Sun Microsystems touts virtualisation for tape drives

Sun's StorageTek tape drive systems will have a new virtualisation manager

Sun Microsystems has revealed plans to add one of the newest storage technologies into one of the oldest storage methods still in use.

The company said on Tuesday that it will update its line of StorageTek tape drive systems with a new virtualisation manager.

StorageTek Virtual Systems Manager will allow companies to manage and operate data stored on tape backup for use in tasks such as archiving and disaster recovery.

Sun said that the latest version of the StorageTek drives would support tape capacities of up to 1TB, and overall system capacity of some 90TB.

The vendor hopes that the systems will appeal to companies looking to handle growing capacity while navigating the economic crisis. Sun's tape storage units have maintained strong growth rates in recent months.

"As the amount of user-generated data continues to grow, there is a need for customers to implement storage solutions that can store more in a shrinking footprint," said Jon Benson, Sun's senior vice president of storage.

"The use of Sun's tape virtualisation offers customers up to a 10 times cost saving versus traditional storage products, reduced management time, less physical systems needed to store data, and risk mitigation through the industry's best disaster recovery options."