SUMMARY: Tape Drive - Sense Key: Media Error

Sorry about the late summary, but I wanted to make
sure the problem was truly fixed.  It turns out that
it WAS a bad tape drive and swapping it out with a
replacement from Sun solved the problem.

Thanks to
 Joe Fletcher
 Mark Hargrave
 Nick Hindley
 Paul Mcintire
 Dave Mitchell
 Paul Ricca
 Peter Stokes
 Justin Stringfellow
for their input on the problem.

Original message follows:

I have a DDS3 tape drive that is not working
correctly.  Backups have suddenly started to fail just
a minute or two after starting.  The tape drive's
'clean' light starts flashing and the following shows
up in the logs:

Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix: WARNING:
/pci@1f,0/pci@1/pci@2/SUNW,isptwo@4/st@4,0
(st4):
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix: WARNING:
/pci@1f,0/pci@1/pci@2/SUNW,isptwo@4/st@4,0
(st4):
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Error for Command:
write
Error Level: Fatal
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Requested Block: 300
Error Block: 300
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Error for Command:
write
Error Level: Fatal
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Vendor: HP
Serial Number:   62       0
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Sense Key: Media Error
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Requested Block: 300
Error Block: 300
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       ASC: 0xc (write
error), ASCQ: 0x0, FRU: 0x0
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Vendor: HP
Serial Number:   62       0
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       Sense Key: Media Error
Jul 10 08:41:39 liz unix:       ASC: 0xc (write
error), ASCQ: 0x0, FRU: 0x0


I've tried cleaning the drive and using new DDS3 tapes
and new cleaning cartridges, but the problem remains.
I have a feeling that I've got a bad tape drive.  Can
anyone confirm this?



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