Physical Configuration; System Expansion; Features - Compaq SW TL881 DLT Mini-Lib/1 Reference Manual

1-8 Compaq StorageWorks TL881/TL891 Family MiniLibrary System Reference Guide

Physical Configuration

System Expansion

Features

The Expansion Unit must be mounted at the top of the stack, which places its
control panel at a convenient height. The control panels of the MiniLibrary
Base Modules and Data Units are of secondary importance, as they serve
mainly to help localize system failures. When installed, the motor drive
assembly of the PTM is directly behind the Expansion Unit.
MiniLibrary Base Modules can be installed anywhere below the Expansion
Unit, in any order. There can be a slight performance advantage in making the
MiniLibrary Base Modules contiguous, but gaps are permitted. The size of a
gap is limited by the fact that the same number of 7- inch track sections must
bridge each gap. For safety, available cover plates should be installed on all
PTM sections that are not connected to MiniLibrary modules.
The Expansion Unit senses the position of each module during initialization at
power-up. Even if there are gaps between modules, the system will operate
correctly. If you plan to leave gaps between modules, be sure to order
additional PTM track segments and cover plates equal to the length of the gap.
A MiniLibrary system can be expanded in capacity and performance by
adding or removing TL881/TL891/TL891DLX modules. Associated with the
Expansion Unit and each MiniLibrary Base Module is a section of the
PTM. System firmware integrates all of the robotics of these system modules
with that of the PTM into a single high-performance library robotics system.
There are a number of important external features to note about the Expansion
Unit, the MiniLibrary Base Module and the Data Unit. See Figures 1-4
through 1-7 to locate the features described in the following sections.