New Transportable Disk Backup Solutions
Solve These Problems Of USB Tape Drives
Tape Is A Headache!
If you've ever been burned by recovering data from a USB tape drive, or suffered through lengthy data restoration issues, you are not alone: A recent survey of 200 IT Managers (cited in InfoStor, November 2004), indicated that nearly half the respondents experienced a high unsuccessful backup rate using USB tape drives. And, trouble with backups equates to long downtime�meaning loss of productivity and revenue, not to mention a lot of stress. With USB tape drives, you are typically looking at 12-18 hours to recover a server, and 15-20 minutes per file restore (which can total up to 3-4 hours with just 10-15 file restorations per month).
What About Disaster Recovery?
With all the problems surrounding USB tape drives, it's no surprise small businesses and system integrators strongly prefer disk backup solutions. A recent InfoStor survey indicated that 63.6 percent of respondents are considering the purchase of disk-based backup products in the next 12 months. However, most of these systems still rely on tape for vital disaster recovery functions of rotation and offsite archival. The main reason tape media is being used is because it is durable and can be transported.
Rotation and offsite archiving is needed to protect your data from hazards such as theft, viruses, worms, Trojan horses, fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, indoor sprinkler systems, media failures and other disasters. USB tape drives are used primarily for disaster recovery because hard drives have traditionally been too fragile to be transported or handled routinely (hard drives can be damaged by a mere 1/4-inch drop). That is why USB tape drives continue to survive even though most users hate using it.
 Transportable Hard Drives Eliminate Tape (And A Lot Of Headaches)
A transportable hard drive is a drive with high shock and vibration protection that enables the hard drive to be safely moved around without risk of drive damage and data loss due to knocks or drops. Today's transportable drives have up to 500 GB of capacity (native), which is higher than most popular USB tape drive formats. These transportable hard drives can transfer a Gigabyte of data in as little as 30 seconds � most USB tape drives will take 3-10 times longer, provided the tape drive works reliably. If the tape drive doesn't work reliably, then plan to spend hours and often overnight-shifts dealing with restoration issues � causing downtime to vital areas like email, databases, and more.
How is a 100 percent disk-based system with transportable drives used to replace a USB tape drive? It's remarkably simple. The drive shows up as a volume (like your hard drive now) in Windows, Mac OS, or Linux. With USB 2.0, Firewire, or SATA, the transportable hard drive is hot-swappable, meaning your server stays on when you swap out hard drives, further minimizing downtime effects on your network.
How Are Hard Drives Made Durable And Safe, Like Tape?
First off, shock protection on hard drives has evolved to a level where you can now purchase a transportable, compact, high-capacity drive that has the durability to compete with USB tape drive media. One company, Olixir Technologies ( www.olixir.com), has developed a patented three-stage shock protection system for hard drives that provides 1,200 Gs to over 10,000 Gs (depending on model) of protection. This company even offers a model that exceeds the MIL-STD-810F Transit Drop Test and withstands numerous drops from 7-feet onto concrete! With so much durability, you can safely rotate and offsite archive, or transport data just like the tape media used in USB tape drives.
Much Easier To Use, And INFINITELY EXPANDABLE
The drives mentioned above can be used in an enterprise chassis (to achieve Terabyte capacity levels), or simply with a low-cost USB 2.0, Firewire, or SATA cable. Users often interchange interfaces such that in the chassis, routine backups and rotations occur, while cables are used to directly restore a particular user workstation. There are many choices with this flexibility and this is much simpler than how USB tape drives work. USB tape drives can only use media that is of the capacity rated for the drive (or lower). Thus, when you need to expand capacity in your organization, you pay for a new expensive USB tape drive. With a transportable hard drive solution, like Olixir's, you can use higher-capacity drives with the same chassis. This will save you thousands of dollars over a three-year period.
Transportable Hard Drive Solution Versus USB Tape Drive:
|
SDLT Tape Drive Solution |
Olixir's Mobile DataVault
FastRestore SE |
|
Restore Time for 100 MB File (Typical)
|
15 minutes
|
<5 seconds
|
|
Restore Time for 250 GB Sever (Typical)
|
12-18 Hours
|
<2 hours
|
|
Media Capacity (native)
|
DLT - Max: ~110 GB
|
Max: 500 GB
|
|
Ability to Rotate & Archive Offsite?
|
Yes
|
Yes, with Olixir's shock protection
|
|
Installation Time
|
Hours
|
Under 30 minutes via plug-and-play USB 2.0 or Firewire.
|
|
Expandable to Larger Capacity?
|
No
|
Yes: Infinitely expandable via higher capacity hard drives; daisy-chainable
|
|
Cleaning
|
Yes
|
No
|
|
Warranty
|
1 Year (Typical)
|
3 Years
|
|
Cost
|
Most midrange
110 GB tape backup
drives with 5 tapes:
$3000-$7000
|
Backup-to-portable 250 GB
drive kit: $2999
(Comes with 5 transportable hard drives, chassis that holds drives, and professional software)
|
Who Is Using Transportable Hard Drives Instead Of USB Tape Drives?
Through its production of transportable hard drives, Olixir has grown a worldwide customer base that uses its transportable hard drive solutions to replace USB tape drives for both backup and disaster recovery. One IT consulting company owner who regularly uses Olixir drives for backup solutions states:
� I can't tell you how many headaches your products have alleviated for us. As far as I'm concerned, there are no other external hard drive solutions that even come close and we have tried several different solutions. �
• Jason Ballard, NetSignalz.com, Illinois
FREE Report
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