EMC sees place for tape after all
EMC sees place for tape after all
Disk-based storage system vendor EMC, which has in the recent past predicted the demise of tape back up systems, has struck a deal with tape library vendor Advanced Digital Information Corporation (ADIC) which would seem to indicate otherwise.
In what will be interpreted as acknowledgement by EMC that tape still has an important role to play in the back up process, particularly for archival data, the storage giant has agreed to resell ADIC's Scalar tape libraries, while ADIC will resell EMC Clariion CX networked storage. Specific terms of the agreements were not disclosed.
Tape is still seen by many enterprises as the most practical format for storing data that does not need to be accessed quickly, as it is significantly cheaper than disk-based systems.
Howard Elias, EMC executive vice president of corporate marketing and office of technology, said: "By selecting ADIC as our partner, EMC now provides customers the option of a tape solution for nearline storage and offsite vaulting, completing the final tier of storage in an ILM strategy."
Peter van Oppen, ADIC chairman and CEO, commented: "ADIC is pleased to be working with EMC to bring IT departments a complete range of storage solutions to support their growing data protection and ILM needs while providing them with the highest overall system reliability and performance along with the lowest long-term TCO. Together, EMC and ADIC offer an industry-leading combination of performance and value, and bring together proven technologies in a way that solves our customers' data storage problems in innovative ways."
The ADIC Scalar library family features include integrated SAN support, intelligent monitoring and alerting functions, capacity-on-demand scalability, and options for full redundant robotics and controllers for high availability operations. Pathlight VX combines disk and tape in a single integrated system, providing twice the backup and restore performance of conventional systems without requiring that users change their existing data-protection procedures.
Products from ADIC and EMC will be available from next month.
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