Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2000/02/28/storagetek_unveils_fibre_channel_products/

StorageTek unveils fibre channel products

New kit aimed at SAN market

By Sean Fleming

Posted in On-Prem, 28th February 2000 14:08 GMT

StorageTek has launched two products that push it into the fibre channel tape storage market. The first is the 9840FC tape drive, the fibre channel version of the 9840 drive. StorageTek says the 9840FC "can move data at up to 20 megabytes per second with 2:1 compression, and can approach 40 megabytes per second at 4:1 compression with highly compressible data." As a native fibre channel product the 9840FC has a maximum distance limit of 500 metres and is being aimed at the SAN market. Cartridges for the 9840 can store up to 20 gigabytes. The second SAN-oriented product from StorageTek is the L180, a native fibre channel tape library. It has 10 DLT drives and up to 174 usable slots and is able to perform automated performance checks without the need of a backup server polling it first. StorageTek's northern Europe multi-platform marketing manager (and candidate for world's longest job title), Martin Medhurst, said the speed of the 9840FC's robot would make significant changes to data retrieval. "The 9840 loads in just three seconds, it can find its first piece of data eight seconds later and takes just another four seconds to find its first piece of media. Consider what happens in the case of a hospital where a doctor might want to find a patient's X-Rays from a previous examination. Where once that could have taken weeks, now it can be a matter of seconds." He also stressed the importance of using fibre channel technology as it gives customers greater flexibility when housing their storage. ®