The GFS scheme is designed to back up to tape libraries, not to standalone tape drives
Symptoms
- You are using a standalone tape drive, not a tape library;
- You set up a GFS (Grandfather-Father-Son) backup scheme to back up or replicate to the vault created on this standalone tape drive;
- At the backup start the software pops out the following interaction message:
Cannot find tape with free space to continue backup. Please insert tape.
Cause
This is expected behavior. GFS scheme is designed for backup to tapes using a tape rotation.
Tapes with monthly full backups are taken off-site for long-term storage and tapes with differential/incremental backups are often rotated.
GFS scheme can only use a tape library with many slots/tapes and automatic tapes movement inside the tape library to function properly. Standalone tape drive is not fully supported by the GFS scheme.
Solution
For standalone tape drive, please use simple or custom backup schemes.
GFS requires a tape library for backup and replication to tape to function.
More information
The behavior will not be changed in future versions.