LTO-5 Keeps Tape Alive

The LTO format is keeping the tape market alive. The LTO Program, which just marked its 10th anniversary, claims that more than 3.3 million LTO tape drives and more than 150 million LTO cartridges have been shipped.

---

“In the third quarter, tape media manufacturers pulled in almost $203 million in revenue, which is expected to actually increase slightly in the next quarter to $205 million, according to the Santa Clara Consulting Group (SCCG). And that’s just from tape cartridges; those figures don’t include revenue from tape drives and libraries.

“All segments (formats) of the tape market are declining rapidly, with one exception: the LTO format.

“LTO tape cartridges accounted for more than 86% ($175 million) of total cartridge shipments in the third quarter, or 6.2 million units, according to SCCG. Sales of LTO-5 (the latest generation, introduced early this year) cartridges were up 100% in Q3 vs. Q2, and accounted for 5% of unit shipments and 15% of revenues. LTO-4 cartridges accounted for 48% of unit shipments and 46% of the total LTO revenues. Even the LTO-3 segment grew in the third quarter (up 3%).

“One reason that users stick with tape is that it’s still way cheaper than disk. Those LTO-5 cartridges cost only four cents per GB (assuming 2:1 compression).

“According to a study conducted by The Clipper Group research and consulting firm, the cost ratio of storing 1TB of data on SATA disk vs. LTO-4 tape is 23:1. Even if you compare the costs of archiving data on a VTL with data deduplication vs. tape, the cost ratio is 5:1, according to the Clipper Group study.

For more, read "Who Says tape is Dead?" at InfoStor.

Follow Enterprise Storage Forum on Twitter.