One Tape Backs Up the Biggest Hard Drives

The need for a big, fast backup solution--such as Ecrix's VXA-1 tape drive--has never been greater. Hard drive capacities for business workstations and small servers keep growing to handle an apparently endless flood of data. And threats abound, with an epidemic of e-mail viruses adding to data killers like operator error, software corruption, and mechanical breakdowns. In this environment, an easily automated backup system is a must--especially if your business runs off your PC. Tape is the only removable media with the capacity to efficiently handle full system backups on one cartridge. But high-capacity tape solutions have always been expensive--a sticking point for people with small office and home office applications. Travan 20 drives are popular and affordable at about $300 to $500 each, but their cartridges hold only about 20GB of compressed data--not a lot when 40GB hard drives now cost less than $300. DDS-4 drives start at about $1000 and back up about 40GB of compressed data per tape cartridge--but even DDS-4 can't back up today's biggest hard drives. Now there's another choice in this (admittedly high) price range that offers a whole lot more capacity.

Ecrix is the new kid on the block with its new VXA-1 tape drive. The drive is extremely fast, and it promises greater reliability than DDS-4. It backs up about 66GB of compressed data (33GB uncompressed) for $1149. The external single-ended SCSI-2 unit we tested includes one data tape cartridge and a cleaning cartridge. If you're not interested in the media or cleaning cartridge, you can get an internal SCSI-2 model for $899, which is not an unreasonable price for a business buyer.

Backup Innovation

The VXA-1 offers several advantages over other tape drives and all stem from a key innovation--writing data in small packets as opposed to the contiguous stream tape drives typically use. Since data is broken up into smaller chunks, the VXA-1 doesn't have to stop, rewind, and realign when data flow is interrupted; instead, the drive simply slows or pauses until the flow picks up, drastically reducing wear on the tape. (Unlike other current tape drives, the VXA-1 can vary the read and write speed of the tape as needed.) Furthermore, it's possible for the VXA-1 to read a small packet of data that may have strayed off the center of the tape; it's harder for drives using other technologies to read large streams of data that have become skewed. The VXA-1 can overscan the entire width of the tape for stray packets should the need arise. The VXA-1 also includes a read-after-write data-verification function that is typically included with drives intended for servers and other mission-critical systems.

Ecrix says the media used by the drive is also better than that used in standard tape technologies. The media has a pure cobalt substrate that's bonded to the tape in a vacuum, and then coated with a diamondlike covering (DLC). The process doesn't use the chemical agents required by older techniques. According to the company, the result is a tape cartridge that's far less abrasive and more reliable than those used in older technologies. Ecrix has so much confidence in the durability of its media that it quotes the life expectancy of a cartridge as being 20,000 full passes. (In contrast, HP rates its DDS media life as greater than 2000 passes.)