Introduction

If the mt-st package is installed then the stinit command will run at boot or via udev-rules when a tape drive is detected by the kernel.

The stinit programme used information in /etc/stinit.def to confgure tape drives operating parameters.

The kernel Documentation/devices.txt file refers to the four possible logical modes for each physical tape device as "mode 0" through "mode 3", while the stinit program refers to them as "mode1" through "mode4". On this page we will use the stinit definition which can be summerised as:

Stinit "mode"

rewinding device

non-rewinding device

Mode 1

/dev/st0

/dev/nst0

Mode 2

/dev/st0l

/dev/nst0l

Mode 3

/dev/st0m

/dev/nst0m

Mode 4

/dev/st0a

/dev/nst0a

Some examples are given in the default file but for modern drives you may need to edit the file to add definitions for the new drive types. The purpose of this page is to collect and share these upto date definitions.

The definition presented here turn off compression for the Mode 1 device and turn on compression for the Mode 2 (suffix-l) device. The other 2 modes are explicitly disabled. Further example modes may be presented but commented out.

LTO2

# HP Ultrium 448
#
manufacturer="HP" model = "Ultrium 2-SCSI" {
scsi2logical=1
can-bsr=1
auto-lock=1
two-fms=0
drive-buffering=1
buffer-writes
read-ahead=1
async-writes=1
can-partitions=0
fast-mteom=0
sysv=1
#
# If your stinit supports the timeouts:
timeout=180 # 3 minutes
long-timeout=14400 # 4 hours
#
mode1 blocksize=0 compression=0 # 200 GB, LTO2 _NO_ compression
mode2 blocksize=0 compression=1 # 400 GB, LTO2 compresses
mode3 disabled=1
mode4 disabled=1
}

LTO4

#LTO4
manufacturer="HP" model = "Ultrium 4-SCSI"{
scsi2logical=1
can-bsr=1
auto-lock=1
two-fms=0
drive-buffering=1
buffer-writes
read-ahead=1
async-writes=1
can-partitions=0
fast-mteom=0
sysv=1
#
# If your stinit supports the timeouts:
timeout=180 # 3 minutes
long-timeout=14400 # 4 hours
#
mode1 blocksize=0 compression=0 density=0x00 # 800 GB, native
mode2 blocksize=0 compression=1 density=0x00 # 1600 GB, LTO
mode3 disabled=1
mode4 disabled=1
}

LTO5

manufacturer="IBM" model = "ULT3580-HH5" {
scsi2logical=1
can-bsr=1
auto-lock=1
two-fms=0
drive-buffering=1
buffer-writes
read-ahead=1
async-writes=1
can-partitions=1
fast-mteom=0
sysv=1
#
# If your stinit supports the timeouts:
timeout=180 # 3 minutes
long-timeout=14400 # 4 hours
#
mode1 blocksize=0 compression=0 # 1500 GB, LTO5 _NO_ compression
mode2 blocksize=0 compression=1 # 3000 GB, LTO5 compresses
mode3 disabled=1
mode4 disabled=1
}

LTO8 (untested)

manufacturer="IBM" model = "ULT3580-HH8" {
scsi2logical=1
can-bsr=1
auto-lock=1
two-fms=0
drive-buffering=1
buffer-writes
read-ahead=1
async-writes=1
can-partitions=1
fast-mteom=0
sysv=1
#
# If your stinit supports the timeouts:
timeout=180 # 3 minutes
long-timeout=14400 # 4 hours
#
mode1 blocksize=0 compression=0 # 12TB, LTO8 _NO_ compression
mode2 blocksize=0 compression=1 # 30TB, LTO8 compresses
mode3 disabled=1
mode4 disabled=1
}

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