If you invoke SMARTMON-UX with the -X option, it will poll tapes at  the specified polling periods and produce a message such as:

       \\.\TAPE0 polled at Sun Aug 18 23:19:21 2002 Status:Passed

 

If there was a problem, you might see:

       \\.\TAPE0 polled at Sun Aug 18 23:26:49 2002 Status:Not Data Grade – The cartridge is not data grade. Data written to it will be at risk.

 

Note that it is possible that in the event of a TapeAlert, you will get more than one message per polling cycle.

The information is used by permisson from SANtools.  The full page is at: http://www.santools.com/smart/unix/manual/tapealertviewer.htm

TapeAlert compatible tape drives – such as the DELL PowerVault 110T SDLT drive – are delivered with TapeAlert features as standard. The internal TapeAlert firmware constantly monitors the drive hardware and the media, checking for errors and potential difficulties. Any problems identified are flagged on a new SCSI log page, where 64 bytes have been reserved for use by TapeAlert.

After a backup has been completed, the TapeAlert-compatible backup application automatically reads the drive’s TapeAlert SCSI log page to check for any problems. If an error is flagged, the backup software displays a clear warning message on the user’s monitor screen, and adds the TapeAlert messages to its logs. These messages are standard across all applications that support TapeAlert, and are designed to give clear explanation of the problem and suggested resolution. For example, a user attempting to backup onto a worn-out tape would encounter the message:

WARNING: The tape cartridge has reached the end of its useful life:

1. Copy the data you need to another tape
2. Discard the old tape

The full article can be found at: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/storage/pv110t/ug/diag.htm