Dell NetWorker 19.9 Administration Guide

Whether to add or recycle volumes

The NetWorker server saves files on volumes marked appen (appendable). If the volumes are marked full, they cannot receive backups. There are situations best suited to either adding a new volume, or recycling an existing volume.

If volumes are marked full, you can:

• Remove the full volumes and replace them with new media if the volumes are being kept for long-term storage.
• Change the volume mode to recyc (recyclable) if the data on the full volumes is not needed. The NetWorker server overwrites the data with new backups, but maintains the existing labels. Changing the volume mode provides information about changing the volume mode.

When all of the save sets on the volume have passed the time period specified by the retention policy, the mode of the volume automatically changes to recyclable.

There are advantages both to recycling media and adding more media to a pool. With recycling, the same volumes are used repeatedly, and there is no need to add new volumes to the pool. The volumes can, however, wear out over time and exhibit a higher failure rate.

On the other hand, if backups are to be stored for some time, then it might be necessary to add more media to the pool instead of recycling. For example, a library might need new volumes every three months if the company policy is to maintain the backups for a year. In this case, new media must be added to the pool until the volumes that contain expired or old backups can be recycled.