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Backup media is one of the oldest data ways to store data, using magnetic tape for reading and writing the content. While most businesses have moved to cloud or disk storage devices as primary storage, tapes are still widely used for recovery and backup purposes. These drives work alongside other storage options, such as USB backup drives, allowing you to enjoy the benefits of employing different data storage strategies. Large enterprises prefer tape backups due to their decreased running costs, increased security and fast data access times.
To compete with disk-based storage or cloud-based storage, manufacturers developed and enriched the functionality of magnetic tapes. Multiple backup media formats exist on the market, depending on their capacities. Linear Tape-Open (LTO) storage technology offers a high native storage capacity of up to 12TB, and a large compressed capacity of up to 30TB. Digital Linear Tape (DLT) cartridges offer support for up to 70GB of compressed capacity, while SuperDLT ensures an increased storage capacity of 300GB. The Digital Audio Tape (DAT) was initially used for audio storage, but is now a popular backup medium with a storage capacity 80GB. Advanced Intelligent Tapes (AIT) can store 400GB of data, and Quarter Inch Cartridge (QIC) tapes have a storage capacity of up to 25GB.
Compared to disk options like a portable external hard drive, tape backups are an affordable option in terms of cost per gigabyte. The tape drives allow for the creation of an easy offline data storage solution. Tape backups are a cost-efficient means of storing large, legacy-data amounts. Further, converting legacy data into appropriate formats and transferring the information from the tape cartridge to a new medium can be costly and time-consuming.
As data value increases, so does the cost of protecting it. Tape provides offline protection by isolating your data from software bugs likely to occur during a continuous disk-to-disk backup process. Backup media provide a true air gap, protecting your data from both ransomware and virus threats. Tapes from LTO-4 provide a tape-level algorithm that does not affect capacity, performance or compression. Tape backup devices in a non-rewritable format prevent data overwriting, while addressing compliance requirements.
The backup media tape formats ensure that you can use it for years to come. For example, generation 1 to 7 LTO drives can read data in tapes two generations older, and can write to tapes from an earlier generation. LTO-8 backup drives can write and read from data written by LTO-7 drives.
Despite the common misconception that backing up to tape media is slower than USB flash drives, a tape delivers respectable performance. An LTO-8 tape offers compressed reading and writing speeds of up to 750 MB/s, which is faster than the speed of 7,200 RPM backup hard drives.
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