Disk-To-Disk Backup — It's Also About Tape

Tape has been a central fixture in corporate data centers for the last 50 years, serving as the primary data backup-and-restore media. But shrinking backup windows, the need to recover critical applications quickly, the emergence of Serial ATA technology, and declining disk costs have combined to push tape out of the spotlight in favor of disk. After all, backing up directly to disk may speed up the backup process and also reduce restore time for individual files.

However, while disk has received a great deal of attention lately as the new backup-and-restore media, it should not be viewed as an all-out replacement for tape but as a complement to the existing backup process.

Those who argue that users should replace all tape cartridges within their data centers with hard disk drives fail to remember the superior attributes of tape drives and media. First, tape is removable. Second, tape is transportable. Third, tape media has been constantly improved since the appearance of round tape reels in the 1950s. And finally, tape is still the most cost effective storage media—not just in a $/GB comparison.