Will,
I can't answer your question definitively because of the same reason Richard 
sighted, but I do agree with him that it operates only on the nodes data
.
In addition I have seen this same message recently when upgrading TSM clients 
from 5.1.1.0 to 5.1.5.15.  Bottom line is that to complete the upgrade you have 
to do the conversion.  The good news is that I never encountered it running 
longer than a couple 
minutes.

Bryan Davis

>>> rbs AT BU DOT EDU 06/20/03 02:05PM >>>
>On trying to run an archive on a win2000 using the backup/archive client I
>get the following message on clicking the archive button (before file
>selection).
>
>ANS5148W The server needs to do a one-time conversion of your archive data
>         before you can continue. This operation may take a long time, and
>         cannot be cancelled once it has started. Are you willing to wait
>         for the conversion to complete?
>
>The server version is:- Tivoli Storage Manager  Version 5, Release 1, Level
>1.0
>
>Does this mean that this will kick of a conversion for all of the archive
>data on the tsm server or just for this node. What do the group recommend?

Will - It seems like you have a very old client which has recently upgraded
       its client software and is now getting active again.
TSM message descriptions are disappointingly vague and undefinitive in too
many cases.  The client session would apparently be inciting what the server
administrator might do by planned schedule: a CONVert Archive command, which
operates on a node's data.

The http://www-1.ibm.com/support/techdocs/atsmastr.nsf/WebIndex/WP100254
paper which Stanfield Alejandro recently mentioned gives a good perspective
on the archives conundrum.

  Richard Sims, BU