ESXI5 and LTO scsi tape

[MicWe]

Hello

I have an ESXi4.0 with scsi LTO working

I would like to upgrade To ESXi5

Saw this post

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1868344#1868344

Did someone use scsi tape drive in exsi5 and confirm it work in real interment

Thanks

[Virtualinfra]

As mentioned in that article.. VMware says that ESXi 5 works fine with tape drive and incase of issue VMware wont support it and you have to contact vendor.

But that has to be tested and certified by vendor. Incase of any issue connecting to tape drive you have to contact vendor and not vmware directly..

Vendor will support you for that issue and incase vendor not able to solve that.. vendor has to contact vmware with there TS team and resolve the issue..

Note: Only restriction is ESXI5 dont support FC tape drives.

Note: ESX/ESXi supports parallel SCSI tape drives and tape libraries only. If you are using a tape drive library (versus using a stand-alone tape drive), the library must be multi-target, and not multi-LUN. Ensure that the tape drive's virtual target ID in the virtual machine's configuration is set to be the same as the physical target ID

Refer below kb:-

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?cmd=displayKC&externalId=2007904

[Lesilhouette]

Hi MicWe,

I can confirm that it should work. I say should because I can only confirm it for a HP SCSI LTO tape drive.

It took me a bit of searching to get it workin but in the end it works like a charm.

Thanks to a member on this forum called Lothar I did the follwing:

'as it has already been a problem doing scsi passtrough for tape drives in ESXi 4.1 here is my solution vor ESXi 5.0.

1. Enable local or ssh support console in ESXi troubleshooting options on the the host (in the F2 settings screen)

2. Login to the support console

3. Change the behaviour how ESXi handles the used controller and force it to VMW_SATP_LOCAL by entering the following command

i.e. for HP / LSI SAS Controller: esxcli storage nmp satp rule add --satp=VMW_SATP_LOCAL --driver="mptspi"
i.e. for Adaptec Ultra 320 SCSI Controller: esxcli storage nmp satp rule add --satp=VMW_SATP_LOCAL --driver="aic79xx"

4. Reboot the ESXi host

5. Add the SCSI device to the virtual machine. According to my tests it works best when you an additional virtual SCSI controller and connect only the tape drive to that controller (i.e. SCSI path SCSI 1:0 for the tape device when using SCSI 0:x for the virtual hard disks). I change the controller type (ONLY the newly generated SCSI Controller, NOT the controller for the boot drives!) to VMware paravirtual as I have seen issues with the defaule SAS controller for Windows Server 2008 as it does not always recognize when a tape is changed.

I verified this scenario with an HP SC44GE SAS (that's on OEM LSI controller in fact) controller, HP Ultrium 3 SAS drive on an Intel S5000PSL board based server system with CA ARCserve backup software. Happy backup!'

Good luck and please let us know if it worked or not.

[MicWe]

UPDATE

I have install ESXi5.0

And my LTO scsi tape drive works fine

Now I am thinking of replacing my LTO to LTO4 scsi tape drive 

I wonder will it work :smileyconfused: