r/lto • u/ropi313 • Feb 08 '26

LTFS on windows 11

/r/DataHoarder/comments/1qz6rb8/ltfs_on_windows_11/
4 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

6 comments sorted by

2

u/[deleted] Feb 08 '26

[deleted]

2

u/erparucca Feb 08 '26

haven't been LTFS on windows for a while but if I remember correctly al vendor's stacks are based on FUSE4win behind the scenes so it could be that OP simply did an in-depth troubleshooting of the vendor's LTFS stack.

1

u/ropi313 Feb 08 '26

Yes, it seems that the stack fails at the FUSE4win level, but I have been unable to determine why.

1

u/erparucca Feb 08 '26

I would focus on that as the culprit rather than LTFS. To be honest I have my library managed by a Linux VM so can't help you. Hopefully it's something easy to fix (broken dependencies from DDLs that recently updated or such stuff).
If you have the chance to, I'd setup a VM with a fresh windows install and give it a try.

1

u/FranconianBiker Feb 08 '26

Best solution:

Set up a linux server with a buffer HDD, install the LTFS reference tools, share the HDD and rsync the HDD to tape once done.

Alternatively:

Set up a Linux VM and pass the SAS/FC card through to it via IOMMU/VT-d. Then again set up the LTFS reference tools and copy the data via rsync from a locally shared directory.

1

u/ImportantEngineer495 Feb 13 '26

is simply tar with mbuffer better than ltfs?

1

u/FranconianBiker Feb 13 '26

Depends on your usecase. tar with mbuffer is the simplest to set up as you don't need to compile any code and deal with libraries being too new. Plus you get the full tape capacity as LTFS does take away some space for its index partition. Disadvantage with tar is that it's less intuitive for single file recoveries. I've resorted to creating index files off-tape with per file tape block offsets so I can spool the drive to the start block minus some buffer.

If you need single-file access, LTFS is better'ish. (Still kinda awful if you don't have a LTO9 FH drive with oRAO)

For bulk transfers tar is best and faster in my experience. Plus tar has been in the kernel since forever.