Using Physical Tapes (Loading Physical Tape Drives)

Using Physical Tapes (Loading Physical Tape Drives)
	Chapter 3. Using a NearStore VTL Appliance

The NearStore VTL appliance provides the ability to copy the data from virtual tapes to physical tape for offsite storage. You can also use the NearStore VTL appliance to import physical tapes. When you import a tape, the NearStore VTL appliance creates a virtual tape that has the same barcode and data as the physical tape.

Because the NearStore VTL appliance preserves the native format of the backup application when it writes data to disk, you can export data to tape and import data from tape without the need for a conversion process. In fact, the backup application can access the data from a physical tape while the NearStore VTL appliance is importing it.

When the backup application specifies a physical tape that is not in one of the virtual libraries, the NearStore VTL appliance generates an action prompting you to load the physical tape being requested. If you have enabled the physical tape pick list functionality of the system, the NearStore VTL appliance will also provide display the needed tape on the Physical Tape Pick List screen.

The Load Physical Tape Drive screen displays a list of physical tapes that need to be loaded into specific tape drives. Once the tapes have been loaded, you can use this screen to let the NearStore VTL appliance know that you have mounted the tapes to the appropriate drives. You can also let the NearStore VTL appliance know that you could not find the specified tapes.

Loading Physical Tape Drive

Complete this task to use the Load Physical Tape Drive screen:

From the Daily Tasks menu, located on the left side of the screen, click the Physical Tapes task category.
Click the Load Physical Tape Drive tab, located in the upper portion of the screen.

The NearStore VTL displays the Load Physical Tape Drive screen:

Done—select this checkbox to let the NearStore VTL appliance know that you have mounted the required tape.

Tape Drive—specifies the name of the physical tape drive on which the physical tape will be mounted.

Previous Tape—gives the name of the last physical tape that was mounted on the specified physical tape drive.

Tape to be Loaded—provides the barcode of the physical tape that needs to be mounted.

Write Protect—specifies whether the tape needs to be write protected before it is mounted. If the import request has been selected as a read-only request, set to yes.
Select the Done checkbox of each physical tape that has been mounted to the specified physical tape drive. If all physical tapes have been mounted, click Select All.
Click Apply when you have mounted the physical tape to the specified physical tape drive.

The NearStore VTL creates a virtual a virtual tape that has the same barcode as the physical tape that it is importing. The backup application can access the data on the physical tape as soon as this NearStore VTL starts the import. See Importing Virtual Tapes for more information.

The following options are also available:
- If you cannot locate the tapes, select If the requested volumes are not to be found, click here. See Marking Physical Tapes as Lost
- If you would like to specify a particular physical tape drive manually, then select If you would like load the volumes to a specific physical tape device, click here.
- If you want to import additional tapes, select If you would like to create more volume import requests, click here. Selecting this option displays the Import Virtual Tape screen, available from Daily Tasks > Virtual Tapes. See Importing Virtual Tapes for more information.