Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!rice!sun-spots-request From: shollen%odin.Wright.EDU@relay.cs.net (Sheila Hollenbaugh) Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun Subject: 60M QIC incompatibilities between Sun-3s? Message-ID: <8811171630.AA26372@odin.Wright.EDU> Date: 1 Dec 88 09:39:26 GMT Sender: usenet@rice.edu Organization: Rice University, Houston, Texas Lines: 22 Approved: Sun-Spots@rice.edu Original-Date: Thu, 17 Nov 88 11:30:20 EST X-Sun-Spots-Digest: Volume 7, Issue 31, message 2 of 19 Recently we have had a problem with tape compatibility between 60M QIC tape drives on Sun systems. The systems are a 3/280 and two 3/60s, all running Sun-OS 3.X. The symptoms are as follows: the 280 cannot read tar tapes which are written by the 60's, but the 60's can read tar tapes written by the 280. I have perused old Sun-spots, and tried the obvious things. I have tried using both /dev/rst0 and /dev/rst8. I also read about the PROM update offer in v6n74, but the 280 seems to fit the criteria of not needing the update (light turns on when tape is loaded, PROM revision 2.3). I also tried using "dd" instead of "tar" to read the tape, without success. The error message I am receiving is "tar: blocksize=0". Has anyone seen this? I would appreciate any help you can give. This is causing real problems, and we anticipate buying more 3/60s with QIC drives. If you reply via email I will be glad to summarize if there is sufficient interest. Sheila Hollenbaugh Wright State University Research Center CSNET: shollen@SPOTS.Wright.Edu 3171 Research Blvd., Kettering, OH 45420 UUCP: ...!wright!shollen (513) 259-1382