When you attach SAS tape drives, either stand-alone or in a Tape Media Library, the following rules apply

•  SAS adapters: Each port on a SAS adapter can be used to attach a single tape drive to an IBM i system
•  SAS Drives:
  • Only 1 port on a SAS drive should be used.
    • Note: If a SAS tape or library device is shared between partitions, a re-IPL of the adapter or partition will disrupt any operation that uses the device from the other partition, even if the device is assigned to the other partition.
  • No daisy chaining of tape drives
• Multiple drive types in the same logical library are not supported on SAS adapters.

Cable information for SAS attachment (updated September 2021):

Use the shortest possible cable when connecting SAS tape media libraries or tape drives to the IBM i.

There are 2 styles of SAS cables. The FC 5278, 5901, 5912, EJ1N, and EJ1P IOA uses the mini SAS cables:

• As a cable ordered as a feature of the Power System to which the tape device is being attached.  This cable is ordered against the host system as one of two features, both of which are called AE-cables. These cables are 4x SAS cables and have cable labels that show customers how to connect them to the device (even though the cables can be used in either direction):
  • FC 3684 - (3 m) Mini-SAS to Mini-SAS 4x cable (P/N 44V4163).
  • FC 3685 - (6 m) Mini-SAS to Mini-SAS 4x cable (P/N 44V4164).
• As a cable ordered as a feature for the particular tape device or tape library being purchased.

For 3GbSAS adapter FC 5901, FC 5912, FC 5278, FC EJ1N, FC EJ1P, and blade FC 8246, FC 8250

• FC 5502 (2 m): P/N 95P4488
• FC 5506 (5.5 m): P/N 95P4494

Note: If interface errors are encountered when connecting these tape media libraries or tape drives to blade servers, 4X cables can be used.

For 6 Gb SAS adapter FC EJ0X, FC EJ10, FC EJ11 (All devices)

• FC 5507 or ECBY (4 m) AE1 straight cable: P/N 46C2900
• FC 5509 or ECBZ (3 m) YE1 Y-cable: P/N 46C2902

Note: LTO4 technology drives are not supported by the 6 Gb SAS adapters

For the 7214-1U2, the following cables can be ordered. These are the same as the 4x SAS cables that can be ordered for the Power System.

• FC 9743 (3 m): 44V4163 (same cable as FC 3684 for Power 520, 550, and 570)
• FC 9746 (6 m): 44V4164 (same cable as FC 3685 for Power 520, 550, and 570)

• For LTO9 SAS devices
  • FC ECE3 (3 m) AA12 straight cable: P/N 01AF507
  • The following SAS cable features available for order with the LTO9 SAS tape devices can also be used for attach to the 12 Gb SAS adapter
    • AGKB (3 m) Mini-SAS HD to Mini-SAS HD 1x Cable
    • AGKD (1.5 m) Mini-SAS HD to Mini-SAS HD 1x Cable
• For LTO5, LTO6, LTO7 and LTO8 SAS devices
  • FC 5507 or ECBY (4 m) AE1 straight cable: P/N 46C2900

If you need sizing for a Dynamic Solutions International (DSI) VTL solution, send the following information to IBMsizing@dynamicsolutions.com

1. Customer Name
2. What VTL/Tape drives are used today
3. The current deduplication ratio if you are using a VTL.
4. Data collected from one of the following actions

If using BRMS, load and apply 7.3 SI69390 7.2 SI69389 or superseding PTF and then run the following commands on each LPAR and send the spool file. The spool files can be compressed to make transfer easier.

CRTDTAARA DTAARA(QTEMP/Q1ARPTRETN) TYPE(*CHAR)

PRTRPTBRM TYPE(*CTLGRPSTAT)

Send in the spool files in text (.txt) format. (Files need to be downloaded as .txt files and not as pdf and converted) See this document on how to create text files  BRMS-Report gathering.docx

Note: Both these commands need to run in the same job stream

If you have multiple systems in a BRMS network, you can use the following command on one of the systems to run the reports for each of the other systems

CRTDTAARA DTAARA(QTEMP/Q1ARPTRETN) TYPE(*CHAR)

PRTRPTBRM TYPE(*CTLGRPSTAT) FROMSYS(xxxxxxxxx) Do not use *NETGRP or list multiple systems

Then, send in the spool files in text (.txt) format. (Files need to be downloaded as .txt files and not as pdf and converted) BRMS-Report gathering.docx

Note: Both these commands need to run in the same job stream

If not using BRMS, send in the following for each LPAR. You can use RTVDSKINF and PRTDSKINF to get library and IFS sizes.

• Type of backup -  Daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, and so on
• Size of each backup
• How often each backup is done - Example: Daily 6 days a week, Weekly once a week,
• Retention of each backup - Example: Daily 14 days, Weekly 35 days
• Start time of each backup

Example

Note: Additional considerations need to be made if data is going to be replicated and backups is occurring at different sites. If so, make sure you indicate which systems are backed up at each site and what data is replicated.

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If all the following conditions are met, you can do an alternate IPL from a fibre or SAS-attached tape drive:

• The system is POWER6, POWER7, Power8, Power9, or Power10 hardware.
• The system is HMC-managed, or is a non HMC-managed Power10 system with system firmware level FW1060 or later.
• The system is running IBM i 6.1.0 or higher of the IBM i operating system.

Notes: 

• When there are multiple tape drives in the same zone on the fibre switch as the IOA, the IOA is able to see all of the drives, and the system searches them for any installation media.  If there is installation media loaded on more than one drive, the system can find the wrong tape.  It is recommended to use either a direct-attached drive or create a zone on the fibre switch that has only one drive in it for installing from Fibre Channel attached tape.
• Alternate restart from USB attached Flash drives, and Removable Mass Storage devices requires an HMC-managed system, except for Power9 and Power10 Servers, which use the System unit USB 3.0 ports for the default D-IPL search path.
• If a VTL drive is going to be used for an alternate IPL device (D-mode), there can be only one drive visible on the adapter as the alternate restart device. LUN masking can be used to satisfy this requirement.

On non HMC-managed models 515, 520, 525, 550, or 570, the system will Alternate restart (D-IPL) only from the internal DVD-ROM or tape drive. If you are using an external device, the Alt Install device must first be selected. This is because the manufacturer sets the Alt IPL to the internal SCSI controller on the system backplane and it cannot be changed.

On non HMC-managed Power8 Servers, the system will Alternate restart (D-IPL) only from the internal DVD drive.

On non HMC-managed Power9 servers the system will only Alternate restart (D-IPL) from optical devices (DVD, Flash, RDX) attached to the USB 3.0 System unit ports or from the System unit internal RDX drive.

On non HMC-managed Power10 servers with a system firmware level older than FW1060, the system will only Alternate restart (D-IPL) from optical devices (DVD, Flash, RDX) attached to the USB 3.0 System unit ports or from the System unit internal RDX drive.

On non HMC-managed Power10 Servers with system firmware level FW1060 or later, the Alternate restart (D-IPL) storage adapter can be selected using the server Power Operations panel in the ASMI dashboard.

Default search sequence for the alternate restart device

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The IBM i partition needs to reserve a tape drive before it can use it.  This reserve is held until the IBM i partition releases the tape drive. 

If the following conditions are met, a reserve can be held by a system that is powered off

• The drive in a tape media library is *ALLOCATED
• The drive in a tape media library is *UNPROTECTED with ENDOPT(*LEAVE)
• The drive in a tape media library is *UNPROTECTED and FAILED, *UNPROTECTED with ENDOPT(*UNLOAD) but use PWRDWNSYS *IMMED, or *CNTRLD with too short of time is used.
• Stand-alone drives are used with ENDOPT(*LEAVE)
• Stand-alone drives are used with ENDOPT(*UNLOAD) but use PWRDWNSYS *IMMED, or *CNTRLD with too short of time is used.