First of all, thanks to all those who sent responses:
larry@ducktales.med.ge.com
canuck@masc38.rice.edu
celestial.xs.com!celeste@stokely.mtview.ca.us
ra.mcs.anl.gov!sun-managers-relay@netcomsv.netcom.com
larry@ducktales.med.ge.com (Larry Landwehr)
peffley@endurance.nrlssc.navy.mil
don@mars.dgrc.doc.ca
rick%pgt1@Princeton.EDU
mandrews@vcrt.hq.videocart.com
lscpdx!jayl@nosun.West.Sun.COM
syslen@math.nwu.edu
pas@medicine.WUstl.EDU
vasey@issi.com
candy%omni@hub.ucsb.edu
djh@igor.rational.com
dal@gcm.com
stergios@kt22.Stanford.EDU
Mike Bauer <mikeba@sa-cgy.valmet.com
Most of the responses suggested that I clean the tape drive. This is
always a good idea, but no help here because I clean the drives
regularly, and had just cleaned them that morning. Other responses
included don't use Sony tapes (I don't); use data grade tapes (I do);
check the cables (I already had); drive worn out (drives are fairly
new); storage location too extreme (it's not).
The one suggestion that I think is pretty close to being the answer
came from Mike Andrews of Videocart, Inc. He suggested "that a bad
tape puts the drive into a condition where it won't read any tape
after it chokes on a bad one." I think this is close to the truth.
Although I can not guarantee it, I believe that the device driver
for the 8mm drive chokes on a bad tape and remains in "blue funk"
mode until: a) the machine is rebooted or b) some time limit has
passed and a good tape is used in the drive.
We have call Sun to see if there is a patch that exists for the
device driver, but have not heard back from them. I will post a
message if one exists.
Again, thanks to all that responded.
Jerry Holt
UNC-Charlotte
jwh@uncc.edu
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : Fri Sep 28 2001 - 23:07:49 CDT