Meridian Mail 12 tape drive problems

[RKDavis]

I am trying to replace a NTAK13aa hard drive power supply unit. The Meridian Mail is 12.12.7 on an Option11c Rel 23. I replaced the tape drive with a newer version because the older one's roller components melted. I was able to make one current backup tape. I tried to run the install tape on the old NTAK13aa and the replacement NTAB13. I was not able to get to the basic menu. I tried a loaner install tape from the same release without success. I just noticed the replacement part number is a NTAB13.. and the old is NTAK13aa. Is this the issue? Thanks in advance.

RKDavis Wilmington,NC

 

[DocVic]

We had one site with this same problem. The vendor sent this older tape unit, and it didn't work. They tried to slip this one by us. We asked for a replacement, and they refused. We acquired a NTAK13, and it worked. Needless to say, we never used that vendor again. They closed their shop in 2008.

DocVic
Dedicated to Nortel Products till the end.
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[Firebird Scrambler]

I've found some notes that may apply below.

There have been a number of issues encountered by engineers involved in Meridian Mail installations and Back ups, when using a Dacon Tape Drive. The description of the problem varies from, Not being able to perform a Mail back up to actually blowing the Mail cards and wiping the Hard drive. If in any doubt about which cable you have, DO NOT USE until it has been verified with Dacon.

These difficulties have so far only been encountered when the Meridian Mail is fitted with a Seagate 51080 Hard Drive.
It has been noted that if the cable supplied with the Dacon Tape drive, SCSI-1102-0600,
is substituted with a cable supplied by Nortel , NTAK1305 (A0372864), then the Tape drives become usable.

Solution
The faulty Dacon cables are 3 metres in length, anyone having a suspect cable, should ring the Dacon Helpdesk on +44 1442 275200, and arrange for a replacement cable to be sent FOC.

The replacement cables are 2 metres in length and can be identified by a coloured band around one end. These cables have been used successfully in the field, by performing an upgrade, install and back ups

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Symptoms:
Intermittent: FHW001 9 SDI DEVICE RESPONSE TIMEOUT BERR705 EXC 0: Bus Error in Task "tSL1"
AML goes down for no apparent reason
SEER 2520 ESDI link is down, reason= 2980
Reason= Meridian Mail received a reset command from the switch
Rdtail shows :BERR705...etc.

Cause:
FAULTY MAIL POWER BOARD NTAK13AA


All the best

Firebird Scrambler
Meridian Programmer in the UK

http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidbromley

If it's working, then leave it alone!.