THE ROLE OF TAPE IN MODERN DATA CENTERS

In this NewsBytes edition, we provide overviews of our newest whitepapers and invite you to check them out for an in-depth look into the state of big data storage and LTO’s tape’s competitive market position.
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As the data storage landscape continues to evolve, LTO tape technology remains a reliable and trusted solution equipped to address some of the industry’s most pressing issues including energy consumption, data growth, security, cost, and capacity. We’ve recently published a series of whitepapers in partnership with Fred Moore, an industry thought leader, where we discuss the role of tape in modern data centers and provide an outlook for LTO tape technology’s next frontier.

AS HYPERSCALE DATA CENTERS EXPAND, LTO TAPE OFFERS RELIEF TO PAIN POINTS

Hyperscale Data Centers (HSDC) have become the fastest growing data center segment, generating massive compute,storage, energy, and carbon footprint requirements. As a result of the explosion in digital content, the need to store data securely, affordably and reliably has become a top priority for organizations across industries and sectors. But the rise in demand for HSDCs brings about growing pains, particularly in the need for exceptional amounts of energy and cooling technologies, fortified cybersecurity measures and overall cost management.

LTO tape is well positioned to help solve for some of the biggest pain points associated with the expansion in HSDCs when considering the following:

  • Most tape cartridges spend the majority of their life in a slot or rack, electronically disconnected from a computer system consuming no energy.
  • LTO’s easy scalability, lower price and the lowest TCO play a greater role as the size of the storage environment increases.

     

  • Tape’s “Air Gap” provides an electronically disconnected copy of data that prevents cybercrime disasters from directly attacking data while stored on tape.

You can read more about the value of tape in Hyperscale Data Centers by accessing the Whitepaper on LTO.org here

LTO TAPE DELIVERS SOLUTIONS THROUGHOUT DATA LIFECYCLES

Over the last ten years, data has become one of the most valuable assets for businesses, making data storage crucial for a myriad of business functions and continuity. Balancing a storage architecture to effectively manage data through increasingly longer lifecycles for a wider variety of workloads while minimizing costs presents the next storage challenge.

The lifecycle of any piece of data, beginning with capture, normally extends 90-120 days until it reaches archival status, where it will spend the majority of its life. Storing and managing massive amounts of archival data can quickly become a cost driver for organizations, and when evaluating budget conscious options, LTO tape technology
rises to the top.

LTO tape is the most cost-effective archive solution available given it has the lowest
$/TB price and TCO of any storage option. With a media life of 30 years or more, LTO is best suited to address archive requirements among today’s storage choices.

You can read more about the data lifecycle in the Whitepaper here and learn about the solutions offered by LTO tape technology.

THE NEW FRONTIER FOR TAPE: BIG DATA APPLICATIONS

The cloud, “fog,” edge and the IoT (the cloud ecosystem) are altering the way data is being generated, processed, and stored. The cloud is acting as the new core data center and serving as a catch-all for backup, disaster recovery, and archival and big data storage. Fog computing is an architecture that performs a substantial amount of computation and data reduction before moving data into the cloud. The IoT (Internet of Things) refers to the billions of physical devices on the edge that are connected to the internet, all ing sensors to ingest and create enormous storage and compute demand for on-premise and cloud environments.

Edge devices and their applications generate massive amounts of data, filtered and reduced in the fog, that can quickly become historical and may be stored untouched for years in a data lake or the cloud awaiting future analysis.

Tape has the greatest potential of any existing storage technology to meet the data growth demands that are fueling the cloud era. It has emerged as one of the most cost-effective complements to SSDs and HDDs due to its high reliability, higher capacities, faster data rates, security, low cost, easy scalability and significantly lower carbon footprint. You can check out the third Whitepaper for more on the tape storage value proposition for the newest big data applications here.

LTO TAPE FOR YOUR GREEN INITIATIVES

When considering that hard disk drives can consume close to 20% of the total power within the data centers and that up to 60% of the data stored on disks is infrequently accessed, it may leave companies wondering if there are more different methods of storing their cold data that are more cost effective and energy efficient.

There is: LTO Tape technology.

As noted in the recently published whitepaper, Reducing Data Center Energy Consumption and Carbon Emissions with Modern Tape Storage, “by moving 10 PB of cold data that is growing 35% annually from disk to tape storage, an [estimated] 87% reduction in carbon emission and an 86% reduction in TCO can be achieved over ten years. IT organizations have a significant opportunity to achieve meaningful carbon emission reductions while lowering operational and capital expenses.” You can view the whitepaper here to learn more about why LTO tape is an eco-conscious data storage solution.

COMING UP FOR THE LTO PROGRAM

The LTO Program is working on more exciting assets so make sure to follow us for what’s next! We’re working with IDC to continue highlighting tape technology’s role in defense against ransomware and will continue having conversations about tape innovation in upcoming webcast programs. Stay tuned!