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IBM Prepares 100-Terabyte Tape Drives

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the your-base-has-been-digitized dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "It's a well-known fact that we're living in an era of data explosion, and that it's not about to stop. So it's not really surprising that IBM researchers are eyeing 100T-byte tape drive. Yes, you read correctly. They want to increase the capacity storage of their largest units by 250 times, from 400 GB to 100 TB. In order to achieve this goal, they're borrowing "nanopatterning" techniques derived from the microprocessor division. Today, the size of a tape track is about 10 microns. They want to reduce it to 0.5 micron -- or 500 nanometers -- in about five years. IBM doesn't really say when a 100-Terabyte tape drive will be available. But more importantly, the company doesn't say a word about future data transfer rates, which today reach a 80 MB/s. Read this overview for more comments about this problem of data transfer rates."

10 of 137 comments (clear)

  1. I bet it's worth the money... by agent+dero · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ...I mean, I'm sure I could back up my entire life to one of these things... ;)

    Seriously, imagine backing up every single thing you've ever heard, seen, or read. 40TB maybe? ;)

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    1. Re:I bet it's worth the money... by MP3Chuck · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Well ... 74 minutes of stereo 16-bit 44.1khz audio is about 650MB. 8.783MB/minute. For the sake of argument, let's assume a 100 year lifespan. 100 years = 52,594,876.6 minutes. 461,982,024.189 MB (440.580 TB) for 100 years of CD-quality audio. Convert to 128 kb/s MP3 and you're looking at about 44TB, give or take. (128kbps .MP3 is about 1/10 size of a .wav).

      So in a sense you are quite right! :)

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    2. Re:I bet it's worth the money... by MP3Chuck · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Gah ... didn't want to reply to my own post but I was too hasty in hitting Submit. That 40TB only applies to audio. Obviously video compression would be quite a bit larger. Somebody want to do the math?

      --
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    3. Re:I bet it's worth the money... by canofbutter · · Score: 2, Interesting

      hmmm 100TB, so 100000000MB (if they market it the way a Hard Drive company would), at the average of 200MB for every 24 minutes (based on my collection of stuff) what would put us at about 22 years of constant video...

    4. Re:I bet it's worth the money... by nyri · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I'm sure I could back up my entire life to one of these things

      I heard that the information flux you receive trough your sensory devices (eyes, ears, etc.) is 20Gb/s. This value is purely anecdotal but it does sound right. For the sake of the argument, let's pretend that the value is correct.

      Let's assume that you live 100years=3 153 600 000s =~ 3Gs. This means that experience being you can be stored to 60Pb. Of cause we need to know your genetic make-up but that is peanuts compared to 60Pb. 60Pb is 75 100TB tapes. This means that if you can compress your sensory data to 1/75=1.4% from the original size, you can, in fact, store your whole life to one of these tapes.

      The compression rate is, in my humble opinion, reachable. First of all, people spend most of their life sleeping. Second of all people ignore most of the data they receive. And third, the perception of the world is far from chaotic and therefore compressible.

      So yes, you are correct: These tapes are capable to store entire human life, if we come up with a mean to record it.

  2. Data transfer rates by IO+ERROR · · Score: 5, Interesting
    We have to solve the problem of data transfer rates. It is patently silly to wait three days for your 100TB backup to finish.

    I don't know where the solution here will come from, but I expect for the meantime this kind of large capacity will be used more for archival storage of old data than for backup.

    Is there any research out there into the data transfer rate problem?

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  3. Re:It's about time by GeekDork · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It'd be about time for the tape drives and media to become affordable. Capacity isn't really a problem for normal end-users. What's lacking is drives in the 40-80GB range (DAT anyone?) that don't cost an arm and a leg. Tapes are available in sizes that should even be enough for smaller publishing offices.

    If you need to backup >100GB on tape for personal use, you most likely have a serious legal problem or a porn collection that I'd want to see (the collection, not the problem).

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  4. Yeah, lose 100TB of data in a single backup by melted · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Now that's an awesome possibility. It's about time storage-related companies start worrying about reliability and longevity of their storage solutions instead of trying to impress everyone with capacity.

  5. 0.05 micron tracks by budgenator · · Score: 2, Interesting

    hard to imagine a 0.05 micron track on anything flexible being readable.

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  6. Re:Roland Piquepaille Spam and Slashdot by fermion · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I just wish i had mod points. This seems to classic sour grapes from a competitor. This is the only thing that would explain the anonymous coward posts. Is this Roland guy so entrenched in media that we are afraid of him?

    Anyway, cribbing articles into a collection is an age old tradition. There are very few original articles, and people seldom use 'orignal sources' Often the analysis provided by secondary soruces is useful. Ignorance and heeding to complaints is also an age old tradition. I am not familiar with this roland guy, and obviously the poster is embarrassed enough so as to hide, and I am neither defending or attacking either. It is just that we are talking about private companies. If there is a connection between Roland and Slashdot, go out and find it post the expose. All you have now is that the Slashdot editors favor a particular news repackager. As you say, many of the articles generate much discussion, and some don't, which is normal. Of the few posts I have had accepted, some have generated discussion and others have not. The /. editors decisions may negatively affect your profits, as they certainly do many others, but you have not shown any unethical behavior.

    So, i suggest that you go out an prove that unethical behavior is happening. First, I suggest that you hire a private dick to servile the persons in question. See if you can discover any connections. Perhaps they are school buddies or in-laws? Perhaps they are lovers? Who knows.

    Second, scan all /, user accounts. Find out how many competing stories were submitted. Were the competitors submitted after or before. Were the write-ups of lesser or greater quality. It could be that roland provides professional write-ups, free of the dreaded grammar and spelling errors. This analysis in itself could provide a simple sanity check, which is why you are unlikely to complete it.

    Third, post as a real user. At this point you are just some crack head who does not know how to positively contribute to the greater social good.

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