by As our technology grows, along with pieces-parts from multiple vendors, so does our job as the technical equivalent of Dr. House. In many ways, what we do as sysadmins is very very similar to that popular TV show (which, by the way, is one of my favorites – his crankiness is something I intend to aspire to…). On the TV show, House guesstimates the problem with the patient of the week– administers various types of remedies (all of which fail), the patient nearly dies, and at the last second- in a brilliant flash of insight, he figures it out.
Today is a day like many other– I’m going through the above process. Software: Sun Storedge Enterprise Backup. Backup server: Sun X4500 (“thumper”). Tape Drive: Sun Storedge SL24 tape loader.
The problem I’m experiencing? Slow tape drive performance that appeared out of nowhere. No errors, nothing special in the logs, the scsi tape backups are now just– S L O W. 2mb/s tops, often slower. ewww. I can’t explain it, and I have yet to find the cause (not for lack of trying).
I start dialing 1-800-usa-4.. because well, this looks like a SUN problem, right?
Nope, not necessarily.
First– the “Sun” software is actually EMC’s Legato – just with a shiny new cover. Sun’s technical support on this thus far has been less than stellar. The hardware? Sun, right? Well, not quite. Sun’s SL24 tape library has an LTO4 tape drive made by — HP! And it gets better, ’cause the SCSI U320 host bus adapter is made by LSI.
So, my problem is one of: Sun, HP, LSI, EMC. (and two other vendors, if you count the tapes themselves, which I haven’t eliminated).
OK Foreman– go update the tape library’s firmware, and report back to me.