When reviewing our options we concluded that a tape changer was a small additional cost compared to the cost of a tape drive. It also enabled automatic tape handling. We are in the USA and purchased a Qualstar Q24 library. The library is network connected and has room for 2 LTO drives. It can use either FC or SAS, depending on the adapter you use in the library.
The Q24 has a mail slot for tape import/export, but so far I've been unable to find a way to use mtx to move tapes to or from the mail slot. The only way to open or close the mail slot is the front console of the library, from what I've seen. I can move tapes to/from the mail slot using the changer web GUI. I am somewhat disappointed by this because I had hoped to enable automated tape interchange workflows where a script moves a tape from the mail slot, runs a job that deposits data to the tape, then ejects the tape, moves it to mail slot, then ejects mail slot. An office staff person removes the tape in the morning, places it into its case, and inserts the next tape. If the tape isn't ejected, the staff person calls IT since that means something went wrong. That workflow isn't possible to automate as far as I can see because mtx cannot see or interact with the mail slot. Not a huge deal, but something you might want to know. The workflow I've described is more commonly used with a single tape drive and no tape changer, but in the interest of air gapping as soon and as regularly as possible in my opinion it's probably among the best practices for routinely removing small single tape backup jobs from the changer. If you want to do virtual full, copy, or migration jobs from LTO to LTO, know that you'll need two LTO drives. For these job types there must be an input device and an output device. Since you're already using bacula for backup to disk volumes, I THINK you should be able to use the disk backup as the input device and the LTO drive as an output device. In the case of having a disk backup set and an LTO drive, I think you could find copy and migration jobs useful since you could perhaps occasionally run off copy jobs from your disk backups to tape, then remove your tape media from the library. I have read about ransomware that automatically seeks out and attempts to attack tape backup systems, over-writing tape media. You already mentioned air gapping, but I must emphasize that actually removing backup media from the changer is a very good practice in defense against that sort of threat. We selected SAS, primarily because we wanted to directly contact the library to the tape drive, and because we didn't know anything substantial about FC. FC also appeared to be more expensive. When considering SAS adapters, we were informed by our backup hardware vendor that some SAS adapters don't properly support tape communication. For that reason, an ATTO SAS card was recommended. Our cost for that card was around $400 USD. Our vendor of choice was backupworks.com. I don't have a business relationship with them or any incentive for recommending them. They've just been really helpful in selecting hardware and their service has been good as we ordered additional media. I believe they are usa based, so if you are not then they might not be the vendor for you. I will note that some libraries in this space locked away the usage of some slots and perhaps some features behind upgrade licenses. I didn't like that idea at all, and didn't select such devices. I have been informed that only a couple companies are still manufacturing tape drives, only ibm is still researching new tape drive mechanisms. I believe the qualstar libraries are actually manufactured in Europe, perhaps in Germany. I have been told that the libraries are also being manufactured by one company and rebadged elsewhere. Don't know if true. Because your goal is to air gap backups, definitely consider two things regarding which drive you select: cost per TB, and cost per cartridge. As of a while ago, LTO 8 media was $5 USD / TB (raw). I haven't checked LTO 9 media recently, but I imagine it might be more per TB. Of course, cost per cartridge might matter a lot if you have otherwise small backups, and if you want to have many cartridges as part of a routine LTO export / data versioning / air gap process. Robert Gerber 402-237-8692 r...@craeon.net On Tue, Mar 19, 2024, 9:35 AM Gary R. Schmidt <g...@mcleod-schmidt.id.au> wrote: > On 20/03/2024 00:56, Anders Gustafsson wrote: > > Hi! > > > > We used to use tape a long time ago. Then it was CA Arcserve for Linux, > ran fine, but CA dropped the product > > so we switched to Bacula and backing up to disk. The recent surges in > ransom attacks has made us think of > > airgapping again and even a resonably small LTO drive would work for our > immediate needs. So the plan is to > > get one, plus a SAS card and install in a separate PC and run the > storage agent on it. At this point I am just > > fishing for advice and pointers. As I see it, the PC does not even need > to be server class and the SAS card > > can be a humble 4-port HBA (Adaptec HBA 1100-4i ). Does this sound like > a reasonable plan? Anything to watch > > out for? > > > Unless you are running a small and static data set, go for FC rather > than SAS, and an autoloader rather than just a drive. > > Cheers, > Gary B-) > > > _______________________________________________ > Bacula-users mailing list > Bacula-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bacula-users >
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