Tape: The Tyrannosaurus Rex Of Backup

4. A long, heavy tail

All the tape cartridge processes: the mechanical arms, the conveyor belts, the labeling, deciding on an off-site storage strategy, loading, unloading, driving them around or waiting for a white van to collect, or even posting them. This is the long, heavy tail of tape – writing the data to tape is only the beginning. VTLs and disk-based backup technologies however have no long heavy tail, providing a far more agile solution that saves organisations time and money.

5. Slow to change direction

T-Rex had rotational inertia due to its centre of gravity, so could not change direction fast. A tape-based backup system has a strong linear direction that means organisations can’t change direction easily.  Disk-based virtual tape appliances are highly adaptable systems as drop-in replacements for tape racks, and once you have a disk array many evolutionary tracks present themselves: de-duplication, virtualisation, off-site-over-fibre backup, security policies and data silos for cloud architectures, scalability (both up and down), and speed increases for seek and restore.

6. Can’t grab

T-Rex’s forearms are one of its most obvious features, with an almost comedic reach. Tape’s weak little forearms can’t grab all that data rushing towards it at fibre-channel speeds and can’t wrestle it down into manageable form. While a VTL with fibre channel and intelligent de-duplication and scalable server architecture can grab as much data as you can throw at it.

Conclusion

65 million years ago a meteor the size of Manhattan hit the earth, changing the climate and ending the dinosaurs’ reign. Like missing data in a tape-based backup, the dinosaurs have gone forever. Yet both T-Rex and tape had their place in evolution, stepping stones to advances for coping with a challenging environment. While T-Rex is now confined to museums, television and books, physical tape storage still has a place, as an efficient means to archive long-term data.

The Age of the Mammals inherited the dinosaurs’ legacy. In the world of storage, virtual tape libraries and disk-to-disk technologies have been proven to be the intelligent choice for protecting legacy investment, decreasing backup and restore times, and deploying a nimble infrastructure that can store more data at lower cost and for longer periods of time. These new technologies emulate existing physical tape libraries without disrupting current backup and restore infrastructure or policies. On top of that, return on investment is increased because current assets are better utilised and there is a seamless and cost-effective scalability to address rapid data growth.

So, isn’t it time your storage infrastructure evolved?

Jon Mills is managing director of SEPATON, which is exhibiting at 360°IT, the IT Infrastructure Event held 22nd – 23rd September 2010, at Earl’s Court, London. The event provides an essential road map of technologies for the management and development of a flexible, secure and dynamic IT infrastructure. For further information please visit www.360itevent.com