Quantum Embraces LTO-8 …

Quantum Corp. announced that LTO Ultrium format generation 8 technology will be available in its Scalar tape libraries and StorNext AEL archive systems beginning in December 2017.

This latest generation of LTO tape extends tape’s value leadership position for low-cost, efficient storage with 2X capacity gain and 20% performance improvements over LTO-7 – for coping with the massive growth of unstructured data.

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Scalar and StorNext AEL are efficient tape automation solutions – with up to almost 10PB uncompressed in a single 19-inch rack, and up to 144PB uncompressed within a standard data center aisle – enabling organizations to meet long-term storage challenges by reducing data center footprint, lowering power and cooling costs and reducing administration time.

Scalar: Efficient Tape Storage
Scalar tape libraries include many features that make them designed to leverage the latest LTO-8 advances:

• Converged design with optional embedded compute capabilities, enabling significant quantities of data to be stored closer to the application and reducing the load on network infrastructure.
• Self-healing and self-protecting backup and archive leveraging EDLM policy-based media health checks and automated data migration.
• In-library vaulting with Active Vault improves security and access to vaulted content while reducing costs.
• Library task automation with RESTful web services for easier automation of repetitive tasks.
• Storage density, maximizing rack utilization with up to 24PB in a single 19-inch rack.
• 80 PLUS Gold Certified power supplies, yielding power and cooling savings while reducing the environmental impact of a data center, certified to be 90% efficient at 50% loading.

Tape Innovation for Persistent and Emerging Challenges
The new LTO-8 doubles the tape cartridge capacity from the previous LTO-7, enabling customers to store up to 30TB per cartridge, providing a cost-effective, long-term retention of data. In addition, with tape drive data transfer rates of up to 900MB/s, or more than 3.24TB of data an hour per drive, LTO-8 systems allow large files to be transferred more quickly. It also includes a new format feature that allows customers to increase the capacity of the latest LTO-7 cartridges by up to 50% to store 22.5TB of enterprise data.

Quantum will leverage these technology enhancements with Quantum certified LTO-8 media to deliver multi-tier solutions for persistent data growth and protection challenges in areas such as media and entertainment, cloud-based cold storage, video surveillance, university research and autonomous driving. The combination of LTO-8 technology with Scalar and StorNext AEL tape automation offers better storage densities than proprietary tape technologies, and with Quantum certified media, LTO bit error rates are equivalent to those of legacy proprietary media. LTO technology is the solution for companies using tape for low-cost, long-term big data storage, or companies using tape as an offline copy to protect against ransomware.

LTO-8 technology is scheduled to be available in December 2017 for Scalar i6000, Scalar i6, Scalar i3 and Scalar i500 libraries as well as Quantum Certified media, with other platforms following, subject to compliance verification. The company will begin taking orders in October and currently offers an LTO-8 technology pre-purchase program, enabling customers to keep pace with tape innovation by deploying LTO-7 drives today and swapping them later for LTO-8 drives.