Hi,

we recently installed RedHat 7.3 on our Internet Server. Now we are looking for 
a backup solution decided to try Amanda, which is included in the RedHat 
distribution. We have installed and configured it as described but have no 
opinion on setting the tapeype. We are using a DAT device from Sony with DDS2 
tapes.

The output from mt status was:
SCSI 2 tape drive:
File number=0, block number=0, partition=0.
Tape block size 28672 bytes. Density code 0x13 (DDS (61000 bpi)).  Soft error 
count since last status=0 General status bits on (41010000):
BOT ONLINE IM_REP_EN


First we tryed to label a tape with amlabel getting the output:
[root@inetsrv root]# amlabel Freitag Freitag_1
rewinding, reading label, not an amanda tape
rewinding, writing label Freitag_1
amlabel: writing label: Invalid argument

In the messages we got the output:
Aug 15 15:48:04 inetsrv kernel: st0: Write not multiple of tape block size.


So we thougt perhapes the tapetype must be set correctly, so we tried the progi 
tapetype with the following output:
[root@inetsrv root]# /usr/sbin/tapetype -f /dev/nst0 -t DDS2
tapetype: could not write any data in this pass: short write


Our config file:
#
# amanda.conf
#
org "Freitag"
mailto "root"
dumpuser "amanda"
inparallel 4
netusage  600 Kbps

dumpcycle 1 weeks
runspercycle 1 weeks 
tapecycle 4 tapes

bumpsize 20 Mb
bumpdays 1
bumpmult 4

etimeout 300
runtapes 1

tapedev "/dev/nst0"
tapetype Sony-DAT
labelstr "^Freitag_[0-9]*$"

holdingdisk hd1 {
        comment "main holding disk"
        directory "/var/tmp"
        use 290 Mb
}

infofile "/log/amanda/Freitag/curinfo"          # database filename
logdir   "/log/amanda/Freitag"                  # log directory
indexdir "/log/amanda/Freitag/index"            # index directory
tapelist "/log/amanda/Freitag/tapelist"         # list of used tapes


# tapetypes
define tapetype Sony-DAT {
        comment "Sony DAT tape drives"
        length 4000 mbytes
        filemark 29 kbytes
        speed 1024 kbytes
}


# dumptypes
define dumptype global {
        comment "Global definitions"
}

define dumptype always-full {
        global
        comment "Full dump of this filesystem always"
        compress none
        priority high
        dumpcycle 0
}

define dumptype root-tar {
        global
        program "GNUTAR"
        comment "root partitions dumped with tar"
        compress none
        index
        exclude list "/usr/local/lib/amanda/exclude.gtar"
        priority low
}

define dumptype user-tar {
                root-tar
                comment "user partitions dumped with tar"
                priority medium
}

define dumptype high-tar {
        root-tar
        comment "partitions dumped with tar"
        priority high
}

define dumptype comp-root-tar {
                root-tar
                comment "Root partitions with compression"
                compress client fast
}

define dumptype comp-user-tar {
        user-tar
        compress client fast
}

define dumptype holding-disk {
                global
                comment "The master-host holding disk itself"
                holdingdisk no # do not use the holding disk
                priority medium
}

define dumptype comp-user {
        global
        comment "Non-root partitions on reasonably fast machines"
        compress client fast
        priority medium
}

define dumptype nocomp-user {
                comp-user
                comment "Non-root partitions on slow machines"
                compress none
}

define dumptype comp-root {
        global
        comment "Root partitions with compression"
        compress client fast
        priority low
}

define dumptype nocomp-root {
                comp-root
                comment "Root partitions without compression"
                compress none
}

define dumptype comp-high {
        global
        comment "very important partitions on fast machines"
        compress client best
        priority high
}

define dumptype nocomp-high {
                comp-high
                comment "very important partitions on slow machines"
                compress none
}

define dumptype nocomp-test {
                global
                comment "test dump without compression, no /etc/dumpdates 
recording"
        compress none
        record no
        priority medium
}

define dumptype comp-test {
                nocomp-test
                comment "test dump with compression, no /etc/dumpdates 
recording"
                compress client fast
}
########################################


We really have no idea on where we should search for a fault in the 
configuration.
We are hardly thinking about installing W2K!

We will be glad about any help!