Tape Drive Storage from the 2000s - A Look Inside The IBM LTO2!

Testing an old LTO2 tape drive I was given to the channel. This ones been in storage for years so lets take a look inside and see how it works in slo mo!

#LTO2 #IBM #tapedrive #tapestorage #tapebackup #jazztech #pc #linux

[flogjam]

i used to manage some HP MSL 6030 libraries (30 slot with barcode reader/robot arm) which were fitted with Dual-LTO drives. They were fibre attached to a SAN Fabric and we used HP Data Protector (formerly OmniBack 2) to manage the backups and archives. It was all highly automated and required tapes being swapped out every couple of days to be stored in a Fire Safe in a different building. Fun times. The cleaning tape was automatically used when the system deemed it required.

[yotest]

Having slow motion footage is brilliant

[dlarge]

I've just started upgrading our tapes at work to LTO8.

At home I archive to LTO4 and BD-R DL.

At work I'm migrating the DDS/DAT archive tapes, as well as recovering data from the 90's that people ask for. Im moving the DDS tapes to LTO4 first as they are the oldest, then I'll start moving everything LTO1 and above up to LTO8.

The DDS tapes go back to the 90's and besides a little bit of manual cleaning of the heads once in a while the tapes are great.

As for running WinNT Backup, you can install Windows XP on a PCI express machine as long as you use SP3, SP2 just wouldn't boot.

Then a PCI SCSI card will work, with the right drivers as long as you use a PCI express mother board with a PCI slot. A couple of years ago Asus certainly had some. My Ryzen 5 1600 system runs WinXP SP3 just fine with the SATA port's in AHCI mode.

I already did similar at work, there I have an XP SP3 install running on a 4 core Xeon at 3GHz. It only has PCI express however but that's fine as I'm using USB DDS tape drives.

Even though it's PCIe the Quadro GPU and latest 32 bit XP drivers from Nvidia work also. The machine, for WinXP is ridiculously overpowered 😂

Also NTBackup will run on Vista but you need to install the storage service manually. By win 7 NTBackup is totally non-functional for tape access but will work fine if opening the BKF files from other media.

Symantec Backup Exec and NTBackup use exactly the same format thus will read each others data, so my Win2022 server at work will read NT Backup tapes with the latest Backup exec.

There is a tool for Linux that will dump the BKF files off a tape, then NTBackup on windows 7 can open them.

I should point out that /dev/st0 automatically rewinds the tape after every operation. If you want to play with the rewind command with mt, use /dev/nst0 instead. The 'n' means non-rewinding.

You'd need to wind the tape forward first as it, according to the 'status' command is at block 0 of file 0. The tape probably only has one file on it, but you can wind it forward a bit looking for the next file like so:

'mt -f /dev/nst0 fsf 1'

That should have the drive wind forward looking for the next file, which probably doesn't exist as most just record one huge tar file! Anyway, press ctrl C to stop it (I think) and seeing as you used the non-rewinding device nst0 you can now issue the rewind command. Or you can issue the 'offline' command which will rewind and eject.

Other 'st0' devices exist if you take a look in /dev, some will enable compression etc. Depends on what the Linux Kernel detected and the drive.

[Mister-Gee-]

I tried a DLT drive from the 90s recently and could restore everything fine using Backup Exec. It's been in storage in my shed for 25+ years.
I still use LTO on my home PC. I have an LTO7 (600GB) auto loader and 3 tapes is enough to backup my 16TB NAS. I write two copies with verify and store them in different locations twice a year. These days I mostly rely on disk to disk backup.

[mikepartin]

I spent several years back in the early 2000's repairing a lot of these, and various tape libraries (mostly dell at the time) at a hardware refurbisher. Lots of fun seeing the 'innards' again.

[justoreyes]

It reminded me of the old VHS tapes...the inner mechanism is fascinating...all that charm has been lost with current technology...but an old 65-year-old technician is speaking...lol

[michaelhawthorne]

Goodness from 100GB to 18TB in just 20 yrs.... that's progress.
I bet 18TB would take a while to
Looking forward to seeing the latter Jazzy...👍

[saturntony]

Ohhh wow! I've been into computer tech all my life and never heard of the ibm lto series of storage. That was very cool, thank you so much for sharing jazze!

[meagrebones]

Great video, I didn't know such a thing existed.

[KeritechElectronics]

Interesting drive and format, even cooler to have it fired up under Linux. It's a bit whirry, could use a mechanical checkup if you haven't done so already.

You're on your way to becoming the Techmoan of computer tech, and I like that :)

[aquaevitae]

The idea behind tape drives is that they are much more reliable mass storage devices for archival purposes than hard drives or flash memories. Anyone who has worked with hard drives or/and flash memories for years know quite well that they are excellent working memories, but they are certainly not very reliable for long-term archiving usage. Meanwhile, there is almost a century of experience with magnetic tapes, and based on this, it's well known that high quality magnetic tape, when properly stored, away from strong magnetic fields, remains easily readable for at least half a century even longer. A fact studied at the laboratory level is, that a signal recorded on ferrous oxide or chromium oxide magnetic tape demagnetizes by about 20% in 30 years, and unoxidized metal microparticle tape demagnetizes by about 15% in 30 years. I have one C-cassette that my mother recorded in 1976, and now, in a year of mercy 2025, it is still listenable. So magnetic tape have been proven to be very reliable archival media.

[chrisg]

I do believe the LTO drive isn't double height, but actually full height or normal height. The CD rom drive you took out is an half height drive. Most drive bays ended up as being half height of their original form factor.

[wfkonynenberg]

I'm surprised to learn that Windows completely removed tape drive support. I remember being a bit upset when Linux removed support for ISA controller cards for QIC24 tape drives some years ago...

[FeliciaByNature]

your name's Jazzy and you're not talking about the jazz drive? For shame ;) Love the video!

[This-Is-The-End]

Fascinating! Thank you.
PS: Linux is out of time!

[uni-byte]

Didn't DEC develop LT technology before LTO came out?

[drmindbender]

Just stumbled across your vid do you service DAT players ?? Iam struggling to find a techy to just do general servicing

[LawpickingLocksmith]

OMG how we have come such a long way now?

[Jerrec]

well not really hard to read tapes for this drive. Every linux can access lto drives with tar. Even much older DLT or AIT. Also even Windows 11 can work with tapes. You just need Backup Exec or Uranium Backup Gold.

Also you got an error code 5 and later 1 on the tape drive.