Blending the past with the present: compatibility of traditional tape storage and cloud technology?

In the ever-evolving landscape of data storage, traditional tape and disk vendors are exploring hybrid solutions. These innovative approaches leverage multiple tiered cloud architectures to cater to the growing demands of businesses.

The Chief Information Officers (CIOs) find themselves at a crossroads. They are faced with a decision: to concentrate on a single recovery product that may not entirely meet their needs or to seek a fit-for-purpose hybrid data center. This dilemma arises as organizations increasingly opt for cloud storage and backup over tape.

The shift away from tape is driven by changes in business nature, more sophisticated pressures on backup and recovery products, and stricter compliance. However, tape, a backup medium that has been in use for over half a century, still holds its ground in certain applications, particularly sequential processing ones, where it outperforms disk storage.

Cloud storage, on the other hand, offers numerous advantages. It is scalable, much more flexible than tape, and provides potentially unlimited storage capacity at an affordable cost. Deduplication and compression techniques in cloud storage make efficient use of network bandwidth, further enhancing its appeal.

One of the most significant advantages of cloud storage is immediate access and recovery from a central console. This feature is particularly valuable when recovery is the primary focus, as it should be when considering data backup solutions.

These hybrid solutions aim to offer a low-cost, reliable, scalable data protection solution with challenging Recovery Point Objectives (RPOs) and Recovery Time Objectives (RTOs). They strive to strike a balance between the cost-effectiveness of tape and the speed and flexibility of new storage technologies.

Amazon Web Services and Google Nearline storage are examples of low-cost cloud storage options with pay-as-you-go subscription pricing. The industry standardization of tape makes it compatible with these new technologies, easing its integration into a hybrid data center.

The benefits of getting the balance right between tape and new storage technologies lie in both cost savings and the actual recovery of data. A properly balanced tape and cloud hybrid offers more cost-efficient recovery, ensuring businesses can meet their data protection needs without breaking the bank.

CIOs are facing greater demands as they need to balance tape, a traditional backup and recovery medium, with faster new storage technologies to create a cost-efficient hybrid recovery infrastructure. Innovations in media density, performance, and reliability have made tape relevant again in the storage mix.

In conclusion, the future of data storage lies in hybrid solutions that leverage the best of both traditional and modern technologies. By finding the right balance, businesses can ensure both cost savings and reliable data recovery, enabling them to thrive in today's data-driven world.