Crossroads Europe is kicking off 2010 with ArchiveVerify, a monitoring tool that safeguards the future readability of data backed up on tape.



The ArchiveVerify allows organisations to validate the readability of data stored on tape. “In our experience, the Achilles’ heel of a data recovery strategy is often the uncertainty of the data’s readability, and this single point of failure can render then entire restore process useless,” adds Bernd Krieger, Managing Director, at Crossroads Europe.
 
However this challenge can now be overcome with ArchiveVerify, which allows IT administrators to examine the readability of selected tape pools according to custom rules. Firstly, the user defines the tapes pools to be verified and selection criteria for the tapes to be analysed. One or more drives are then selected for the verification and the tape analysis schedule is defined. Once these rules have been set, no further user intervention is necessary as Crossroads’ ArchiveVerify then automatically performs the verification and generates all the required reports and information on the status of the analysed tapes.
 
“Our ArchiveVerify tool helps our customers in two ways: one, it reassures the user that their data can be successfully read from backup tapes in the event of recovery even in the long-term, and two, it helps businesses fulfil statutory requirements for the reliable storage of long-term data,“ concludes Krieger.
 
ArchiveVerify is available as an optional feature with the Crossroads ReadVerify Appliance, a solution that proactively validates the integrity, utilisation and performance of the backup system.
 
Originally a specialist in the router business, Crossroads Systems, Inc. today enjoys several years of experience within tape backup environments and its routers manage more than 200,000 tape drives worldwide.