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Although they face some stiff competition, today's DLT tape libraries offer time-tested stability with significant technical advances.
If you've ever spent Christmas Eve wrapping a mound of gifts with bargain-bin trimmings, you know that all tape is not created equal. Sure, the store-brand variety might stick to your carpet really well, but the likelihood of it remaining adhered to your packages is rather slim.
The same principle applies to Digital Linear Tape (DLT) and the libraries made to accommodate it. While some consider entry-level DLT library systems to be on the commodity level, the more significant differentiating features are in the midrange and high-end systems.
There's no shortage of options when it comes to backup and storage tape technologies. There are many alternatives, and the list continues to grow. According to International Data Corp. (IDC, Framingham, MA), the market segment including tape drives for 4mm, 8mm, and DLT technologies will reach $2.9 billion by 2002. The company also predicts that in 1998, the DLT segment of the market will see a revenue increase of 30 percent, while worldwide shipments will increase by 27 percent.
Strong growth is also projected by Freeman Associates, a Santa Barbara, CAbased consulting firm that specializes in data storage markets. The firm expects revenues in the DLT market to increase from $850 million in 1997 to $1.35 billion in 2003.
Driving the demand for higherperformance tape technologies in the midrange and enterprise segments are the growth of the Internet and intranets, the increasing number of servers it takes to accommodate this growth, and more stringent requirements for storage and disaster recovery. The demand for DLT backup and storage is particularly strong, spurred by the increased usage of such applications as multimedia, video on demand, audio content, publishing, and medical imaging.
WHY DLT?
Quantum (Milpitas, CA) bought DLT technology from Digital Equipment in 1994, and now refers to the media as DLTtape. Quantum remains the sole vendor of DLT drives, with the DLT 700 being the most prevalent in the midrange and enterprise segments. DLT'S closest competitor in many applications is 8mm tape (see Table 1).
DLT'S linear serpentine structure has some advantages over helical scan systems. In linear serpentine recording, data is written along tracks from one end of the...