The following best practices are for effective tape and disk cartridge media management:

• Be aware of the following consequences of the infinite setting for the overwrite protection period for all tape media and disk cartridge media:

  • Backup data may consume tape and disk cartridge media capacity quickly.

  • Tape and disk cartridge media do not become recyclable automatically. You must specify when to overwrite each media.

• Create new media sets with the append and overwrite protection periods that accommodate your needs. When the overwrite protection periods expire, the tape media and disk cartridge media are recyclable and Backup Exec has access to overwritable media.

• Overwrite tape and disk cartridge media periodically to keep the media family at a manageable size so that Backup Exec can rebuild the catalog if necessary. You can use a media rotation strategy so that media is periodically overwritten, or select the option Overwrite media when you run a full backup.

  Note:

  A media family is a set of tape and disk cartridge media that is related because one or more backup jobs span from one media to another. For example, you back up Resource A to Media 1. When Media 1 runs out of space, Backup Exec uses Media 2 to complete the backup. Media 1 and Media 2 are now in the same media family because the backup job started on Media 1 and finished on Media 2. If you append more backups to Media 2 until it runs out of space, then Backup Exec uses Media 3. Media 3 is now part of the same media family as Media 1 and Media 2. The media family continues to grow as Backup Exec appends backup jobs. A new media family starts when a backup job overwrites the first media it uses.