Spectra Logic Launches LTO-6 Tape Drive Pre-Purchase Program

Spectra Logic announced the worldwide launch of its Linear Tape Open Generation 6 (LTO-6) tape drive pre-purchase program.  With general availability of LTO-6 tape drives and media expected in 2012, customers can now join the LTO 6 pre-purchase program and receive LTO-5 drives today for use until LTO-6 drives become available. Once LTO-6 is released, pre-purchase customers will be at the top of the initial shipment list to receive new LTO-6 drives from Spectra.

This unique program from Spectra Logic enables customers to make tape library purchases to meet today’s data storage needs while ensuring the investment is future-proofed with an upgrade to the next generation drive and media technology once available.

For Spectra’s larger libraries, including the T-Finity, T950, T680, T380, and T200, LTO-6 tape drives will include native 8 gigabit (Gb) fiber channel interfaces that are compatible with existing 2Gb, 4Gb and 8Gb fiber channel switches and host bus adapters. For the Spectra T50e and T120 libraries, LTO-6 tape drives will come in either 8Gb fiber channel or 6Gb SAS interfaces. LTO-6 will offer a storage capacity of up to 8.0 terabytes (compressed, or 3.2 TB native) – more than double the capacity of the previous generation, and expected transfer rates of up to 525 megabytes per second (compressed, or 210 MB/s native).

LTO-6 drives are designed with backwards-compatible read-and-write capability with LTO-5 cartridges, and backward read capabilities with LTO-4 and LTO-5 cartridges, to ensure investment protection and to ease deployment. In addition, LTO-6 drives will be fully compatible with Spectra’s BlueScale software and features, including BlueScale Encryption and Key Management, Spectra’s Media Lifecycle Management (MLM), Data Integrity Verification, drive-level AES-256 bit encryption key generation, and WORM media capabilities.

“Spectra Logic’s LTO-6 pre-purchase program will allow our customers to seamlessly and economically scale the capacity of their storage backup and archive infrastructures,” said Dave Hiechel, president and CEO of EAGLE Software, a U.S.-based Elite SpectraEDGE channel partner.  “Many of our customers took advantage of Spectra’s industry-first LTO-5 advance purchase program, and we are excited about this similar offering for LTO-6. When LTO-6 becomes available, our customers will have the libraries and infrastructure already in place, and will immediately recognize dramatic capacity and performance increases from this new technology within the same data center footprint they use today.”

“Once again Spectra is ahead of the pack with its LTO-6 pre-purchase program, which allows customers to drive forward with new tape library hardware today rather than delaying purchasing decisions until new technology becomes available,” said Keith Warburton, director, Global Distribution, a SpectraEDGE value add channel distributor based in the United Kingdom. “With Spectra Logic’s exclusive LTO-6 advance purchase program our resellers’ customers can future-proof their storage requirements, lower their total cost of data protection, and greatly increase their capacity and performance in the same or smaller foot print.”

“Spectra Logic’s LTO-6 pre-purchase program offers customers confidence that investments they make today are future proofed. There is no risk in implementing today’s LTO-5 technology when a pre-purchase program for LTO-6 guarantees cost, priority shipment and seamless upgrades when available. LTO-6 Pre-purchase customers will be among the first to gain the capacity and performance advantages of LTO-6 drive technology,” said Molly Rector, Spectra Logic’s chief marketing officer. “LTO’s roadmap provides consistent, state-of-the-art technological advancements in tape reliability, capacity and transfer rate capabilities. These advancements leverage the inherent advantages of tape technology, and enable customers to keep pace with their ever-growing data storage requirements – reliably and cost effectively.”

Spectra Logic’s pre-purchase program is available immediately to customers and channel partners worldwide for Spectra’s complete line of T-series tape libraries. The Spectra T-Finity, T950, T680, T380, T200, T120, and T50e libraries are all LTO-6 ready and eligible for pre-purchase.  Participants in Spectra’s LTO-6 pre-purchase program will be the first to receive LTO-6 drives when they become available. LTO-6 drives and media are expected to ship in the second half of 2012.

Spectra Logic shipped its first T950 tape library in October 2004 with LTO-2 tape drives/media, and began shipping LTO-5 tape drives/media in June 2010. The LTO Ultrium “open format” technology provides a trusted, long-term roadmap that currently extends to the eighth generation of LTO technology, and offers users the flexibility of multiple sources for their drives and media.

To learn more, register here for Spectra Logic’s live webinar “Trends in Tape: Looking beyond LTO-5 with LTO-6 and LTFS,” to be held on Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 10:00am MST.