XenData and Qualstar Collaborate

XenData, provider of digital video archive software to the media and entertainment industry, announces its initiative with Qualstar Corporation.

Through their collaboration, Qualstar and XenData are greatly simplifying the deployment of digital video archives by delivering turnkey data storage solutions that run XenData software on Qualstar’s BQ Series Video Archive Systems. To complete the offering, XenData provides web based training after the system is installed on the end-user’s site.

The XenData-Qualstar solution has been widely implemented by the media and entertainment industry around the globe, with installations completed at the BBC UK, the Metropolitan Opera and Televisa Networks in Mexico. To date, there are over 65 digital archive installations using Qualstar robotic data tape libraries managed by XenData software. Qualstar’s BQ Series Systems consist of a high performance robotic LTO tape library, a rack-mount Windows server with RAID cache, LTO data tapes, media, barcode labels and all the necessary interconnection cables. These systems are available with capacities from 700 hours of SD video, to over 700,000 hours making them suitable for the world’s largest video archives.

The key elements of the new initiative are:

• Qualstar installs XenData software on its BQ Series Video Archive Systems at its factory. The complete system is thoroughly tested at the Qualstar factory prior to shipment.
• The system integrator purchases the BQ Series System directly from Qualstar and the XenData software license from XenData. The BQ Series System is delivered directly to the end-user’s facility.
• After arrival at the end-user’s site, XenData activates the software for the purchased capacity of the license and provides web training and advice on setting up archiving policies. The system is typically up and running within hours.

This new initiative means that broadcasters, post-production companies and other media and entertainment organizations are now able to benefit from a complete turnkey digital video archive solution, delivered without the usual high cost of deployment. Conventional deployment of digital video archive systems traditionally required extra shipping and trained specialists from the system integrator for installation and on-site commissioning. In contrast, the XenData and Qualstar initiative simplifies deployment and reduces costs for the system integrator and ultimately the end-user.

“Digital video archives based on Qualstar LTO tape libraries and XenData software have proven to be highly reliable and are used around the globe,” said Dr. Phil Storey, co-founder and CEO of XenData. “This new cooperation between XenData and Qualstar streamlines deployment and delivers significant cost savings.”

The Qualstar BQ Series Archive Systems are now shipping with Version 5 of XenData’s X64 Edition software. XenData’s standards-based solution presents the archive as a Windows file system, typically accessed over a standard 1 GigE or 10 GigE network using either CIFS/SMB or FTP. XenData’s use of a standard file system interface makes for easy integration and the creation of a universal digital video archive that can be used by many automation, asset management, monitoring and post-production systems.

Files are written to LTO data tape using the open standard POSIX tar format. This means that archived files can be restored from tape by a wide range of native Linux and UNIX operating systems, Microsoft Services for UNIX, as well as XenData software. By archiving in the tar format, XenData ensures that files can be restored for decades to come.

“XenData and Qualstar each have a record of delivering reliable, cost-effective products that are not overly complicated. We have now taken this one stage further by simplifying the deployment process which will further benefit our customers,” added Bob Covey, VP Marketing at Qualstar.