Tape Storage Adoption for Data Archiving, Long Term Data Retention Grows

Overland Storage recently conducted a nationwide survey of its customers in the United States to learn more about how they use Overland tape libraries. The results of the survey indicate that tape storage remains a critical component of the data center. Half of respondents said that their business could not manage without tape storage and 56 percent of respondents said they keep data on disk for a month or less before moving it to tape.

Nearly three-quarters (74 percent) of respondents are using tape storage for onsite backups and 63 percent are using tape storage for offsite backups and disaster recovery, according to survey results, and 80 percent of respondents do not believe that archiving to the cloud will replace tape storage.

"Industry analyst research, Overland Storage customer survey data and the overall growth in the tape storage marketplace confirm that tape-based storage remains a critical part of any data protection strategy due to its cost of ownership, portability, lower energy consumption, long shelf life, robust design and compact footprint advantages," said Peri Grover, director of marketing for tape solutions at Overland Storage. Fueling the current expansion of the tape storage market is an increased demand for flexible solutions designed to address rapid business data growth combined with the increasing acknowledgment of tape's cost-effectiveness over de-duplicated disk, the report noted. 

Research from analysts at IT research firm Enterprise Strategy Group also indicates tape is the predominant storage media used for data protection due to its portability and, from an acquisition cost perspective, its price. As tape capacities continue to out-ship disk capacities and "the use of tape now dominates archiving over internal disk, external disk or cloud... tape's lead is expected to grow during the next five years, demonstrating 45 percent annual growth by 2015."

Overland also announced the availability of NEO 600s and NEO 800s, two additions to its line of automated tape libraries aimed at offering more choices for tape deployments in the tape storage market. NEO 600s and NEO 800s are designed to help solve data storage protection challenges. The NEO 600s packs up to 216TB of backup and archive capacity into a 6U form factor while NEO 800s provides up to 244TB in an 8U form factor.

In addition to high-capacity storage, the 600s and 800s feature multi-drive support. Utilizing LTO-5 tape drive technology, NEO 600s and 800s allows businesses to leverage the efficiencies of new linear tape file system (LTFS) technology. The NEO 600s and NEO 800s solutions are available with a starting of $14,499 and are included in Overland's "Trade Up and Save" promotion, which offers customers up to $2,000 in cash rebates for a limited time.

Overland Storage Announces Integration of IBM LTO Drives in Their NEO Series LTO Tape Libraries

Overland Storage today announced they are integrating IBM Linear Tape-Open (LTO) technology into the company's line of NEO tape libraries. With over 100,000 NEO libraries installed worldwide, Overland Storage is recognized as a leader in high-capacity data backup and archive for enterprise data center environments and this offering further enhances both Overland's NEO S-Series and NEO E-Series backup and archive solutions.

"Our relationship with IBM is part of a multi-year agreement that we believe gives us the ability to enhance our data protection product set, as well as provide solutions designed to meet the growing demands for data archive," said Eric Kelly, President and CEO of Overland Storage. "While the integration of IBM LTO technology benefits our NEO Series product line, we are particularly excited about the opportunities the overall relationship will bring to our business, including the ability to leverage IBM's worldwide logistics and supply chain," said Mr. Kelly.

NEO E-Series libraries provide users with storage capacities ranging from 24TB to 3PB, and are focused on delivering flexible, robust backup and archive solutions that deliver superior cost of ownership. NEO S-Series libraries deliver storage capacities ranging from 19TB to 144TB and are designed to provide compact, cost-effective backup and archive solutions. The transition to IBM tape technology in both the NEO S-Series and NEO E-Series solutions is effective April 2012.

Reliable, Scalable Data Storage For The Long Haul

Finding a way to store data in a safe and accessible way has left many corporations perplexed. This is especially true as companies try to accommodate data growth, tight regulatory requirements, and distributed environments.

Overland Storage’s NEO E Series now take advantage of LTO-5 technology, the latest innovation in high-capacity storage. With LTO-5 technology, overall performance is doubled, and data throughput is increased by 20% when compared to LTO-4

The NEO E Series consists of the NEO 2000E, NEO 4000E, and NEO 8000 enterprise-level tape archive and storage library systems. The E Series offers between 45TB and 3PB of capacity, 30 to 1,000 cartridge slots, and one to 24 tape drives, and it is capable of data transfer rates up to 24TB/hour.

The NEO E Series features continuous operation, remote failover, and the ability to expand on demand. It also supports several connectivity options, including SCSI, iSCSI, and native Fibre Channel.

“The NEO E Series products offer the ultimate in cost of ownership by providing affordable high-capacity, high-performance data storage that provides reliable access to data with minimized management, maintenance, and service costs,” says Peri Grover, director of product management at Overland Storage.

“The NEO E Series products provide superior density with up to three times the capacity in the amount of physical space, which minimizes the use of costly data center space,” Grover says.

Additionally, NEO E Series products provide redundancy features, including redundant robotics, for environments that require scaled capacity and performance. They also offer twice the reliability of the competition, ensuring dependable access to mission-critical data, Grover says.

With the NEO Upgrade And Save Program, current NEO customers can upgrade their existing NEO systems and receive up to $12,000 in cash rebates.