From owner-freebsd-hardware@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Sep 8 01:52:14 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A7FA516A4BF for ; Mon, 8 Sep 2003 01:52:14 -0700 (PDT) Received: from cirb503493.alcatel.com.au (c211-28-27-130.belrs2.nsw.optusnet.com.au [211.28.27.130]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B4A5343FE3 for ; Mon, 8 Sep 2003 01:52:11 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from PeterJeremy@optushome.com.au) Received: from cirb503493.alcatel.com.au (localhost.alcatel.com.au [127.0.0.1])h888q3gh001683; Mon, 8 Sep 2003 18:52:03 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from jeremyp@cirb503493.alcatel.com.au) Received: (from jeremyp@localhost) by cirb503493.alcatel.com.au (8.12.8/8.12.8/Submit) id h888pvBo001682; Mon, 8 Sep 2003 18:51:57 +1000 (EST) Date: Mon, 8 Sep 2003 18:51:57 +1000 From: Peter Jeremy To: "Jason A. Crome" Message-ID: <20030908085157.GE44292@cirb503493.alcatel.com.au> References: <000001c372e9$8faef460$2600a8c6@cromedome> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <000001c372e9$8faef460$2600a8c6@cromedome> User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.1i cc: freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Recommendations for Tape Drives? X-BeenThere: freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: General discussion of FreeBSD hardware List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 08 Sep 2003 08:52:14 -0000 On Thu, Sep 04, 2003 at 08:36:35AM -0500, Jason A. Crome wrote: >I am in the process of setting up several x86-based FreeBSD servers and will >be in need of a quality backup solution. Which tape drives, in your >experience, play nicely with FreeBSD, and what software would you recommend >to go with it? On the software side, dump(8) is defintely the best way to go. Nothing else can match it for handling wierd cases. There are two downsides: 1) You can confuse it by turning a file into a directory (or is it vice versa) whilst the dump is running. 2) The lack of internal filesystem buffering can hurt throughput. Matt Dillon committed some changes that help but it's still below filesystem throughput. For network awareness, amanda has a good reputation though I haven't used it personally. As for a tape drive, last time I checked (admittedly a year ago), SuperDLT seemed to be the most cost-effective solution in the 100GB region. Compaq were also selling a (relatively) cheap 26 slot library if you needed more capacity. One problem with raw tape drives is keeping them streaming - once they switch to start/stop mode, both the performance and reliability drop significantly. This is a particular problem with dump. You might find it useful to have some disk space for staging (dump to disk and then dd the disk to tape). You'll also need Gigabit Ethernet to avoid saturating the network to the tape drive. Peter