HP StoreEver Ultrium Tape Drives - Manual (Page 58)

2. Once you have selected your device you have a number of choices for troubleshooting.
• Device identification: shows part number, serial number and information about any cartridge
loaded.
• Firmware upgrade: allows you to locate and upgrade to the latest firmware. You will need
to be connected to the internet for this.
• Run tests: allows you to run proactive tests on your drive, such as the drive assessment test,
which will verify the functionality of your drive in around 20 minutes. HP recommends running
this test before calling HP Support. You will need to provide a ‘trusted' cartridge that can be
written to during this test.
• Generate a support ticket: this is a full dump of the drive logs along with interpretation and
is used by HP Support to learn about the condition of your drive. Most useful is the device
analysis section which is the output from approximately 20 rules forming a comprehensive
analysis of the health of your drive. These rules may give advice such as cleaning the head
or trying a different tape if issues are found. The support ticket can be sent to HP Support for
further analysis.
• Run the performance tests: the tests to measure the write/read performance of your tape drive
and the data generation rates of your disk subsystem are also integrated into Library & Tape
Tools. Use these tests to find the performance bottleneck in your system.
Performance Assessment Tools
NOTE:
We strongly recommend that you check the information on our web site at
http://www.hp.com/support/pat . This contains detailed support information that will enable you to
identify bottlenecks and take full advantage of the performance capabilities of the Ultrium family of
tape drives.
You can use our free, standalone performance assessment tools to check tape performance and test
whether your disk subsystem can supply data at the maximum transfer rate.
The tools are located online at http://www.hp.com/support/pat . They are also integrated into HP
Library & Tape Tools, which is available both online ( http://www.hp.com/support/tapetools ) and
on the CD-ROM supplied with your tape drive.
Optimizing performance
Various factors can affect tape drive performance, particularly in a network environment. In nearly
all cases when performance is not as expected, it is the data rates of the disk subsystem that cause
the bottleneck.
If your tape drive is not performing as well as expected—for example, if backup windows are longer
than expected—please try the tools and consider the following points before contacting HP Support
at
http://www.hp.com/support .
Can your system deliver the required performance?
• The Ultrium 3000 tape drive can write uncompressed data at up to 140 MB/Sec (504 GB/hour).
• The Ultrium 1760 tape drive can write uncompressed data at up to 80 MB/s (288 GB/hour).
• The Ultrium 920 tape drive can write uncompressed data at up to 60 MB/s (216 GB/hour).
Diagnostic Tools and Performance 58