SpectraLogic Completes Gator Product Line With Robotic Library

Tape library maker SpectraLogic Corp. next week will launch a new product, the Spectra 20000, which will fit into its Gator midlevel and high-end series.

Positioned between the Spectra 12000 and 64000, the 20000 can hold 52 terabytes of compressed data on 200 slots of 100GB-capacity, 12MB-per-second, AIT (advanced intelligent tape)-3 cartridges.

The robotic library fills out the Boulder, Colo., companys product line, according to company officials.

"Weve now completed a full offering for our customers," said Product Manager Sharon Isaacson.

Isaacson said the company expects iSCSI support to be added to the 20000 early next year.

Also new from SpectraLogic, and available now, are Fibre Channel and dual Gigabit Ethernet connections for all three libraries. The Fibre Channel will be upgraded to 2G bps later this year, Isaacson said.

AIT-4 cartridges, which have 200GB capacity at 24MB-per-second speeds, will be supported in the fall of next year, Isaacson said.

From there, "theres a couple of ways a company can move," said Bob Abraham, president of Freeman Reports, a research company in Ojai, Calif. SpectraLogic could upgrade its hardware and microcode to support half-inch formats such as digital linear tape, at 320GB capacity and 32MB per second, or linear tape-open, at 200GB capacity and 20MB to 40MB per second.

However, Abraham said, the probable next step for the company is an upgrade to the half-inch format of Super-AIT, which holds 500GB accessed at 30MB per second.

SpectraLogic officials declined to comment on future plans.

The Spectra 20000 fits in 14U (24.5 inches) of standard rack space; its price ranges from about $50,000 to $114,000. The upcoming 2G-bps Fibre Channel option will cost slightly more, Isaacson said.

Computer Associates International Inc., Legato Systems Inc. and Veritas Software Corp. have certified the product to work with their backup software, Isaacson said.

The library is run by SpectraLogics Tape Automation Operating System, or TAOS, which users manage by touch-screen, by serial connection or by network.

FTP and SNMP are used for updates, and the Network Data Management Protocol is used for file-level storage management.

The libraries can also attach to servers directly.