[Info-vax] Backup TK50 tapes

[Paul Sture]

In article <kgb9r6$mac$2 at tdi.cu.mi.it>, supervinx <nessuno at libero.it> 
wrote:

> Il Sat, 23 Feb 2013 13:39:34 -0500, Stephen Hoffman ha scritto:
> 
> > On 2013-02-23 17:41:38 +0000, supervinx said:
> > 
> >> Well, let's see again what I've understood...
> > 
> > 0) No one willing uses tape boot.
> > 
> Hmmm ... so why do boot tapes exist ?
> I know that booting from TK50 takes more than an hour ...
> But for an historical purpose I'll save those tapes.

I first came across bootable tapes in the IBM world circa 1980 and yes 
the IBM 4331 could boot from a 9 track tape.

When bootable TK50s arrived I welcomed the ability but quickly realised 
that I didn't want to spend an hour watching the tape load.  I had 
already learned how to put standalone backup onto disks to avoid the 
pain of using the even slower TU58 cassettes so simply continued with 
that approach.

But for a virgin system or a situation where the one and only disk on a  
VAXstation 2000 failed, tape booting was there to get me back up and 
running.

-- 
Paul Sture