One embodiment of the present invention includes a method for handling status commands direct to a partitioned media library that comprises establishing a set of initial logical element addresses for a set of physical element addresses with each initial logical element address corresponding to a physical element address of an element assigned to a library partition, assigning a set of new logical element addresses for the set of physical element addresses in response to a command from a host application (e.g., a MODE SELECT command) and determining a corresponding physical address for a received element address based on the set of new logical element addresses.