Recovering Files Written with Fixed Block Sizes

If you have been previously running your tape drive in fixed block mode (default 512) and Bacula with variable blocks (default) Bacula will fail to recover files because it does block spacing, and because the block sizes don’t agree between your tape drive and Bacula it will not work.

The long term solution is to run your drive in variable block mode as described above. However, if you have written tapes using fixed block sizes, this can be a bit of a pain. The solution to the problem is: while you are doing a restore command using a tape written in fixed block size, ensure that your drive is set to the fixed block size used while the tape was written. Then when doing the restore command in the Console program, do not answer the prompt yes/mod/no. Instead, edit the bootstrap file (the location is listed in the prompt) using any ASCII editor. Remove all VolBlock lines in the file. When the file is re-written, answer the question, and Bacula will run without using block positioning, and it should recover your files.

See also

Go back to:

• Bacula Cannot Open the Device

• Incorrect File Number

• Incorrect Number of Blocks or Positioning Errors

• Linux: Setting Tape Modes Properly

• Tape Hardware Compression and Blocking Size

• Using btape to Simulate Filling Tape

Go to:

• Autochanger Errors

• Syslog Errors

Go back to the Troubleshooting chapter.

Go back to the Tape Autochanger Setup chapter.

Go back to the main Advanced Features Usage page.