Configuring vendor-supported tape drives and media changers on VMware ESXi 5.x and later releases

Products

VMware vSphere ESXi 6.0 VMware vSphere ESXi 7.0 VMware vSphere ESXi 8.0

Issue/Introduction

This article provides steps/instructions to configure vendor-supported tape drives and media changers so that virtual machines on ESXi 5.x and later can access these devices. These instructions are provided with these caveats:

VMware does not provide support for backup tape drives and tape library devices or their functionality on ESXi/ESX hosts.
The functionality of the tape library and the backup software in conjunction with VMware ESXi is partner-supported.
VMware assumes that the third-party vendor has completed necessary validation to support this configuration in a production environment.
VMware does not maintain a hardware compatibility guide that includes tested tape devices.
Devices and configurations that worked on earlier releases of ESXi may not work with later ESXi releases.

If there are problems, open a support request with the third-party or partner vendor's support organization.

Environment

VMware ESXi 6.x
VMware ESXi 7.x
VMware ESXi 8.x

Resolution

Note: Beginning with vSphere 5.x, VMware no longer supports Tape Drives connected directly to ESXi 5.x and later.

To configure a tape device with a virtual machine in ESXi 5.x and above:

Consult the backup hardware and software vendor to ensure that the tape device and backup software are supported to work with current ESXi Release
Configure the tape device and controller according to the hardware vendor's guidelines.
Connect the vSphere Client to vCenter Server or an ESXi host.
Click the ESXi host to which the hardware is connected.
Click Configuration > Storage Adapters.
On the Storage Adapters list, identify the controller that has the tape attached.
Under Details, record the Runtime Name of the tape device (for example, vmhba2:C0:T1:L0). For more information about the Runtime Name, see Identifying disks when working with VMware ESXi.
Add the SCSI Device to the Virtual Machine using PowerCLI, refer Add Passthrough Devices to a Host and Virtual Machine for more information (Note: vSphere Client or Host Client does not support adding SCSI device to the Virtual Machine).

The Virtual Device Nodes are denoted as <Bus>:<Target>.

For example: The Runtime Name vmhba2:C0:T1:L0 corresponds with a Virtual Device Node of (1:1), (2:1), or (3:1) as the Target is 1(T1) .

Warning: For clarification, (0:1) is also available for configuration. However, this bus is usually already populated by a virtual disk in a typical virtual machine setup. As tape operations by nature are quite disruptive for devices on the same bus, to avoid interruption, ensure that the tape devices' target IDs are on a separate bus from the other virtual machine disks attached to the virtual machine. For example, bus (0:x) can have several virtual machine disks, while bus (1:x) has the tape pass-through device(s).
Install and configure the backup software according to the software vendor's guidelines.

Note: ESXi supports vendor-supported parallel SCSI tape drives and tape libraries only. If using a tape drive library (versus using a stand-alone tape drive), the library must be multi-target, and not multi-LUN. Ensure that the tape drive's virtual target ID in the virtual machine's configuration is set to be the same as the physical target ID.

Additional Information

Requirements while configuring vendor-supported tape drives and media changers

The tape hardware must be connected to a VMWare-supported Adaptec SCSI controller.
The tape hardware must be SCSI ID addressed and cannot be LUN addressed.
The virtual and physical SCSI IDs must match each other.
Tape devices should not share a BUS with any other non-tape device and should be given their own dedicated SCSI controller.
The SCSI controller for the guest virtual machine should be configured as a LSI Logic SCSI card and not the BUS logic card.
BUS sharing must be disabled.

Limitations

Fiber connected tape devices are not supported.
Tape devices cannot be connected to RAID controllers