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A recent announcement by HP, IBM and Quantum, provided insight in the foreseeable extension of the LTO tape product roadmap. The new LTO generation 9 and LTO generation 10 will be a welcome surprise to data hoarder alike. According to the giant tape vendors, LTO-9 will offer up to 25 TB of native capacity and LTO-10 will offer 48 TB native capacity.
Previous reports have shown that transfer rates are expected to increase at a much larger rate than previous LTO generations. LTO-9 and LTO-10 will have transfer rates of 708 Mbps and 1,100 Mbps. In comparison, the earlier generation LTO-6, offers a native transfer rate of 160 Mbps, with LTO-7 at 315.2 Mbps and LTO-8 at 472 Mbps.
Even more so, both new generation LTO tapes will include read-and-write backwards compatibility with tapes from the previous generation and read compatibility from the previous two generations. The new generations will also continue to support LTFS, WORM functionality and encryption.
Back in 2010 when LTO6 was introduced to the market (wow time flies) some had remarked they were in favor of transfer rates not increasing at such a rapid rate like they did with generations before LTO6. Others mention that the LTO tape transfer rate increases in the new road map are in direct correlation to higher densities on the tape itself.
Another added that although disk storage is where most IT organizations currently base their data protection efforts, the continuation of the LTO roadmap should stimulate confidence among users of tape media and for the future of tape technology.
The roadmap adds certainty as much as capacity, which is essential to people investing in long-term data storage and retention.
It goes without saying that tape media in general has uses even outside long-term data storage, data mobility, and data recovery. As the longevity of the LTO roadmap continues and tape’s new uses gain recognition, backup storage vendors and storage management retailers will need to take notice that modern tape could be the answer to additional tiers of storage beyond what disk can offer.
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