During a scheduled quarterly backup-validation exercise, a systems administrator needs to satisfy the equipment portion of the organization's backup-validation policy. Which action BEST meets this specific requirement?
Review the off-site tape-rotation log to confirm all media were transferred according to policy.
Connect the same model tape drive used in production to a test server and complete a full write-and-restore cycle with the latest backup set.
Verify that recent backup jobs completed within the defined overnight backup window.
Generate cryptographic checksums of the restored files and compare them to the originals.
Validating the equipment element of a backup plan means confirming that the hardware used to read and write the backups (for example, the tape drive, autoloader, or disk controller) is operational and still compatible with the media that contains the backups. Performing a full read/write cycle on the same model drive that created the backups exercises the transport mechanism, heads, firmware, and interface cards-directly proving that the gear can both write a fresh backup and restore data from existing media.
Checksum comparison of restored data verifies data integrity, not hardware functionality. Reviewing rotation logs addresses media-handling processes. Checking that jobs finished inside the backup window validates scheduling performance, not the underlying restore hardware. Therefore, only the test read/write on the production-class drive fulfills the equipment-validation requirement.