On Wed, 30 Jan 2002, maximum entropy wrote:

> >Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 22:32:47 +0330 (IRT)
> >From: Bamdad Ehterami <bamdad@sharif.edu>
> >
> >Hi everyone;
> >
> >	I've recently found a TK50Z-G3 tape drive and attached it to my 
> >already-working VAX4000/VLC which runs NetBSD 1.5 quite well. Everything 
> >seems to be right until for example I try "mt -f /dev/st0 rewind", here is 
> >a sample output: 
> >
> >st0(asc0:1:0):  Check Condicion on CDB: 0x1e 00 00 00 01 00
> >    SENSE KEY:  Illegal Request
> > COMMAND INFO:  117440512 (0x7000000)
> >     ASC/ASCQ:  No Additional Sense Information
> >
> >st0(asc0:1:0):  Chech Condition on CDB: 0x1e 00 00 00 00 00
> >    SENSE KEY:  Illegal Request
> > COMMAND INFO:  117440512 (0x7000000) 
> >     ASC/ASCQ:  No Additional Sense Information
> >     FRU CODE:  0z1
> >
> >It seems that the tape unit does not like the command. well in fact,
> >I do not have any idea of what those messages mean.. are they error 
> >messages (which they seem to be) or what?)
> >
> >more question: how can I initialize a new tape? how can I make a bootable
> >tape (the FAQ speaks of two files which I cannot find).
> 
> It's a warning that the drive doesn't support SCSI command 0x1e, which
> is used to prevent or allow media removal (i.e. to lock the drive
> while it's busy).  Most tape drives and other removable media support
> this, but it's an optional command.
> 
> We should probably have a quirk table entry for drives that don't
> support this command, so they don't spew so much.  I thought about
> doing it once, but I got distracted working on some more serious
> problems...
> 
> Cheers,
> entropy
> 
> --
> entropy -- it's not just a good idea, it's the second law.
> 

So it's not that bad anyway... 
And another I-don't-know-what-a-tape-is question (!) I've read the NetBSD 
docs about TK50 and it says that the tape capacity is 95MB, is it the 
compressed capacity?