Unfortunately, this is almost a no-brainer: 10 GB per cartridge vs. perhaps
200 GB per cartridge. Unless you really need sub 20 second access to data,
you almost have to go LTO. Magstar is not cost effective given the 20X
increase in capacity with LTO.
We've seen mount times of about 40 seconds. I've not personally seen
time-to-data so I can't comment on that. I would guess it will be in the
one to two minute range. Once on data, it should be pretty fast with the
expected stop/start time caveats if the data is highly fragmented on the
tape.
I'm about 80% go on LTO in almost all situations. If you are not tied
specifically to an IBM product, take a look at AIT libraries from Qualstar.
Qualstar also has LTO libraries that might fit your needs. Qualstar is
using HP LTO drives rather than IBM drives. This is primarily due to the
greater heat generated by the IBM product, or so I'm told.
I've seen and played with both the IBM 3583 and 3584. I really liked the
3584. Excellent expansion capability and from what I can tell, fairly
economical. And I love the 3494 and the 3584 is very similar.
I think it's time to let your Magstar die.
Kelly J. Lipp
Storage Solutions Specialists, Inc.
PO Box 51313
Colorado Springs CO 80949-1313
(719) 531-5926
Fax: (240) 539-7175
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] or [EMAIL PROTECTED]
www.storsol.com
www.storserver.com
-----Original Message-----
From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of
Lu Ann Mezera
Sent: Thursday, February 08, 2001 10:45 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: MagStar Tape Library #3575 vs. LTO
We are reaching storage capacity limit in our current MagStar Tape Library.
We have TSM 3.7 (will upgrade to 4.1 later in the summer). Our TSM
environment is in an AIX environment. We have 6 RS/6000 AIX nodes on an SP
switch and about 30 NT servers that we back up nightly.
We are looking at upgrading or adding on to our existing library. One
option our vendor would like us to consider is the use of a LTO system. He
said that although it is not quite as fast our as MagStar the storage
capacity on the tapes are 100 gig native and 200 gig compressed. Does
anyone have any opinions on that?
Thanks.
Lu Ann Mezera
Data Center Supervisor
Lab Safety Supply
(608) 757-4909 voice
(608) 757-4652 fax
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
