
Comparing Tape and Cloud Storage for Long-Term Data Preservation

By: David Feller
Spectra Logic recently announced an entirely new product line and we are speeding towards the release of this exciting new offering – ArcticBlue Deep Storage Disk. This is something truly new that bridges the gap between disk performance and tape cost and longevity.
Spectra has been in the digital tape business for more than 36 years. We have refined both large and small libraries and led the industry in low cost, reliable, deep storage of data with literally tens of thousands of tape drives under support and a rapidly growing customer base in every major market segment. A few years ago we announced our entry into the disk world with Spectra Verde. Back in August, Spectra launched Verde DPE, a NAS-based product that brings costs as low as $.09/GB to bulk storage file based applications using a new Shingled Magnetic Recording technology.
Earlier this week, Spectra Logic unveiled an exciting new product, Verde DPE. Verde DPE is a first to market Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR) based network attached storage (NAS) disk platform based on the building blocks of our very successful Verde NAS product. This product is not only a breakthrough in digital preservation for enterprise, but also a revolution in price for Bulk NAS storage.
What is Shingled Magnetic Recording?
Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR) is a new disk technology that increases drive storage capacity. Spectra Logic Verde DPE leverages SMR technology to allow each written disk drive track to overlap the previous track in the same way that shingles on a roof are laid increasing storage density by an average 25%. Coupled with Spectra’s implementation of ZFS software RAID, this technology brings new life to long term storage for enterprise, as low as 9₵ per gigabyte.