HP StorageWorks Ultrium 215 tape drive (LTO1): cartriges recognition problem

I recently bought a used HP Storageworks Ultrium 215 tape drive instead of my even more antique HP Superstore DAT 40 which malfunctioned after few good years of working. I installed the tape drive into my full tower case desktop, connected the power and SCSI connectors,( SCSI ID was the same (3) so nothing to change there) turned ON the system (AMD 64 on Asus M3A79T deluxe mboard running Fedora 17). Pressing the "Eject" buton I noticed that the tape drive came with a tape cartridge inside (C7971A 200GB) because it poped out. When I attempted to re-insert it the tape drive repeated 4 times the movement of the tape inside then outside, after which the "Tape error" LED started blinking. I attempted to insert a cleaning cartridge (IBM Total Storage LTO Ultrium Cleaning Cartridge, intended for all Ultrium 1 & 2 drives) but got the same LED blinking. I also attempted it with a new data cartridge - the same result.

Doing some googling I saw someone mentione that such problem could be caused if the tape drive used in server had two plastic guides attached from its sides and removing them solves the problem. I remembered that I saw two plastic guides before inserting the tape drive into the case, and I had to remove them to install the drive, so it seems that isn't the problem (or is it?).

Could it be that the cartridge left inside te tape drive somehow affected the tape detection mechanizm? Any way to "debug" it?

Am I forgetting something or I just got a malfunctioning tape drive?

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