Revision 04012005 Getting the most performance from your tape technology. Exabyte  tape  storage  products  include  VXA™  and  Linear  Tape  Open  (LTO®)  Ultrium  format.    VXA  and  LTO  Ultrium  have significant  performance  gains  over  previous  tape  technologies.  In  order  to  realize  the  increased  performance  capability  the infrastructure  supporting  this  technology  must  be  capable  of  providing  comparably  high  data  rates.  Otherwise,  full performance  and  reliability  may  be  impacted.  Listed  below  are  topics  and  best  practice  to  consider  when  supporting  the capabilities of Exabyte VXA and LTO Ultrium tape technologies. Tape Technology Performance Capabilities VXA-1, Up to 33 GB Native Capacity, 40 MBps buffer data rate, 3 MBps native transfer rate to tape. VXA-2, Up to 80 GB Native Capacity, 80 MBps buffer data rate, 6 MBps native transfer rate to tape. VXA-3, Up to 160 GB Native Capacity, 80 MBps buffer data rate, 12 MBps native transfer rate to tape. LTO-1, Up to 100 GB Native Capacity, 80 MBps buffer data rate, 15 MBps native transfer rate to tape. LTO-2, Up to 200 GB Native Capacity, 160 MBps buffer data rate, 26-35 MBps native transfer rate to tape. LTO-3, Up to 400 GB Native Capacity, 160 MBps buffer data rate, 80 MBps native transfer rate to tape. CPU Processor and Bus Speed When the data path is routed through the server as in SCSI or Fibre Channel direct attached architecture higher CPU speeds and increased bus widths will support increases in tape performance.  Dedicating a server to manage backup operations allows the full performance of the CPU and bus to support tape operations. High Speed Dual processors, 64bit PCI-X bus architectures are highly recommended to support the high transfer rates.   Interface The VXA  and LTO drives include a high-speed interface.  Connecting drives to at least a comparable performance interface is recommended  to  allow  data  to  flow  into  to  and  from  the  tape  drive  at  its  fullest  capability.  Consider  the  entire  data  path  and bottlenecks that do not perform at least the specified buffer data rate.   Disk Drives High rotational speed disk drives and disk array’s with high spindle counts supply and receive data at higher rates. Archiving to tape from these resources will support higher data rates to tape drives. Network When the data path includes networking gigabit speeds are the minimum standard recommended for Tape. Best practice would be to stage data to be written to tape on disk storage that would eliminate the network from the data path, like a disk to disk to tape implementation.     Software There are many backup software options to choose from when planning for a data protection solution. Software that includes enterprise level functionality is better suited to maximize tape performance.  Disk to disk to tape, virtual tape library, and large image and Serverless backup functionality are all examples that would support performance tape technology.   Device Tuning Most backup software and operating system command line archive tools allow setting write and read data block sizes. The rule of thumb is to set the device to the highest block size the device is capable of without limiting performance. Since differences exist across the range of installations pre production testing with different block sizes should be implemented to benchmark the best setting for a given installation.   Which Tape technology is right for you?  Green=Prefered , Yellow=Caution, Red=Not Supported Category   VXA1 VXA2 VXA3 LTO1 LTO2 LTO3 80 MB/s, 252 GB/h 80MB/s 35 MB/s, 126 GB/h 35Mb/s 35MB/s 15 MB/s, 54 GB/h 15MB/s 12 MB/s, 43.2 GB/h 12MB/s 6 MB/s, 21.6 GB/h 6MB/s 3 MB/s, 10.8 GB/h   3MB/s Ultra (40MB/s) SCSI Interface 10/100 Ethernet Network Data Path to Tape Single Disk Drive   32 bit CPU (132 MB/s bandwidth)   Ultra 160 LVD SCSI Interface Ultra 320 LVD SCSI Interface   1 Gb/s Fibre Channel Interface 2 Gb/s Fibre Channel Interface 64 bit CPU (528 MBps bandwidth) Gigabit or Faster Ethernet Network Data Path High Spindle Count Disk Array (RAID/JBOD)   Software with basic backup and restore ability   Disk to Disk to Tape (Ability to stage to disk or virtual tape) Serverless Backup Software  (Fibre Channel SAN Required)