went to a VTL,
Milton Johnson
-----Original Message-----
From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On Behalf Of
Larry Peifer
Sent: Friday, December 09, 2005 11:56 AM
To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
Subject: Re: Define path for direct attached fiber
We're beginning to look into VTL and I'd be interested in what systems /
vendors your considered and then which one you are going with. Running
TSM 5.3 with AIX 5.2ML 5 on RS6000 P650.
LTP
San Clemente, California
Victoria Ortepio <victoria.ortepio AT MCI DOT COM> Sent by: "ADSM: Dist Stor
Manager" <ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU>
12/09/2005 06:40 AM
Please respond to
"ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" <ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU>
To
ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
cc
Subject
Re: [ADSM-L] Define path for direct attached fiber
Be careful with this one. We just purchased a VTL ourselves.
We are running TSM 5.2.3. We are currently waiting for a fix with the
vendor in order to configure TSM.
In TSM V5.3, the code seems to have loosened up. Verify that the TSM
version, o/s version, device drivers (o/s or TSM), the type of drives,
is a configuration that the vendor has certified.
Our problem is with LTO2 drives. Try speaking with one of their
customers that has the same configuration as you do.
Regards,
Vicki
MCI
Piscataway, NJ
-----Original Message-----
From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On Behalf Of
Thorneycroft, Doug
Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2005 5:24 PM
To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
Subject: [ADSM-L] Define path for direct attached fiber
We are getting ready to purchase a Virtual Tape library.
It will be direct fiber attached to our TSM 5.2.6 Win2K server via a
host bus adapter.
I was wondering how Tivoli will see the device for the path, is it
similar the a scsi attached device ie. LB0.0.0.1 or something completely
different?
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