Re: AS/400 DR Restore - Life without local tape?

Situation you describe with TSM is possible, but you need BRMS. There is no
regular TSM client for OS/400. BRMS plus a TSM API (library QANSAPI, can
download for free from Tivoli website) lets you save/restore. IBM makes the
distinction by referring to this connectivity as a TSM application client.

Since you don't want tape, I'll assume you'll have a TCP/IP connection to
the TSM server. That's the setup I'm familiar with.

With newer releases of OS/400, it is possible to save even when dedicated.
They've made it possible to start a subset of TCP/IP, to allow saves to
happen. I don't know the details, as I haven't needed this functionality
myself.

Anyway, BRMS with TSM lets you do the bulk of your saves to TSM, but there
are limitations. The biggest, is that you can't do the SAVSYS to TSM. There
is no ordinary TSM client to use to restore from scratch. Restore entire
system needs IPL media (tape, CD, or DVD).

Still, you could write a backup that does SAVSYS and SAVLIB *IBM to DVD-RAM,
and then do remainder to TSM (SAVLIB *NONIBM, SAVDLO, SAV). Restore is a
little trickier, but in theory you do a D IPL from the DVD, then RSTLIB
*NONIBM. Then start TCP/IP, and use BRMS to restore everything else.

IBM doesn't recommend this, by the way. They suggest using tape for full
system recovery, due to the complexity added to the recovery process. I do
my nightly and weekly backups to TSM, and only use tape for full system
backups. I even SAVSECDTA and SAVCFG to save files, and then save the save
files to TSM. I figure I can restore full system from tapes, then restore
the save files from TSM to get back user and configuration changes. It's not
perfect, but I'm willing to live with the deficiencies.

You might also consider LTO tapes. IBM's brand is Ultrium, but there are
less expensive 3rd part LTO drives that should be compatible (check the the
manufacturer first). Though, to be honest, I don't think the Ultrium's are
all that expensive, as long as you stay with a single slot drive; the
autoload and library devices are quite expensive. LTO is also very fast.
Transfer rates are much higher than older tape models, and almost certainly
going to be faster than BRMS/TSM backups.

Ultrium 2 supports up to 200GB tapes (400GB with compression), which is
enough for me to save my entire system to a single tape, with plenty left
over. Also backwards compatible to Ultrium (1) tapes, which are 100GB/200GB.
I understand that Ultrium 3 is out, but I'm not sure of the capacity of a
single tape.

So, as it is now, I do daily (data) and weekly (data, programs, and save
files with configuration and security) backups to TSM. The only time I use
tape is for full system backup, where I need the tapes to do a D IPL. If I
were willing to deal with keeping everything straight, I might try the
BRMS/tape combo, but use of a DLYJOB in my backup CL allows me to 'schedule'
the backups to run in the middle of the night, unattended, so I don't care
too much about how long it takes.

"nospam" <douglasalanschroeder@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1120061926.969423.233110@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> Hello. I'm very new to AS/400. I have extensive background in
> Unix/Windows/networking/DB etc but not the 400.
>
> I have been tasked with getting rid of local tape devices for AS/400.
> The goal being to slim down our current
> AS/400 beasts and move to rack-mounted units such as a tapeless 520.
> IBM's support price structure makes tape
> expensive and local tape does not fit our DR model. Our DR model
> involves DR from CD/network then restore from Tivoli (TSM).
>
> Does anybody have experience performing AS/400 build/DR without tape?
> It would be desireable to NOT feed
> multiple CD's and manually apply fixes/configs/settings for a DR
> process. I would like to create a plan that looks something like this:
>
> <IPL from DVD or network> To get OS, filesets, patches, settings and
> TSM client and config.
>
> <Restore from TSM> To get any additional apps and data
>
> This would allow us to eliminate local tape and associated
> costs/maintenance/etc.
>
> Is this practical? How to proceed? Anybody done this?
>
> Thanks!
>


.

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