cannot read tar archive from tape: directory checksum error

From: news.amnet.net.au (hugo_at_geoinformex.com)
Date: 08/16/04

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    Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 08:18:03 GMT

    Hi

    I have a tar archive spanning over two tapes. The tapes are DDS-1 tapes and
    an old Irix indigo with a tape drive has been used in the past to read/write
    from and to these tapes.

    I recently wanted to recover some data from these two tapes, but when I
    issued the command

    irix>tar xpf /dev/tape /tmp

    I get the following error:

    tar: directory checksum error

    the same with the command to simply read the data back to stdin:

    irix> tar tvf /dev/tape

    I know that /dev/tape is pointing to the right tape device. I also tried to
    out the other tape first i.e. if the tar archive spans over two tapes, I may
    have to put the first tape in rather than the second and maybe a mistake was
    made labeling the tapes.

    I also tried different block sizes i.e

    irix>tar xbf 512 /dev/tape /tmp

    or

    irix>tar xbf 1024 /dev/tape /tmp

    In the case directly above I get a read error and I am quite sure it reads
    as 512 blocks which is correct.

    Under newer versions of tar there is the i option to ignore the checksum but
    the older version of tar does not support this.

    Is there any way of getting these data off the tape when you get this
    directory checksum error? It is quite important we get the data off.

    Any suggestions or advice would be most welcome.

    Thanks

    Hugo

    NB: I have tested the tape and the tape device with mt commands such as
    "mt -f /dev/tape status" and everything is fine, so I suspect it is a
    problem with the data on the tape - but I would still like to try a recovery
    if it is at all possible.

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