Travan Tape Care & Maintenance

Reliable backup with Imation Travan™ Data Cartridges requires routine care and maintenance. Please read the following examples and guidelines to establish the best care and maintenance for your Travan data cartridges and tape drives.

Media Care & Maintenance
Although the Imation Travan data cartridges look rugged, they must be handled with some care. Please observe the following precautions:

• The data cartridges must be kept free from contamination. Do not expose the cartridges to dirt, dust or moisture. Do not open the cartridge access door and touch the tape itself. Do not use the cartridge beyond the recommended life. If you practice the care procedures described, you can expect 2 years of service from a Travan data cartridge that is used once a week.
  
  
• For the best protection always remove the cartridge from the drive when not in use. Store the cartridges in their protective plastic cases at all times. Never remove the cartridge from the drive when the drive LED light is ON or blinking indicating that the tape is moving. Wait for the tape motion to stop and the drive LED light to turn off before removing the tape from the drive.
  
  
• Do not store your cartridges in extreme temperatures. Always allow the cartridge to acclimate to its surrounding environment prior to use. Retensioning the cartridge after exposure to a temperature change, such as hot to cold or cold to hot is highly recommended. Retensioning allows the tape pack to stabilize and will give you the best performance.
  
  
• Keep the data cartridge away from direct sunlight and heat sources. Such as radiators, heaters or warm air ducts.
  
  
• Keep your cartridges away from sources of electromagnetic fields, such as bulk erasers and magnetic tools. Do not bulk erase any of the preformatted data cartridges, they can not be reformatted by the tape drive and it will render the cartridge unusable.

Dropped Cartridges
If a Travan cartridge is dropped it can misalign or permanently damage the tape guiding components inside the cartridge and possibly render the cartridge unusable. If the cartridge has been dropped it may be suitable for a single use. As with all high capacity and high performance media, it is recommended that the data on a dropped cartridge be copied to another cartridge. First the cartridge must undergo a retensioning pass prior to use. Once the data has been copied to a new cartridge, the dropped cartridge should be disposed of.

Tape Retensioning
Travan data cartridges do require periodic retensioning to operate properly in your tape drive. Retensioning restores the proper tension and removes any pack shift. Proper tape tension ensures the drive head is in good contact with the tape media in the data cartridge.

Retensioning should be performed under the following circumstances:

• The cartridge is new and is being used for the first time.
• If the cartridge has not been used for over a month.
• The cartridge has been exposed to changes in temperature. (Note: Allow the media to acclimate to its surroundings before retensioning.)
• If the cartridge has been “shoe shining” back and forth over the same spot on the tape and the backups are proceeding slowly. Tape “shoe shining” causes loss of tape tension.
• A failure code is reported by the drive during a write or read operation when backing up. Retensioning the cartridge may solve the problem.
• If a cartridge has been dropped. Assess the damage and retension as stated above.

Guidelines for Cleaning Your Tape Drive
Please check with your drive manufacturer for their recommended cleaning routine. Tape drives do require routine cleaning. How often you clean your drive can be based on the tape usage and environment.

Do you use the tape drive for at least three hours every day?

• If the answer is YES then clean your tape drive at least once a week.
• If the answer is NO then clean your tape drive at least once a month.

Are you using your tape drive in an office environment?

• If the answer is YES then the recommendations above apply.
• If the answer is NO and the tape drive is in an environment that is high in airborne contaminants, like non air conditioned, then double the number of cleanings per interval outlined above.

Broken Tape or Tape Offs
In most cases when a Travan data cartridge is reported as a "broken" or "tape off", it has actually ran the tape off the end. Unlike the tape in audio or videocassettes, the tape in a data cartridge is not attached to either hub or spool in anyway. The tape is not attached to prevent damage to either the cartridge or the drive when a malfunction occurs. The data cartridge has a series of holes punched through the tape a few feet from each end of tape. A sensor in the drive is constantly looking for the holes. This pattern of punched holes tells the drive when it is reaching either end of the tape.

When the tape runs off one of the spools, it is most likely because the drive has failed to see the holes in the tape or it has misinterpreted them. This is a drive issue, not a cartridge issue, and some drives exhibit this problem much more than others. In most cases, the record data still existed on the tape and the tape off should not affect it. Despooled Travan cartridges can be rethreaded. This operation requires great care to put the tape back in the proper path while avoiding the loss of parts or further damage to the tape.

In addition to drive adjustment margins, dust or debris in the drive optical sensor path can cause a tape off condition. A random static discharge is another cause of a tape off condition.

Consult the Technical Services Bulletin for a diagram of the parts of your tape cartridge. The best recommended method for cleaning the optical sensor is a can of compressed air. Using the extended tube, direct the air at the optical sensor and give it several good blasts of air. Using a cleaning cartridge will not clean the optical sensors. If the problem with tape off persists, the drive may have to be replaced or refurbished.