Tape wearing out on Exabyte?

[Calvin Hayden x2254]

leadley at uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Scott Leadley):
> In article <1990Aug15.235722.7639 at rice.edu> grant at saturn.cs.swin.oz.au (Grant Collins) writes:
> 
>>I have a brand new Exabyte with a brand new tape in it and everytime I do
>>a dump over the network to it it gives a message like:
>>
>>st1: warning, the tape may be wearing out or the head may need cleaning.
>>st1: write retries= 13936, file= 0, block= 3448

Just a note here.  We have 8mm units, (Exabyte transport units) sold by
othere companies (workstation solutions, Microtechnology, etc).  Most of
the vendors have told us that their hardware maint (replacement within 24
hours) is invalidated if we have been using anything other than the
Exabyte cleaning cartridges - the Sonys are supposedly too abrasive, and
cause excessive wear on the head(s).  Dont know how true this is, but
thought I'd mention it.

Calvin Hayden
TI
...mcnc!rti!{tijc02|olympus}!root