60M QIC incompatibilities between Sun-3s?

[Sheila Hollenbaugh]

Recently we have had a problem with tape compatibility between 60M QIC
tape drives on Sun systems.  The systems are a 3/280 and two 3/60s, all
running Sun-OS 3.X.  The symptoms are as follows:  the 280 cannot read tar
tapes which are written by the 60's, but the 60's can read tar tapes
written by the 280.

I have perused old Sun-spots, and tried the obvious things.  I have tried
using both /dev/rst0 and /dev/rst8.  I also read about the PROM update
offer in v6n74, but the 280 seems to fit the criteria of not needing the
update (light turns on when tape is loaded, PROM revision 2.3).

I also tried using "dd" instead of "tar" to read the tape, without
success.  The error message I am receiving is "tar: blocksize=0".

Has anyone seen this?  I would appreciate any help you can give.  This is
causing real problems, and we anticipate buying more 3/60s with QIC
drives. If you reply via email I will be glad to summarize if there is
sufficient interest.

Sheila Hollenbaugh             	 Wright State University Research Center
CSNET: shollen at SPOTS.Wright.Edu  3171 Research Blvd., Kettering, OH 45420
UUCP: ...!wright!shollen                            (513) 259-1382