> 
> I've never ran one on FreeBSD, but I've used several DDS-3 drives of all
> kinds of flavors.  I've had some problems with some Seagate ones, but
> aside from that, I've had no problems.  The only thing I'd keep in mind,
> and that I've experienced is that the DDS-3 tapes are not designed for
> heavy use.  From what I've done, using 5 tapes a week, one a day, I end
> up throwing the tapes out (after destroying them) after about 4-6
> months...which is fairly average from what I've heard.  Also, a cleaning
> tape, though I never believed it till I saw & used it, increased the
> life of the tapes slightly, and I assume it also extends the life of the
> drive...but I've never seen one croak, so I don't know.

Your experience sounds about like ours.  I think we get just a little more
average life out of a cassette than you indicate, but not a large amount.
Actually, we've used some DDS-4 too with pretty much similar results.

One thing though,  the cleaning tape may increase the life of tapes, but
frequent use can reduce the life of a drive.  The cleaning tapes can
cause increased head wear.  We recommend only using them when really 
needed - write errors show up - and not on a regularly scheduled basis.
But, this is true of DDS-2 and even original DAT.  Keeping your drive
and storage environment clean and as free of dust as possible is a more
important thing to improve tape and drive longevity, I think.

If your usage justifies the cost, you might want to consider DLT
or LTO type drives.   They handle the load with less failure and 
higher capacity and data rates.

////jerry

> 
> Hope I helped,
> --Brian
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of Peter Erickson
> Sent: Saturday, December 14, 2002 7:57 PM
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: Tape Backup
> 
> I am running Freebsd 4.6 and my dds-2 tape backup drive just died on me.
> I am interested in moving up to a bigger capacity drive so does anyone
> have any recommendations? I am not interested in anything high end, this
> is just for my system at home. I was looking at the dds-3 drives, but
> before i went out and bought one, I would like opinions and or
> recommendations. Thanks in advance.
> 
> -- 
> Peter Erickson

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