...From what I have been told, early tests have not been promising and TSM still thinks files have changed even if the last change date/time etc has not altered. Does anyone have any experience with this or any advice they can give that may help us avoid a long backup that will hog system resources? ...
IBM site Technote 1154307 notes that prevailing Windows settings can cause restored objects to inherit parental permissions, to the exclusion of the permissions they had at backup time. This may or may not be a factor.
Given that you have both the production and test restoral file systems in place, you have the ideal opportunity to conduct detailed comparisons of the same objects and directories in the two cases, and discern differences, potentially leading to resolution of your issue. It will be valuable to identify restored files which TSM does *not* deem subsequent candidates for backup, as a further source of information. Be sure to reference the client manual's summary of backup criteria. Where TSM 5.3 is used, the new PREview command may be helpful.
Richard Sims http://people.bu.edu/rbs
