Troubleshooting problems with devices

You can troubleshoot errors that occur when you configure or use devices with IBM Storage Protect.

About this task

Use Table 1 to find a solution to the device-related problem.

Table 1. Resolving device problems
Symptom	Problem	Solution
Conflicts with other applications.	IBM Storage Protect requires a storage area network to share devices.	Set up a storage area network. Attention: Data loss can occur if multiple IBM Storage Protect servers use the same device. Define or use a device with only one IBM Storage Protect server. Other applications can access IBM Storage Protect devices, by using a SCSI tape driver.
Labeling fails.	A device for labeling volumes cannot be used at the same time that the server uses the device for other processes.	You cannot overwrite existing volumes in a storage pool. You must resolve any hardware issues before you label a volume.
	Incorrect or incomplete license registration.	Register the license for the device support that was purchased.
Conflicts among device drivers.	IBM Storage Protect issues messages about I/O errors when you define or use a sequential access device.	Windows device drivers and drivers that are provided by other applications can interfere with the IBM Storage Protect device driver if the IBM Storage Protect driver is not started first. To check on the order that device drivers are started by the system, complete the following steps: Click Control Panel. Click Devices. Device drivers and their startup types are listed.
I/O errors	When you try to define or use a tape device, there might be device-driver conflicts. Windows device drivers and drivers that are provided by other applications can interfere with the IBM Storage Protect device driver if it is not started first.
Unable to preempt tape drive reservation conflict with persistent reserve on Linux platform.	On a Linux platform, the IBM Storage Protect server or storage agent requires that the IBM lin_tape device driver is configured for persistent reserve and an IBM pseudo device file /dev/TSMtape is created.	If the Data Path failover is enabled in the IBM lin_tape driver, the /dev/TSMtape file is created automatically and persistent reserve can be used. Alternatively, configure persistent reserve for tape drive reservation on a Linux platform according to the following procedure: Tip: By default, the IBM lin_tape device driver uses SCSI-2 reserve to reserve tape drives. Unload IBM lin_tape device driver. In the lin_tape configuration file /etc/modprobe.conf or /etc/modprobe.conf.local (or, if you are running RHEL 6 or higher, the /etc/modprobe.d/lin_tape.conf), add the following line: `options lin_tape tape_reserve_type=persistent` In the rules file /etc/udev/rules.d/98-lin_tape.rules, add the following line: `KERNEL=="TSMtape", MODE="0666"` Reload IBM lin_tape device driver. The IBM pseudo file /dev/TSMtape is created and the IBM Storage Protect server can use persistent reserve to preempt tape drive reservation on Linux platforms.