Hi Bud, You might want to check out the following site. http://www.performancecomputing.com/features/9912sr.shtml It lists a variety of tape technologies and specs and when some of the new stuff is slated for release. As far as who will win the tape technology wars, I won't even pretend to know, but what I'm seeing out in the real world right now, is DLT7000/8000 and AIT-2. I personally think that Exabyte destroyed their credibility with the first version of Mammoth. It was something like three years late. They made announcements like every three months,for years. It's coming, it's coming. When it finally did show up, nobody gave a damn, because everyone had bought DLT by then. I know a lot of customer's are waiting for Quantum's SuperDLT due out at the end of this year, because they are already using DLT and have found the DLT7000 to be reliable, once Quantum improved their "dropped leader" problem. Sony's AIT-2, also has a good rep and is being made available in more of the various libraries. I think one of the real determining factors is the number of library vendors who choose to support the various tape technologies. Because of the massive growth in data, fewer sites are using stand-alone drives and more customers are choosing libraries with backup software to manage them. Right now the majority of library vendors I know about, all have at least DLT support and more are also starting to offer AIT-2. That is one factor in determining the future. Sorry this message rambled on so long.

-----Original Message----- From: Bud Greasley [mailto:bud@algorithmics.com] Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2000 2:30 PM To: toasters@mathworks.com Subject: Tape technologies: off topic

Any opinions out there on what tape technology will dominate in the next year? Mammoth 2 is soon to be released, and promises to have better capacity and performance than DLT (7000/8000).

Super DLT is supposedly coming this quarter, and will leap frog Mammoth 2.

Any insights welcome.

Sorry if this is off topic. I figure, you folks have the storage, you have to back it up ;-).

---------------------------- Bud Greasley Manager, NCIT Algorithmics Inc. Phone: 416.217.4202 Fax: 416.971.6263 Email: bud@algorithmics.com