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New-Tech Tape Drive Debuts

Ecrix's $1295 VXA-1 exploits new technologies to store as much as 66GB per tape.

Stan Miastkowski, special to PC World

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Ecrix this week announced the VXA-1 tape drive, a new SCSI-2 device designed specifically for servers in small-to-medium-size businesses. The drive uses a combination of three new technologies that the company claims optimizes backup speed and ensures that stored data can always be accessed and restored.

Available in May, the VXA-1 drive includes built-in hardware compression, and holds up to 66GB on a tape. It retails for $1295 for an internal unit and $1495 for an external. Tapes sell for $79.95 each, and smaller capacity (24GB) tape cartridges are available for $29.95 each.

Backup speed, according to the company, is up to 6MB per second, about three times that of a comparably priced DDS-3 DAT tape backup drive (which holds up to 24GB on a tape).

A Discrete Approach

Ecrix says a technology called Discrete Packet Format (DCF) is the key to the VXA-1's advantages. Instead on writing data to the tape in large blocks as most existing tape technologies do, DCF writes data in small packets, much the way it's handled on the Internet or across networks.

Packets are written by two pairs of overlapping heads, with the second pair immediately checking the data for integrity as soon as it's written. Writing data in packets allows the tape mechanism to speed up and slow down as the flow of data from the PC changes, a common occurrence during the backup process. Other tape technologies run at a single speed, having to start, stop, and sometimes reverse to keep up with the flow of data. Ecrix claims its procedure reduces wear and tear on both tapes and the drive mechanism.

Finally, according to Ecrix, OverScan Operation (OSO), coupled with packet storage, allows the drive to restore data regardless of the condition of the tape or even if the tape heads get out of alignment. The company also claims OSO also increases restore speed by eliminating the "backhitching" common in other tape drives, where the drive has to stop and reverse to re-read data. And Ecrix says OSO also guarantees full interchangeability of tapes between different VXA-1 drives. In other high-capacity tape drives, data cartridges can usually only be read by the drive that originally recorded them.

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