TO  *SMers - All,
New to this so please bear with.

ENVIRONMENT:
TSM Server IBM RS6000 R50  2 Procs 1GB ram
AIX 4.3.3 MNT_lev 004
TSM Server Version 3.7.2
Library IBM3575 - L12 2 drives - NOT XL
No disk pools.
All pools sequential to 3575.

APPLICATION:
Export node every weekend - active files for client node.
(WHY? - Company Policy requires weekly full backups of this
client to go off site.)
This is in addition to daily incremental to the primary storage pool.
Exports:
  395,963 items
  160,980,891,020 bytes.
Copies active files from 71 sources tapes (2 storage pools) to 15 output
tapes.
Starts 0300 Saturday morning and runs until Sunday Afternoon.

PROBLEM:
Export node waits for retention timeout on source tape before
unmounting it and mounting the next source tape.  With a 5 minute
mount retention this wastes almost 3.5 hours. Even with 1 minute
retention wastes way over 1 hour.  I have other thing that need to
happen over the weekend that also need these drives.

QUESTION:
Is there a way around this?  Is there a fix for it?
Is there a better way to get a set of offsite tapes for
the active files for the node without doing a selective
backup to new storage pool?
Please don't mention backup sets.  Also, please don't tell
me I need more drives.  Upgrade request for them has been in the
works, for more than 6 months along with upgrade to a L18.
These systems are orphans, so to speak.  Upper management does
not like to spend money on them. Another story.

Thanks to all,

James D. Poehlman (Denny)
AIX / Unix Systems Administrator
Senior Technical Specialist
Mid-Range Server Technology Team
Black and Decker
North American Power Tools - Information Systems
james.poehlman AT bdk DOT com
Voice 410-716-3039
Cell  410-375-5974