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You found the backup wrap up.

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Your go-to podcast for all things
backup recovery and cyber recovery.

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In this episode, we tackle the age
old question, is taped backup dead?

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The short answer is no, but it's glory
days are definitely over persona, and

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I will explain why this happened and
how it's probably not what you thought.

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We'll also explain why the cloud giants
like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft

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are the biggest tape users today.

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While showing you the four key
reasons, the tape remains unbeatable.

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If you're thinking tape is outdated,
this episode might just change your mind.

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Let's get into it.

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By the way, if you don't know who I
am, I'm w Curtis Preston, AKA, Mr.

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Backup, and I've been passionate about
backup and recovery for over 30 years.

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Ever since.

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I had to tell my boss that we
had no backups of the production

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database that we had just lost.

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I don't want that to happen to you,
and that's why I do this podcast.

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On this podcast, we turn unappreciated
backup admins into Cyber Recovery Heroes.

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This is the backup wrap up.

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Welcome to the show.

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Hi, I am w Curtis Preston, AKA mis backup.

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And I have with me a guy who has never
actually used the thing that we're

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gonna talk about in this episode.

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Prasanna Malaiyandi, at
least not in production.

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You've maybe touched one.

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I've, I've, I've, I've
touched a offspring of it.

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An offspring.

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What's the offspring of tape?

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A zip drive,

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a zip drive slash jazz drive,

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Zip drive is a bastard.

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Stepchild, not an, not an offspring.

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I guess that's also a sprint, but

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zip drive.

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Wow.

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That, that is a blast from the past.

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and

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a jazz drive.

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I've used both of those in production.

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uh, what's that

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In production

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in production?

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Yeah.

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I actually, you know, the, if you go
back to the first book that I wrote,

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way back in the day.

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in the day, uh, no, actually
I think it's the sec.

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It's the sec. No, it's the
fir, uh, I can't remember.

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Anyway, there's a chapter in the
book, one of the books that I wrote, I

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can't, I can't keep 'em all straight.

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And it's on Linux, bare metal Recovery.

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The Linux Bare metal recovery
chapter in that book is based

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on doing it with a zip drive,

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Hmm.

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um, because it was at that time
an affordable thing that you

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could buy, um, to do, you know,

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Yeah, because the

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drive itself was

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cheap or

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relatively cheap, and the actual
media wasn't that expensive.

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So,

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yeah, yeah.

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Um, and, you know, we can totally
trash talk about the guy that helped

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me write that chapter, which is
my, my good friend Reed, um, who

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I think listens to this podcast.

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Reed.

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And he, um, he took forever
to write that chapter.

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Like I, I, it was like one of
two chapters that I, that I had

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somebody else, uh, help me write.

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And, um, let's just say at some
point I was like, okay, okay.

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The rest of the book is done.

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Dude, you just need to
write these 10 pages.

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Uh, I re

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Anyway, um, and speaking of which, you
know, got the, what, what was that?

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so.

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You have to take it back because
I have touched something similar.

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What, what?

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I told you, you said

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That's not similar.

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That's not tape.

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That's a

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What about, okay, what about
a VHS tape slash a cassette?

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VHS you know, uh, we're, We're gonna
talk about VHS tape in a minute.

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We're gonna talk about VVH

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actually, oh

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wait, so I have

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to go back further.

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So I haven't used it in production,
but way back in the day, I used to

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go with my dad to his office and they
had huge machines with tape drives.

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The big nine track drives.

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You did, uh, like that looked
like reels with the thing.

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Yeah,

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love that you're describing it like,
it's like, like a museum piece.

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Yes.

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Those would be nine track drives.

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So, but did you use them?

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No.

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You, You, okay.

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All right.

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I take it back.

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He has touched the tape.

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Uh, it's just you grew
up in a different era.

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You grew up in it in a different era.

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You also worked at a very sort of,
I'm gonna call it anti tape vendor.

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multiple, anti tape

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multiple, multiple anti tape vendors.

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Yeah, yeah.

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Uh, the meanwhile, I was at the
same time, you know, I'd already

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spent, you know, 10 years or
whatever in deep, you know, in tape.

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Uh, and so that's what we're talking
about in this episode, by the way,

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is we're talking about tape and.

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Uh, you know, why, why
it's still not dead, right?

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Why, why, why, why people think it's
dead, why, why it's still not dead.

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And, um, um, yeah, and that's
what we're gonna talk about.

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And to do that, I'm gonna start with
VHS You, you, you literally, you, um,

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you made, you made me think about that.

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There, there's some really important,
interesting, at least I think they're

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interesting, uh, technical tidbits that
we can take from the design of VHS.

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So there are, um, and, and because I
think a lot of people, when they think

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about tape, they think about VHS, right?

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It's the only tape that many people
have any sort of experience with.

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And, and they're like, oh, it's,
you know, it's this, it's that.

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You know, you have all of these, um.

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Uh, problems a number of things.

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One is the, the, the substrate quality.

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The substrate would be the, the part
of the tape that, that you're actually

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laying the data on is, you know, miles of
difference between a consumer grade VHS

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tape and, um, you know, the, uh, now if
we do go back in time, there was a time

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where there was a tape drive that you
could buy for backups that was exactly

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the same as a, uh, tape drive that
was being used in the consumer world.

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And that would be, um, eight millimeter
video tapes when there was, when

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there was eight millimeter, um,

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Sony I

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video cam.

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Video cameras, right?

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Sony's standard, right.

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Yeah.

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Um, there were, uh, tape drives
that were, that you could buy for.

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The data center that were literally
made on the same, uh, assembly

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line as the, as those tapes.

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but let me go back to VHS
and why, why it's important.

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One of the things that people, when
they think about VHS and they think

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about tape and they think about, oh,
the low quality, et cetera, is they

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think of like the way audio sounds
on some BHS tapes, for example.

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Right?

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And it, it's just a chance to sort of
explain the two different ways that, um,

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data is typically written to, uh, tape.

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There's what's called helical scan

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and there's linear.

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Right.

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Helical scan is where you take the
tape and you wrap it around a drum

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that is mounted at like, at a, at a a
slant, and then, um, it's gonna write

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diagonal stripes across the tape.

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Linear is the closest to linear
that most people would be

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familiar with is a cassette tape,

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like an old school.

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For those of you,

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Hmm.

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they remember what cassette tapes are.

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It, it's a, it's a stationary
head that's writing data across.

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Now why does all this matter?

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In order to get a high signal to noise
ratio, which we want, we want a high

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signal to noise ratio because that means
that we wrote the data correctly to tape.

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In order to get a high signal
to noise ratio, the tape has to

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go across the head very quickly.

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I don't know why that is.

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It's just the law of physics.

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I didn't, I didn't create it, et cetera.

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But that's just the rules.

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So you have two ways to do that.

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One is you can either, um, do the he
scan method, because that way you can,

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the, the speed at which the head is
going across the tape is determined by

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the speed of the spinning drum, right?

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And then the other is you can
do a, a linear, uh, method.

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And the way that you do that is that the,
the tape, the tape has to be drug across

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that recording head very, very fast.

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And when you don't do that, you get a,
you get a low signal to noise ratio.

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Now lemme go back to VHS tape.

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This, this is way before your
time, but there was a time

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when you had VHS tape and I.

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Y if the reason VHS took off in
the US market, uh, was two reasons.

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One is that, um, um, they bought
somebody, somebody bought the entire

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back catalog of everything, and you
could only get older movies on VHS.

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You couldn't get it on Betamax.

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Right?

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The other reason why it took off
was that the tapes were much bigger

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and you could fit so much more.

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And one of the reasons for that was
that they would, they would slow

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down the rate at which the tape
moved and it would, um, uh, you, you

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could fit so much more on the tape.

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remember that they used

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Do you remember this?

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I, I remember this because there
were different modes when you're

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recording where you could say,
extended, right, normal, or

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whatever it was, and like, it would be
like one hour, one and a half hours or

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two hours, or maybe it was like two,
three and six hours on a single VHS tape.

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Yeah, exactly.

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Okay.

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Now why does that matter?

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Again, this is only gonna speak to some
of the older folks that are gonna remember

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this, but when they first started doing
that, if you chose ep right, the extended

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play, the audio sounded like crap.

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Okay.

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It really did.

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Like you had to choose, do I want
to fit a three hour movie on the

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tape, or do I want to be able to
understand a three hour movie?

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Right.

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Those were your choices.

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Three hour movie.

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Three hour movie.

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Yeah.

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What they did was that they moved the
audio head onto the spinning drum.

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Hmm.

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00:11:19,258 --> 00:11:23,758
And so now the audio is being recorded
at the same speed because when you did

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ep, the tape was crawling across the
recording head, which was fine for the

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00:11:28,348 --> 00:11:33,298
video because the, the drum still spun
and the video was fine, but the audio

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sounded like crap because as I was trying
to explain, tape has to go across a

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recording head quickly in order to get a
high signal to high signal to noise ratio.

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00:11:45,508 --> 00:11:49,828
In this case, you were getting a low
signal to noise ratio, which results in

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00:11:49,828 --> 00:11:52,858
data loss, which results in bad audio.

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And in the computer world,
that would be very, very bad.

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So what they did in VHS was they just
moved the audio head up to the record,

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up to the spinning drum, and then that
created what was called Hi-Fi VCRs,

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right?

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00:12:08,188 --> 00:12:13,078
So that you could get high fidelity audio
along with your high fidelity video.

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high fidelity at the time.

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00:12:15,358 --> 00:12:16,228
We should clarify.

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the time.

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00:12:17,038 --> 00:12:18,298
At the time, yeah.

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00:12:18,598 --> 00:12:18,958
Yeah.

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00:12:19,438 --> 00:12:27,358
Um, all of that is to just drive home
a really important point when we talk

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00:12:27,358 --> 00:12:32,758
about tape, and that is we're gonna talk
about tape and what's good about it.

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00:12:33,238 --> 00:12:40,288
One of the real challenges with
tape is that it has to go very

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00:12:40,288 --> 00:12:42,868
quickly in order to write the data.

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00:12:43,088 --> 00:12:43,508
Mm-hmm.

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Okay?

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00:12:44,128 --> 00:12:45,778
It cannot go slow.

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That's tape's primary problem.

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We'll get to that.

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00:12:49,678 --> 00:12:55,318
Um, and this just drives
home that point, right?

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That tape does have to go very fast.

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00:12:58,108 --> 00:13:01,198
And by the way, it's
important to understand that.

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00:13:02,068 --> 00:13:05,968
Almost all of the digital tapes
that are taped drives that are

242
00:13:05,968 --> 00:13:08,068
being used in production today.

243
00:13:08,338 --> 00:13:13,978
LTO, the T series from I
from, um, uh, what is it now?

244
00:13:14,098 --> 00:13:19,258
Uh, Oracle, it, was it Sun Source Tag?

245
00:13:19,273 --> 00:13:19,513
Yeah.

246
00:13:19,633 --> 00:13:20,143
Oracle

247
00:13:20,728 --> 00:13:21,088
Yeah.

248
00:13:21,268 --> 00:13:23,248
So I don't even think, I don't
think they're not in production, but

249
00:13:23,248 --> 00:13:26,998
they're still in, use the t series
from, from them, like the T 10 Ks,

250
00:13:27,418 --> 00:13:32,908
the um, and then the IBM series
that are like, start with a three.

251
00:13:33,028 --> 00:13:33,388
Okay.

252
00:13:34,378 --> 00:13:39,448
Those are all linear tapes, meaning
that the tape head stationary and

253
00:13:39,448 --> 00:13:42,778
the tape is brought across it, which
means that that tape helps to go very,

254
00:13:42,778 --> 00:13:44,878
very fast when it's recording data.

255
00:13:44,938 --> 00:13:46,108
Otherwise you get data loss.

256
00:13:46,438 --> 00:13:46,768
Okay.

257
00:13:47,668 --> 00:13:49,858
It's just a really important, it's
just we, you start, you brought up

258
00:13:49,858 --> 00:13:54,598
VHS, I just thought I'd use that to
illustrate this really important point.

259
00:13:54,658 --> 00:13:56,428
I hope everyone found that interesting.

260
00:13:56,428 --> 00:14:00,553
I. If not, we're 10 minutes
into the thing and I just bored

261
00:14:00,883 --> 00:14:03,853
but, I think another important
thing, so we've also covered a

262
00:14:03,853 --> 00:14:08,953
lot of the technical aspects of
tape and prior podcast episodes.

263
00:14:08,953 --> 00:14:11,338
We even had, uh, what was the guy's name?

264
00:14:12,493 --> 00:14:13,933
Joe Jurneke.

265
00:14:14,503 --> 00:14:16,393
Joe on talking about that as well.

266
00:14:16,393 --> 00:14:19,633
So if you wanna really geek out on
tape, we'll add links in the show

267
00:14:19,843 --> 00:14:21,073
You know, add some links.

268
00:14:21,073 --> 00:14:21,313
Yeah.

269
00:14:21,313 --> 00:14:22,093
In the description.

270
00:14:22,093 --> 00:14:22,693
Exactly.

271
00:14:23,953 --> 00:14:28,033
So let, let's just, let's just talk
about, so first off, you know, I'm

272
00:14:28,033 --> 00:14:31,483
gonna say some stuff that, you know,
that might go, you know, against, so

273
00:14:31,483 --> 00:14:33,433
first off, just a couple of facts.

274
00:14:33,973 --> 00:14:35,768
More tape is sold today than ever before.

275
00:14:37,728 --> 00:14:39,523
Uh, that surprises most people.

276
00:14:39,523 --> 00:14:40,153
When I say that,

277
00:14:40,768 --> 00:14:41,058
Well,

278
00:14:41,203 --> 00:14:42,733
what, what do you think
about when I say that?

279
00:14:43,063 --> 00:14:48,133
I, so I was surprised the first time,
and I can't remember, this must have

280
00:14:48,133 --> 00:14:50,443
been like seven, eight years ago

281
00:14:50,773 --> 00:14:53,983
when people were saying, and I don't
know what the number is now, that tape is

282
00:14:53,983 --> 00:14:56,083
still like over a billion dollars a year,

283
00:14:56,988 --> 00:15:02,578
Editor's Note: 4.4 Billion dollars
a year in 2024, to be exact,

284
00:15:02,798 --> 00:15:06,668
growing at CAGR of $7.8% per year.

285
00:15:07,031 --> 00:15:07,451
Yeah,

286
00:15:07,826 --> 00:15:08,156
right?

287
00:15:08,471 --> 00:15:12,101
Which surprises because everyone
always talks about disc, but

288
00:15:12,431 --> 00:15:14,741
tape has its purpose, right?

289
00:15:14,891 --> 00:15:18,521
And so I'm not surprised that
you're saying more tape is

290
00:15:18,521 --> 00:15:20,021
sold today than ever before.

291
00:15:20,021 --> 00:15:20,561
Because

292
00:15:21,221 --> 00:15:24,101
we have such huge data sets, right?

293
00:15:24,101 --> 00:15:25,931
Everyone's keeping data forever.

294
00:15:25,931 --> 00:15:31,001
We're now creating all these large
data sets with ai, with DNA sequencing,

295
00:15:31,001 --> 00:15:33,971
with all of these other things
that require a significant amount.

296
00:15:34,421 --> 00:15:37,181
The what is the electron
collider thing that

297
00:15:37,181 --> 00:15:39,641
creates a huge amount of data, right?

298
00:15:39,641 --> 00:15:40,871
And so people want to keep that.

299
00:15:40,931 --> 00:15:43,691
You wanna put it somewhere,
tape is super cheap, right?

300
00:15:43,691 --> 00:15:44,051
It's a great

301
00:15:44,051 --> 00:15:44,861
place to store data.

302
00:15:46,331 --> 00:15:46,751
So I'm

303
00:15:46,751 --> 00:15:47,411
not surprised.

304
00:15:48,476 --> 00:15:51,206
More tape is sold today than ever before.

305
00:15:51,756 --> 00:15:58,416
It's an abs also an absolute fact
that mi um, a lot fewer environments

306
00:15:58,416 --> 00:16:01,896
use tape for their backups today
than they, than than they did today.

307
00:16:01,896 --> 00:16:05,796
It's, it's a, I don't know what the
percentage is, but it's very, very small.

308
00:16:05,976 --> 00:16:06,336
Right.

309
00:16:06,786 --> 00:16:12,546
And if we look at the percentage of
people who send their backups directly

310
00:16:12,546 --> 00:16:15,816
to tape, that percentage is really small.

311
00:16:16,386 --> 00:16:19,446
The, the main people that I know
that are using backups for tape

312
00:16:19,446 --> 00:16:21,126
are using it for that second copy.

313
00:16:21,261 --> 00:16:21,501
Yeah.

314
00:16:21,651 --> 00:16:23,001
Do you think people,

315
00:16:23,001 --> 00:16:30,051
are you putting less backups on
tape because they've adopted disk,

316
00:16:30,051 --> 00:16:32,841
they've adopted SaaS applications.

317
00:16:32,841 --> 00:16:35,871
They've adopted cloud
native, all of the above.

318
00:16:36,606 --> 00:16:38,076
yeah, all of the above.

319
00:16:38,226 --> 00:16:43,176
But it really started with tape be,
tape became a real pain in the ass.

320
00:16:43,956 --> 00:16:46,656
When, when it was used for backups, right?

321
00:16:47,046 --> 00:16:54,216
Because tape tape is really bad at
incremental backups because again,

322
00:16:54,216 --> 00:16:58,596
increment incremental backups
go slow, tape can't go slow.

323
00:16:58,836 --> 00:17:01,146
It was a fundamental
mismatch of technology.

324
00:17:01,326 --> 00:17:03,426
Most backups are incremental backups.

325
00:17:03,936 --> 00:17:06,666
Today, more backups were incremental
backups than ever before.

326
00:17:07,056 --> 00:17:10,056
And, uh, it, it, it was just a
fundamental mismatch, and they

327
00:17:10,056 --> 00:17:11,136
had to find something better.

328
00:17:11,256 --> 00:17:14,436
And they were finding something better
even before DDU came along, right?

329
00:17:14,436 --> 00:17:16,926
We were starting to do dis
staging and things like that.

330
00:17:17,586 --> 00:17:24,426
So, yeah, so the backup world went away
from tape, you know, because it was just

331
00:17:24,426 --> 00:17:26,586
really, really difficult to use for that.

332
00:17:26,586 --> 00:17:30,276
Not because it wasn't reliable,
not because it was slow, none of

333
00:17:30,276 --> 00:17:34,176
those things, but because it was a
fundamental mismatch of technology.

334
00:17:34,326 --> 00:17:38,316
Okay, so let's take those two facts.

335
00:17:39,336 --> 00:17:39,546
More.

336
00:17:39,636 --> 00:17:41,286
Tape is sold today than ever before.

337
00:17:42,681 --> 00:17:43,641
one's using it for backup.

338
00:17:47,061 --> 00:17:48,381
So who's using tape?

339
00:17:49,476 --> 00:17:52,091
I am going to go out on a
limb and say the hyperscalers,

340
00:17:52,816 --> 00:17:53,867
Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

341
00:17:55,371 --> 00:18:00,861
Yeah, so it's the, the worst kept
secret in the tape world that,

342
00:18:01,101 --> 00:18:05,121
you know, Amazon, Google, IBM, uh,

343
00:18:05,841 --> 00:18:07,341
uh, Microsoft.

344
00:18:07,371 --> 00:18:07,911
Thank you.

345
00:18:08,181 --> 00:18:13,161
Microsoft are the biggest
customers of tape.

346
00:18:13,671 --> 00:18:17,721
To which again, many
people would be like, what?

347
00:18:20,571 --> 00:18:21,111
Right.

348
00:18:21,861 --> 00:18:23,511
They're, they're, wait, wait.

349
00:18:23,511 --> 00:18:25,281
They're the future, right?

350
00:18:25,281 --> 00:18:26,301
Cloud is the future.

351
00:18:26,301 --> 00:18:31,251
You're telling me that the biggest
users of tape today are cloud Really?

352
00:18:33,381 --> 00:18:35,211
And I'm not surprised, right?

353
00:18:35,661 --> 00:18:38,541
Because everyone throws
data up in the cloud.

354
00:18:38,601 --> 00:18:41,811
Everyone wants it to be
the lowest cost possible.

355
00:18:42,281 --> 00:18:42,771
Yes.

356
00:18:42,771 --> 00:18:44,571
And the cloud providers, right?

357
00:18:44,571 --> 00:18:49,461
The hyper scales are going to provide a
service to meet the customer needs, right?

358
00:18:49,761 --> 00:18:50,091
Large

359
00:18:50,091 --> 00:18:52,071
amounts of data, low cost.

360
00:18:52,431 --> 00:18:53,211
What can they offer?

361
00:18:53,991 --> 00:18:54,441
yeah.

362
00:18:54,501 --> 00:18:55,761
Large amounts of data.

363
00:18:55,821 --> 00:18:59,811
Keep it for a really long time,
really low cost, and I'm probably

364
00:18:59,811 --> 00:19:00,831
not gonna ever look at it,

365
00:19:00,831 --> 00:19:01,041
Yep.

366
00:19:02,961 --> 00:19:03,321
right?

367
00:19:03,651 --> 00:19:08,541
Or my, or, you know, and, and so yes, that
stuff, like when you start talking about,

368
00:19:08,541 --> 00:19:14,901
and again, I can't speak specifically to
certain products as to which ones use tape

369
00:19:14,901 --> 00:19:19,071
and which ones don't, but I can absolutely
tell you that when we start talking about

370
00:19:19,071 --> 00:19:26,511
products like Glacier Deep Archive, those
products are most likely using tape.

371
00:19:27,021 --> 00:19:28,731
And if you look at, go

372
00:19:29,001 --> 00:19:31,221
And what gets you to
that conclusion though?

373
00:19:31,221 --> 00:19:33,321
Maybe for people who aren't
as familiar with Glacier Deep

374
00:19:33,591 --> 00:19:35,751
Well, well, two reasons.

375
00:19:35,751 --> 00:19:41,211
One is the cost and, and, and the behavior
of how things like Glacier Deep Archive.

376
00:19:41,211 --> 00:19:43,731
Again, I'm not speaking specifically
about that product, I'm just using

377
00:19:43,731 --> 00:19:44,961
it 'cause everybody knows its name.

378
00:19:46,161 --> 00:19:52,851
Uh, if you look at it, the retrieval
time is, is very tape friendly.

379
00:19:53,511 --> 00:19:56,541
The normal retrieval time
is very tape friendly.

380
00:19:56,871 --> 00:20:00,171
It's measured in hours, not seconds.

381
00:20:00,681 --> 00:20:01,041
Right.

382
00:20:01,291 --> 00:20:07,561
Even the quick access is still
measured in minutes, not in seconds.

383
00:20:08,161 --> 00:20:10,621
And so that's all very tape friendly.

384
00:20:10,621 --> 00:20:14,791
And all that is is when you
look at a gigantic tape library,

385
00:20:15,361 --> 00:20:18,091
it's just prioritization of
requests is really all that is.

386
00:20:18,096 --> 00:20:24,331
It, it takes, it takes a, a, a couple
of minutes to get to an object in

387
00:20:24,361 --> 00:20:26,551
the middle of the biggest tape.

388
00:20:27,076 --> 00:20:28,006
That's out there, right?

389
00:20:28,006 --> 00:20:32,296
It'll take literally 10 seconds to
get it from whatever slot it's in to

390
00:20:32,296 --> 00:20:33,736
whatever drive you want it to be in.

391
00:20:33,946 --> 00:20:38,206
And it takes an average of about
two minutes to get to the file, no

392
00:20:38,206 --> 00:20:39,976
matter where it is on tape, right?

393
00:20:40,306 --> 00:20:44,206
And so it, it's, it's perfect for tape.

394
00:20:44,626 --> 00:20:47,956
Notice that the service descriptions
pay very close attention.

395
00:20:48,046 --> 00:20:50,206
They don't say anything about
what they're storing it on.

396
00:20:50,206 --> 00:20:53,746
They're just like, you're gonna give us a
thing, we're gonna charge you this much.

397
00:20:53,986 --> 00:20:58,606
You're gonna agree not to ask for
it anytime, anytime soon, right?

398
00:20:58,816 --> 00:21:03,136
Uh, and if you do, we're gonna
charge you, you know, uh, up

399
00:21:03,136 --> 00:21:06,256
the wazoo, uh, for it, right?

400
00:21:06,481 --> 00:21:10,531
now we, I should preface this by
saying you and I have no insider

401
00:21:10,531 --> 00:21:13,111
knowledge of what they actually
do or how it's been built.

402
00:21:13,111 --> 00:21:16,621
It's just our understanding based
on publicly available materials.

403
00:21:17,716 --> 00:21:22,846
And I, I will say I have, I have a tiny
amount of insider knowledge in that I

404
00:21:22,846 --> 00:21:27,406
do talk to a lot of tape people and they
all tell me that, you know, all these

405
00:21:27,406 --> 00:21:28,906
companies are their biggest customers.

406
00:21:29,476 --> 00:21:30,706
They gotta be using it for something.

407
00:21:31,006 --> 00:21:32,416
This is what I think they're using it for.

408
00:21:32,656 --> 00:21:32,986
Right.

409
00:21:33,946 --> 00:21:38,746
Um, and they probably also, and
again, don't know this for sure, but

410
00:21:38,746 --> 00:21:44,056
they probably also are doing object
level backup from a DR perspective,

411
00:21:44,476 --> 00:21:45,436
but don't know that for sure.

412
00:21:45,646 --> 00:21:45,976
Right.

413
00:21:46,786 --> 00:21:54,796
Um, so that's all to say that,
um, you know, the title of the

414
00:21:54,796 --> 00:21:56,236
thing is this tape Back up Dead.

415
00:21:57,196 --> 00:22:01,606
So, so we sort of, and we're, we're
still in like the intro at this point.

416
00:22:01,606 --> 00:22:01,996
Right.

417
00:22:02,476 --> 00:22:10,486
Um, so, so let's go back to why tape.

418
00:22:11,716 --> 00:22:12,316
Um.

419
00:22:12,901 --> 00:22:19,171
Sort of died in, um, in every
day, what I'm gonna call

420
00:22:19,171 --> 00:22:20,851
operational backup and recovery.

421
00:22:20,851 --> 00:22:21,631
There's two reasons.

422
00:22:21,631 --> 00:22:26,161
We, you know, in the backup world,
we talk about backup and operational

423
00:22:26,161 --> 00:22:30,601
recovery, which is I deleted this file,
and then there's disaster recovery

424
00:22:30,901 --> 00:22:34,861
tape still has a place, I think,
in disaster recovery, le much less

425
00:22:34,861 --> 00:22:36,451
of a place in operational recovery.

426
00:22:37,441 --> 00:22:45,541
Um, so I, I'm gonna give you, I'm gonna
give you a, an ab question, uh, ab

427
00:22:45,541 --> 00:22:48,961
question, an a multiple choice question.

428
00:22:49,471 --> 00:22:51,241
I'm gonna give you a
multiple choice question.

429
00:22:52,051 --> 00:22:59,611
The reason tape became a real pain
in the butt in backup and recovery is

430
00:22:59,611 --> 00:23:03,271
that it was A too slow B, too fast.

431
00:23:03,811 --> 00:23:04,801
Can I go with C

432
00:23:06,151 --> 00:23:06,601
What?

433
00:23:06,601 --> 00:23:06,751
What?

434
00:23:06,751 --> 00:23:06,996
What's c?

435
00:23:09,121 --> 00:23:09,721
Pickles?

436
00:23:14,071 --> 00:23:16,081
No, so, so I, so, so, okay.

437
00:23:16,081 --> 00:23:19,501
So I will tell you what I
thought before you and I had

438
00:23:19,501 --> 00:23:21,601
conversations about tape, right?

439
00:23:21,601 --> 00:23:27,091
My understanding at the time or
by it was that tape was too slow,

440
00:23:27,511 --> 00:23:30,031
that everything was moving
way too fast, right?

441
00:23:30,061 --> 00:23:34,771
And that networks and disc and
everything else is so much faster,

442
00:23:34,771 --> 00:23:36,841
and therefore tape died off.

443
00:23:36,901 --> 00:23:37,081
And

444
00:23:37,081 --> 00:23:40,711
therefore, and that's why everyone
switched from using tape to using disc.

445
00:23:41,071 --> 00:23:41,491
That's what I

446
00:23:41,491 --> 00:23:42,601
thought before we started.

447
00:23:43,231 --> 00:23:48,031
that is, uh, I'm so glad to hear that
you, that you have learned, you know,

448
00:23:48,031 --> 00:23:52,501
the error of uas, that is the most
common misunderstanding of tape, right?

449
00:23:52,831 --> 00:23:56,581
Is that the reason tape went away
is because it was too slow, right.

450
00:23:57,001 --> 00:23:59,401
The truth is actually the opposite.

451
00:23:59,971 --> 00:24:01,141
And what's interesting is.

452
00:24:02,011 --> 00:24:06,061
It, it was some, it was somewhat of
a self-fulfilling prophecy, right?

453
00:24:06,361 --> 00:24:08,521
Because people thought tape was too slow.

454
00:24:08,521 --> 00:24:11,611
They treated it like it was too
slow, which then made it too slow.

455
00:24:13,381 --> 00:24:17,281
Um, so let me, let me
explain what I mean by that.

456
00:24:17,521 --> 00:24:21,991
And I, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna
tell a, tell a story, okay, so

457
00:24:22,621 --> 00:24:25,411
large entertainment company, right?

458
00:24:25,531 --> 00:24:30,901
One that, that everybody would know who
they were, are they're still around.

459
00:24:31,561 --> 00:24:38,251
And they had, my memory is that
they had about 20 terabytes of

460
00:24:38,251 --> 00:24:39,481
data that they were backing up.

461
00:24:40,441 --> 00:24:42,691
They had 18 tape drives
running around the clock.

462
00:24:42,721 --> 00:24:43,801
They were literally like.

463
00:24:44,086 --> 00:24:45,946
Backing up like 28 hours a day.

464
00:24:46,246 --> 00:24:48,646
They, they just, they were
never finishing their backups.

465
00:24:49,276 --> 00:24:52,396
Not once Were they ever
finishing a, a complete backup?

466
00:24:52,401 --> 00:24:54,766
It, it was, it was a complete disaster.

467
00:24:55,876 --> 00:25:03,886
And, um, I took a look at the numbers
and in five minutes I be, I, I knew

468
00:25:03,886 --> 00:25:08,356
what the problem was and I charged
them a crap ton of money to fix it.

469
00:25:08,446 --> 00:25:08,626
Right.

470
00:25:09,556 --> 00:25:13,036
Their solution was to go buy more tape.

471
00:25:13,186 --> 00:25:14,296
which is what you would think.

472
00:25:14,326 --> 00:25:15,466
Or tape drives, right?

473
00:25:15,736 --> 00:25:16,006
Yeah.

474
00:25:16,246 --> 00:25:17,146
Buy more tape drives.

475
00:25:17,236 --> 00:25:17,566
Yeah.

476
00:25:17,746 --> 00:25:25,096
They were using, um, the storage tech
98, 40 drives, and they said, we just

477
00:25:25,096 --> 00:25:27,016
need to buy two more of these things.

478
00:25:27,016 --> 00:25:27,976
We think that'll fix it.

479
00:25:28,066 --> 00:25:28,276
Right.

480
00:25:28,276 --> 00:25:29,596
Because we're at 28 hours a day.

481
00:25:29,596 --> 00:25:33,826
We need to get to 23 hours a day, and
these two drives will get us back.

482
00:25:33,826 --> 00:25:37,696
You know, and I, and these drive,
those drives were expensive.

483
00:25:38,296 --> 00:25:38,776
They were like.

484
00:25:40,831 --> 00:25:44,221
it is like $20,000 it seems
like, like, like per tape.

485
00:25:44,536 --> 00:25:45,796
Which would be like a million

486
00:25:45,901 --> 00:25:46,291
great.

487
00:25:46,291 --> 00:25:47,491
They were really expensive.

488
00:25:47,551 --> 00:25:47,791
What was

489
00:25:48,046 --> 00:25:49,576
Which would be like a
million dollars today.

490
00:25:50,281 --> 00:25:50,431
Yeah.

491
00:25:51,841 --> 00:25:56,011
This, this is a 15-year-old story.

492
00:25:56,581 --> 00:26:02,701
Um, so I said, please don't do that.

493
00:26:03,121 --> 00:26:03,541
Right?

494
00:26:03,931 --> 00:26:06,751
And then I basically, what, what I
remember saying, I don't remember

495
00:26:06,751 --> 00:26:12,271
this, this is a hundred percent what
I said was, give me that money, right?

496
00:26:13,141 --> 00:26:14,341
Give me that money.

497
00:26:14,821 --> 00:26:20,971
Instead of spending, you know, $30,000
or whatever it was on, on tapes, give

498
00:26:20,971 --> 00:26:25,081
me the $30,000 and I will guarantee that
we will solve this problem and we're

499
00:26:25,081 --> 00:26:28,051
actually gonna, we're gonna make it so
much better than you could ever dream.

500
00:26:29,046 --> 00:26:30,151
And, and if I don't.

501
00:26:30,526 --> 00:26:34,336
You can have your money back and you
can go buy your stupid tape drives.

502
00:26:34,906 --> 00:26:38,596
And we went in there and I
made a bunch of configuration

503
00:26:38,596 --> 00:26:39,946
changes to their environment.

504
00:26:40,036 --> 00:26:44,956
One of them was, um, they were
specifically listing file systems

505
00:26:45,466 --> 00:26:48,046
rather than just saying this was
a net backup environment rather

506
00:26:48,046 --> 00:26:49,516
than just saying all local drives.

507
00:26:50,386 --> 00:26:50,806
Right.

508
00:26:51,226 --> 00:26:52,666
And that it's one of my pet peeves.

509
00:26:52,666 --> 00:26:52,966
Right.

510
00:26:52,966 --> 00:26:53,596
Don't do that.

511
00:26:53,626 --> 00:26:55,186
Don't, because you'll miss stuff.

512
00:26:55,246 --> 00:26:56,176
And I was right.

513
00:26:56,236 --> 00:27:00,406
They were missing, uh, 50%
or 30% of their environment.

514
00:27:00,921 --> 00:27:01,141
So

515
00:27:01,161 --> 00:27:03,341
now they needed four drives instead of two

516
00:27:03,991 --> 00:27:06,061
So they were backing up 20 terabytes.

517
00:27:06,271 --> 00:27:10,321
And by the time I had finished, you
know, tweaking their all local drives,

518
00:27:10,321 --> 00:27:11,941
they were now backing up 30 terabytes.

519
00:27:12,451 --> 00:27:15,421
They were missing 30%
of their environment.

520
00:27:16,261 --> 00:27:21,751
Um, and of the, the new, the new 10
very little of it was true garbage.

521
00:27:21,811 --> 00:27:24,631
You know, like, I was like, oh,
so what you do is you say, back up

522
00:27:24,631 --> 00:27:27,691
everything and then exclude the things
that you definitely know are garbage.

523
00:27:27,901 --> 00:27:32,071
We're gonna exclude temp, we're gonna
exclude like in temporary internet

524
00:27:32,071 --> 00:27:34,801
files and, and windows and so on, right?

525
00:27:36,031 --> 00:27:40,261
And, um, so we increased the amount
of data that they were backing up.

526
00:27:40,891 --> 00:27:42,691
Uh, we increased it by 50%.

527
00:27:44,341 --> 00:27:47,401
They were backing it up once
a day, not finishing it.

528
00:27:48,721 --> 00:27:53,311
By the end they were creating two
copies instead of just one copy.

529
00:27:54,991 --> 00:27:56,371
The backups were finishing.

530
00:27:56,851 --> 00:27:57,541
Overnight,

531
00:27:57,871 --> 00:28:03,121
meaning they were running in like eight
hours instead of 28 hours, and we were

532
00:28:03,121 --> 00:28:07,711
using six of the tape drives they had.

533
00:28:07,831 --> 00:28:12,991
So what I remember was of the, like the 16
or 18, whatever, how, whatever the number

534
00:28:12,991 --> 00:28:17,431
was of the drives that they had, six of
them were the newer, like 98, 40 drives.

535
00:28:17,881 --> 00:28:20,221
And then the other ones
were the older drives.

536
00:28:21,211 --> 00:28:24,121
So I was able to retire the older drives.

537
00:28:24,451 --> 00:28:27,451
So go from 16 tapes down to six tapes.

538
00:28:28,231 --> 00:28:32,041
Um, go from one copy to two, copy go
from 20 terabytes to 30 terabytes.

539
00:28:32,131 --> 00:28:35,611
Did all of that by simply making
configuration changes in the environment.

540
00:28:36,691 --> 00:28:40,651
And it all had to do with
recognizing the fact that these

541
00:28:40,651 --> 00:28:43,321
tape drives were starving for data.

542
00:28:44,641 --> 00:28:45,091
Right.

543
00:28:45,451 --> 00:28:52,141
Um, because as I illustrated
with the VHS thing, um.

544
00:28:52,966 --> 00:28:55,486
Tape drives, want the
data to go very fast.

545
00:28:55,486 --> 00:28:56,926
Tape drives have two speeds.

546
00:28:57,046 --> 00:28:59,236
They have stop and they have very fast.

547
00:28:59,866 --> 00:29:00,286
Right.

548
00:29:00,946 --> 00:29:02,776
Now that's, that's a bit simplistic.

549
00:29:02,836 --> 00:29:06,616
There are some, some steps that
different drives can do, but they

550
00:29:06,616 --> 00:29:11,026
do have a minimum, you know, a
minimum speed at which they can go.

551
00:29:11,026 --> 00:29:15,526
And if you try to go slower than
that, they cannot go slower than that.

552
00:29:16,036 --> 00:29:18,046
So they speed up to their minimum speed.

553
00:29:18,286 --> 00:29:21,076
They write the data that's in the
buffer, they turn back in and they look

554
00:29:21,076 --> 00:29:23,686
at the buffer and the buffer's empty
because you're not feeding the buffer.

555
00:29:23,836 --> 00:29:26,206
And then they stop and they have
to back hitch and they do it.

556
00:29:26,206 --> 00:29:27,586
And that's what they call shoe shining.

557
00:29:28,126 --> 00:29:31,456
The tape drive as a result becomes slow.

558
00:29:31,606 --> 00:29:32,506
That's what I was saying.

559
00:29:32,506 --> 00:29:36,916
When you treat a tape like a tape
drive, like it's slow and to make it

560
00:29:36,916 --> 00:29:41,386
faster, you buy another tape drive, you
actually make the tape drive slower.

561
00:29:42,016 --> 00:29:42,346
Right.

562
00:29:42,556 --> 00:29:46,786
That's, that's, that's what I
meant by, because they believed it.

563
00:29:46,786 --> 00:29:47,686
They made it so

564
00:29:48,466 --> 00:29:50,386
like, it's like a
self-fulfilling prophecy.

565
00:29:50,731 --> 00:29:56,281
so I definitely agree that's one of the
problems with tape or why tape sort of

566
00:29:56,281 --> 00:30:01,381
went away and, but I think you had also
alluded to sort of the problem, uh, at the

567
00:30:01,381 --> 00:30:07,021
start of the episode, right, where backups
have changed formats to incrementals

568
00:30:07,801 --> 00:30:11,611
and I think one of the challenges
speeding onto what you were saying

569
00:30:12,031 --> 00:30:18,106
with it being slow, is I. They're not
able to feed enough data to tape drives

570
00:30:18,106 --> 00:30:19,481
when you're just doing incrementals.

571
00:30:20,281 --> 00:30:21,151
Yeah.

572
00:30:21,151 --> 00:30:28,501
And you know when, when I, I, so
my memory is that once we solved

573
00:30:28,531 --> 00:30:32,761
the tape problem, the world went
to Forever Incremental, right?

574
00:30:32,821 --> 00:30:37,381
Um, there was only one company that was
doing Forever Incremental back then.

575
00:30:37,381 --> 00:30:45,931
And that was IBM with A DSM, which became
TSM, which became, uh, spectrum Protect.

576
00:30:47,401 --> 00:30:49,351
Um, and.

577
00:30:50,596 --> 00:30:55,246
The only way TSM would really work
is if you did disc staging, right?

578
00:30:56,126 --> 00:30:59,066
So we just, we just started moving
slower and slower away from tape.

579
00:30:59,066 --> 00:31:01,976
And then once DDU came on
the scene, it solved the cost

580
00:31:02,096 --> 00:31:05,756
problem, uh, from for disc, right?

581
00:31:06,356 --> 00:31:12,026
Um, and then we just started moving
off of tape, uh, as much as we can, um,

582
00:31:12,566 --> 00:31:15,056
or for operational recovery.

583
00:31:15,386 --> 00:31:18,296
So it turns out tape is actually
way faster than we needed it to be.

584
00:31:19,436 --> 00:31:23,246
When we talk about data transfer
rate, tape is indeed slow.

585
00:31:23,306 --> 00:31:24,326
When we talk about.

586
00:31:25,316 --> 00:31:27,926
Random access tape is not random access.

587
00:31:27,926 --> 00:31:31,311
So if you're, if you need it to behave
like an object storage system, which

588
00:31:31,331 --> 00:31:32,741
you could, you could do it right?

589
00:31:32,741 --> 00:31:35,805
There's LTFS, you can write to
it like an object storage system.

590
00:31:36,195 --> 00:31:39,645
It's just gonna be really slow when
compared to anything other than tape.

591
00:31:40,635 --> 00:31:47,595
Um, and tape will become slow if
you treat it like it's slow, right?

592
00:31:48,045 --> 00:31:56,115
Um, and, and so there were all these
design considerations, some of which

593
00:31:56,115 --> 00:31:57,945
we talked about in a few episodes ago.

594
00:31:57,945 --> 00:32:03,045
All of these design considerations
that we did in order to, you know,

595
00:32:03,045 --> 00:32:09,105
all of the contortions that we went
through to make tape, uh, happy, right?

596
00:32:09,105 --> 00:32:13,305
What I found was that if you made tape
happy, if you gave the tape drive the

597
00:32:13,305 --> 00:32:17,595
amount of data that it needed, then
everything, literally the skies would

598
00:32:17,595 --> 00:32:19,695
open up to, the angels would sing.

599
00:32:20,325 --> 00:32:23,175
You know, the rain would go away, right?

600
00:32:24,075 --> 00:32:27,165
The tape drives would also become more
reliable, because when you treat them

601
00:32:27,165 --> 00:32:30,675
like, you know, they're shoe shining
all day, they also become unreliable.

602
00:32:30,675 --> 00:32:32,715
They become slow and
they become unreliable.

603
00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:37,335
and you had that issue last year when you
were dealing with the customer or with the

604
00:32:37,395 --> 00:32:37,725
I did,

605
00:32:38,295 --> 00:32:38,805
right?

606
00:32:38,925 --> 00:32:39,015
Where.

607
00:32:39,435 --> 00:32:40,035
yes.

608
00:32:40,095 --> 00:32:41,925
The tapes were not happy with you.

609
00:32:41,925 --> 00:32:42,915
The drives, in fact,

610
00:32:43,185 --> 00:32:44,145
would overheat.

611
00:32:44,145 --> 00:32:46,215
I think you had to replace
them once or twice.

612
00:32:46,215 --> 00:32:46,335
They

613
00:32:46,335 --> 00:32:46,425
were

614
00:32:46,655 --> 00:32:47,115
yeah.

615
00:32:47,235 --> 00:32:49,665
happy running 24 7 for months

616
00:32:49,665 --> 00:32:50,085
on end.

617
00:32:51,225 --> 00:32:51,615
yeah.

618
00:32:51,620 --> 00:32:52,995
And, and, and they weren't.

619
00:32:53,235 --> 00:32:56,205
And the, they were also
being shoeshine to death.

620
00:32:56,385 --> 00:32:56,805
Right.

621
00:32:56,805 --> 00:33:03,435
Because I couldn't, I was backing
up across s and b over the network.

622
00:33:03,525 --> 00:33:06,195
It just, it was, it, it was
just, it was just not good.

623
00:33:06,195 --> 00:33:09,165
And also the, the, you remember the
core problem was that there were

624
00:33:09,225 --> 00:33:11,145
millions and millions of fights.

625
00:33:12,295 --> 00:33:15,685
And so a lot of people went to DISC
and specifically Deduplicate disc and

626
00:33:15,685 --> 00:33:20,425
Deduplicate backup services and, you know,
and software, you know, like the, the, the

627
00:33:20,425 --> 00:33:22,735
first one I re really remember was Avamar.

628
00:33:23,095 --> 00:33:23,515
Right.

629
00:33:23,905 --> 00:33:28,735
Um, which for those that don't know,
before it was Avamar, it was called Undo

630
00:33:29,215 --> 00:33:30,445
with two O's.

631
00:33:30,865 --> 00:33:35,395
Um, they were actually, they were
invented, I don't know, I dunno what,

632
00:33:35,425 --> 00:33:38,875
I dunno what the right, they, they
started creating Avamar, like right up

633
00:33:38,875 --> 00:33:40,615
the road from me, like up in Irvine.

634
00:33:40,975 --> 00:33:41,845
That's where I first,

635
00:33:41,965 --> 00:33:42,985
I've been, to their offices.

636
00:33:43,585 --> 00:33:43,975
Yeah.

637
00:33:44,425 --> 00:33:49,405
Um, and, um, uh, they were
like the first like DDU backup

638
00:33:49,405 --> 00:33:50,785
software that was like, right.

639
00:33:50,785 --> 00:33:54,145
And then I remember
Commvault started adding it.

640
00:33:54,145 --> 00:33:56,425
Veritas started adding, and
then you started getting these

641
00:33:56,425 --> 00:34:00,355
services, um, that, that, that,
it's just a core design element.

642
00:34:00,355 --> 00:34:00,625
Right.

643
00:34:01,915 --> 00:34:04,915
Um, and, and as a result, tape
just got smaller and smaller

644
00:34:04,915 --> 00:34:05,725
and smaller and smaller.

645
00:34:06,550 --> 00:34:08,830
Now, fast forward to today.

646
00:34:09,700 --> 00:34:12,010
Why would I want to
think about tape at all?

647
00:34:12,220 --> 00:34:12,580
Right?

648
00:34:12,580 --> 00:34:13,690
And so the, the title is,

649
00:34:13,740 --> 00:34:14,940
is Tape Backup Dead?

650
00:34:15,660 --> 00:34:16,590
The answer is no.

651
00:34:17,340 --> 00:34:17,820
Right?

652
00:34:18,030 --> 00:34:18,870
It's not dead.

653
00:34:18,870 --> 00:34:20,220
It is definitely on life support.

654
00:34:23,430 --> 00:34:23,880
So,

655
00:34:24,840 --> 00:34:29,940
Uh, but there are real reasons
why we would wanna use tape.

656
00:34:30,240 --> 00:34:34,380
And I know the, so far we've
talked about operational recovery,

657
00:34:34,830 --> 00:34:35,160
right?

658
00:34:35,160 --> 00:34:37,620
But one thing that pops to
mind is disaster recovery,

659
00:34:38,100 --> 00:34:38,520
Yes.

660
00:34:39,090 --> 00:34:39,480
right?

661
00:34:39,930 --> 00:34:46,500
How difficult is it for you to take a
copy off site, uh, when you are storing

662
00:34:46,500 --> 00:34:48,570
something on, say, a disc based system?

663
00:34:49,140 --> 00:34:49,530
Right.

664
00:34:49,740 --> 00:34:49,950
Are

665
00:34:49,950 --> 00:34:51,750
you going to copy it onto disc?

666
00:34:51,750 --> 00:34:55,020
And I know there are companies that do
like removable disc packs and things like

667
00:34:55,020 --> 00:35:00,120
that, but that's quite a lot
of, like, physically, that's

668
00:35:00,120 --> 00:35:01,680
a lot to take with you, right?

669
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:05,340
Versus can I just take a small
tape and then move it offsite?

670
00:35:06,510 --> 00:35:07,140
exactly.

671
00:35:07,140 --> 00:35:11,250
Because, and again, it's a, it's a
phrase that some people use a lot, never

672
00:35:11,250 --> 00:35:12,900
underestimate the bandwidth of a truck.

673
00:35:13,260 --> 00:35:13,620
Right.

674
00:35:14,730 --> 00:35:15,060
Yep.

675
00:35:15,990 --> 00:35:19,740
Truck has unlimited
bandwidth, really bad latency.

676
00:35:19,890 --> 00:35:20,100
yep.

677
00:35:21,150 --> 00:35:21,540
Right.

678
00:35:21,740 --> 00:35:21,960
Or,

679
00:35:22,235 --> 00:35:28,500
But yeah, you, you can move, you can
move an immeasurable amount of data

680
00:35:28,650 --> 00:35:31,500
via tape by going from A to B, right?

681
00:35:31,965 --> 00:35:33,885
we used to call it also sneaker net

682
00:35:34,320 --> 00:35:34,560
Yeah.

683
00:35:34,560 --> 00:35:35,550
Sneaker net's another.

684
00:35:35,550 --> 00:35:35,850
Yeah.

685
00:35:35,940 --> 00:35:37,950
'cause you're, you know, it's,
it's going back and forth.

686
00:35:38,460 --> 00:35:38,850
Um,

687
00:35:39,760 --> 00:35:39,980
and

688
00:35:40,110 --> 00:35:43,680
before we, before we get to that,
let's just, I'm, I'm just gonna try

689
00:35:43,680 --> 00:35:46,890
to summarize and we, I, I'm sure we
have an episode where we go to this in

690
00:35:46,890 --> 00:35:49,260
more, de go into this in more detail.

691
00:35:49,800 --> 00:35:55,410
But let me just summarize sort of, I think
it's gonna be three reasons why tape.

692
00:35:56,340 --> 00:35:58,890
Is still, you know, the
value that tape still brings.

693
00:35:58,890 --> 00:36:01,080
One is you cannot beat the cost.

694
00:36:01,710 --> 00:36:02,880
It's not even close.

695
00:36:02,880 --> 00:36:03,420
I don't care.

696
00:36:03,420 --> 00:36:08,040
The cheapest cloud storage, the
cheapest on-prem object storage that

697
00:36:08,040 --> 00:36:09,990
you can buy, it will not even approach.

698
00:36:09,990 --> 00:36:13,260
It will be one, possibly two
orders of magnitude cheaper.

699
00:36:14,100 --> 00:36:16,105
It's just not even close.

700
00:36:16,650 --> 00:36:17,040
Right.

701
00:36:17,610 --> 00:36:18,785
FF go ahead.

702
00:36:19,095 --> 00:36:22,035
When you say cost, are you talking
the cost of the media or are you

703
00:36:22,365 --> 00:36:23,505
I'm talking everything.

704
00:36:23,895 --> 00:36:27,795
I'm talking fully burdened cost,
including the cost of buying a tape

705
00:36:27,795 --> 00:36:33,705
library, powering that tape library,
uh, dealing with tape management,

706
00:36:33,765 --> 00:36:35,055
putting those tapes somewhere.

707
00:36:35,055 --> 00:36:38,175
That's not the tape library because you
didn't buy a tape library big enough,

708
00:36:39,105 --> 00:36:41,145
iron Mountain contract, all of that.

709
00:36:41,145 --> 00:36:42,645
It's not even close.

710
00:36:42,675 --> 00:36:45,615
It will be one, possibly two
orders of magnitude cheaper

711
00:36:45,825 --> 00:36:47,325
than the cheapest alternative.

712
00:36:47,745 --> 00:36:49,095
And that's just a fact.

713
00:36:49,515 --> 00:36:49,995
Okay.

714
00:36:50,415 --> 00:36:58,155
Um, and the, one of the core reasons
for that is that tape, unlike most

715
00:36:58,155 --> 00:37:03,375
other media, the media is separate
from the thing that makes the media

716
00:37:03,675 --> 00:37:05,085
right, that writes to the media.

717
00:37:05,805 --> 00:37:11,655
And because of that, the tape is
so cheap in comparison, uh, to.

718
00:37:11,985 --> 00:37:13,275
Anything else, right?

719
00:37:13,695 --> 00:37:14,055
Right.

720
00:37:14,415 --> 00:37:16,395
So, so cost is number one.

721
00:37:16,395 --> 00:37:19,635
And by the way, that includes
power, that includes cooling,

722
00:37:20,025 --> 00:37:21,105
that includes all those things.

723
00:37:21,555 --> 00:37:28,155
That's in fact, if I, I've made
this claim before, if a disc was

724
00:37:28,155 --> 00:37:31,215
free, tape would still be cheaper

725
00:37:32,175 --> 00:37:32,775
I remember

726
00:37:32,805 --> 00:37:35,355
because of, because of, the power cooling.

727
00:37:35,565 --> 00:37:36,045
Okay.

728
00:37:37,185 --> 00:37:38,565
Which means it's also greener.

729
00:37:38,745 --> 00:37:41,235
For those of you that care
about those things, it, it

730
00:37:41,235 --> 00:37:42,885
means it's also greener, right?

731
00:37:44,295 --> 00:37:45,405
Um, so it's cheaper.

732
00:37:46,545 --> 00:37:49,050
And then these two will
surprise, probably.

733
00:37:50,445 --> 00:37:52,245
Uh, well, uh, okay.

734
00:37:52,245 --> 00:37:52,815
I, I remember.

735
00:37:53,115 --> 00:37:54,735
Okay, so I came up with the fourth reason.

736
00:37:55,215 --> 00:37:58,155
So second is that it's faster, right?

737
00:37:58,695 --> 00:38:05,055
It's faster from a, if you need to
transfer a crap ton of data from A to B,

738
00:38:05,355 --> 00:38:09,345
it's faster to write it to tape than it
is to write it to any disc on the planet.

739
00:38:09,345 --> 00:38:10,965
I don't care which disc
we're talking about.

740
00:38:10,965 --> 00:38:14,355
I don't care if we're talking solid
state, rotational disc, whatever

741
00:38:14,355 --> 00:38:20,625
it is, just from a transfer rate
perspective, tape is faster than disc.

742
00:38:20,625 --> 00:38:22,065
It's without question.

743
00:38:22,365 --> 00:38:22,695
Okay?

744
00:38:22,755 --> 00:38:24,135
Number one, number two.

745
00:38:24,975 --> 00:38:27,375
Um, and then, and then when we
talk, you know, the thing that you

746
00:38:27,375 --> 00:38:32,565
brought up when we start talking
about, um, um, uh, bandwidth,

747
00:38:33,045 --> 00:38:33,375
right?

748
00:38:33,675 --> 00:38:36,135
Tape has unlimited bandwidth, right?

749
00:38:37,305 --> 00:38:40,125
And then the two that, that I think will
actually, and by the way, I think that

750
00:38:40,125 --> 00:38:41,415
one will surprise a lot of people too.

751
00:38:41,535 --> 00:38:43,575
But feel free to, feel free to check me.

752
00:38:44,745 --> 00:38:46,785
Uh, but check yourself
for you Ricky stuff.

753
00:38:48,030 --> 00:38:52,830
Um, tape is also better at writing
ones and zeros than disc is.

754
00:38:53,280 --> 00:38:56,700
Tape is also better at holding
on to ones and zeros than disc is

755
00:38:56,940 --> 00:38:57,160
by.

756
00:38:58,245 --> 00:38:58,575
A

757
00:38:58,680 --> 00:39:02,370
by multiple orders of magnitude, right?

758
00:39:02,910 --> 00:39:09,030
Um, so this has to do with something
called, uh, well the first one has

759
00:39:09,030 --> 00:39:11,250
to do with the, the bit error rate.

760
00:39:12,030 --> 00:39:15,900
So for every, every, you know,
10 million zeros that you write,

761
00:39:15,960 --> 00:39:17,250
you're gonna write one wrong.

762
00:39:17,550 --> 00:39:21,840
I'm just making up a number there,
but that, that's somewhere in there.

763
00:39:21,840 --> 00:39:27,300
It's, it's one 10 to the
like 15th or something.

764
00:39:27,600 --> 00:39:28,050
Right?

765
00:39:28,140 --> 00:39:28,620
That's.

766
00:39:29,505 --> 00:39:35,755
Like, uh, there's like when, when we
look at disc and there's, there's SATA

767
00:39:35,775 --> 00:39:39,765
disc, fiber channel, disc, and then we
start talking about solid state disc.

768
00:39:40,245 --> 00:39:42,045
Each of these, those in order.

769
00:39:42,045 --> 00:39:44,115
Those are better at
writing ones and zeros.

770
00:39:44,895 --> 00:39:48,550
But when we get, and, and it's like,
and I'm, I, I can't do the exact,

771
00:39:49,050 --> 00:39:52,965
the, the last time I looked, it was
like 10 to the 14th, 10 to the 15th.

772
00:39:53,055 --> 00:39:53,985
10 to the 16th.

773
00:39:54,525 --> 00:39:58,635
When we start looking at like SATA
fiber channel and, and, uh, SSDs.

774
00:39:59,595 --> 00:40:05,205
Um, but at that point, the worst
tape drive was 10 to the 18th.

775
00:40:05,385 --> 00:40:07,215
The best tape drive was
like 10 to the 20th.

776
00:40:07,485 --> 00:40:09,225
That means it's four.

777
00:40:10,485 --> 00:40:11,265
What, what would that be?

778
00:40:11,265 --> 00:40:14,565
That means it's 10,000 times better,

779
00:40:14,850 --> 00:40:15,030
Yeah.

780
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:15,480
Oh, sorry.

781
00:40:15,495 --> 00:40:15,735
right?

782
00:40:15,735 --> 00:40:16,695
Because it's four zeros.

783
00:40:16,845 --> 00:40:17,745
It's 10,000.

784
00:40:17,745 --> 00:40:22,245
times better at writing ones and zeros
than discus, than the best, uh, disc.

785
00:40:22,765 --> 00:40:22,985
And

786
00:40:22,985 --> 00:40:23,940
that's Yeah.

787
00:40:23,940 --> 00:40:27,450
And like you said, That's just writing the

788
00:40:27,675 --> 00:40:28,335
just writing it.

789
00:40:28,455 --> 00:40:28,785
Yeah.

790
00:40:28,845 --> 00:40:29,475
The first time.

791
00:40:29,775 --> 00:40:32,955
Because every time you write
ones and zeros, some of them are

792
00:40:32,955 --> 00:40:34,095
going to be written and wrong.

793
00:40:34,245 --> 00:40:37,095
This is why we have ECC by
the way, this is after ECC,

794
00:40:37,290 --> 00:40:37,500
yeah,

795
00:40:38,865 --> 00:40:39,135
right?

796
00:40:39,555 --> 00:40:41,645
Um, that's error correction codes.

797
00:40:43,025 --> 00:40:46,145
Um, so it's better at writing the
ones and zeros in the first place.

798
00:40:46,445 --> 00:40:49,325
It's also better at storing the
ones and zeros for long term.

799
00:40:49,355 --> 00:40:52,565
And that was what we had
Joe Jurneke to talk about.

800
00:40:53,195 --> 00:40:56,735
Something called, um, bit, uh, bit rot

801
00:40:57,040 --> 00:40:57,330
Yeah.

802
00:40:58,415 --> 00:41:02,525
and is the, that's the
vernacular term, but the, the

803
00:41:03,215 --> 00:41:03,635
of

804
00:41:04,475 --> 00:41:04,865
what?

805
00:41:05,075 --> 00:41:05,705
Coercivity.

806
00:41:06,725 --> 00:41:10,385
Coercivity, it comes
from the idea that a one.

807
00:41:10,685 --> 00:41:12,935
Could be coerced to be a zero

808
00:41:13,865 --> 00:41:14,225
right?

809
00:41:14,255 --> 00:41:17,765
Over time based on heat
and the size of the grain.

810
00:41:18,515 --> 00:41:19,925
Bigger the grain, the better.

811
00:41:20,435 --> 00:41:26,585
the the cooler the media, the better
tape has gigantic grains in contrast

812
00:41:26,585 --> 00:41:29,045
with, uh, any other magnetic media.

813
00:41:29,555 --> 00:41:34,145
And tape is stored in ambient
temperatures versus disc that is

814
00:41:34,145 --> 00:41:35,795
typically very, very hot all the time.

815
00:41:36,455 --> 00:41:36,725
Yep.

816
00:41:36,935 --> 00:41:38,795
Um, you can play with it a little bit.

817
00:41:38,825 --> 00:41:39,605
It's a formula.

818
00:41:39,635 --> 00:41:42,005
K-U-V-K-U-V over kt.

819
00:41:42,905 --> 00:41:45,515
You can play with it a little bit when
we start talking about things like

820
00:41:45,515 --> 00:41:49,055
made where they power off some of the
discs that will extend the life better.

821
00:41:49,835 --> 00:41:55,955
But tape by design is kept cool,
you know, unless it's being used

822
00:41:56,060 --> 00:41:56,180
not

823
00:41:56,180 --> 00:41:59,120
gonna keep it in the back of your car,
or you shouldn't keep it in the trunk of

824
00:41:59,225 --> 00:41:59,795
You shouldn't,

825
00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:01,880
in the middle of summer in India,

826
00:42:04,205 --> 00:42:04,955
Exactly.

827
00:42:05,885 --> 00:42:08,165
Um, and so.

828
00:42:08,615 --> 00:42:11,195
Those are, those are four reasons.

829
00:42:11,405 --> 00:42:15,725
Cost, speed, um, what would you call that?

830
00:42:15,725 --> 00:42:20,405
Um, integrity, uh, initial
integrity and long-term integrity.

831
00:42:20,405 --> 00:42:23,285
Those are the four reasons why you
might want to think about tape.

832
00:42:23,765 --> 00:42:29,855
Now, let's talk about the fifth,
which is really what, to go back

833
00:42:29,855 --> 00:42:33,215
to what we were talking about
before you brought up about Dr.

834
00:42:33,425 --> 00:42:33,645
Yep.

835
00:42:34,805 --> 00:42:40,565
Why, what would be the additional
feature that tape can bring

836
00:42:40,565 --> 00:42:41,795
when we start talking about Dr.

837
00:42:42,200 --> 00:42:43,910
You can basically just

838
00:42:43,910 --> 00:42:49,610
copy it, ship it off somewhere
else and just leave it there.

839
00:42:49,610 --> 00:42:52,130
And if something happens,
you have that copy.

840
00:42:52,400 --> 00:42:55,220
It's low cost, like all
those four factors you talked

841
00:42:55,220 --> 00:42:55,670
about before.

842
00:42:55,670 --> 00:42:55,910
Right.

843
00:42:55,910 --> 00:42:58,940
You know it's gonna be there,
ready for whenever you need it.

844
00:42:58,940 --> 00:43:01,850
You could pull it back, you could
restore it and you can get going again.

845
00:43:03,110 --> 00:43:04,400
So that is true.

846
00:43:04,400 --> 00:43:06,500
That isn't where I was
going, but that is true.

847
00:43:06,705 --> 00:43:07,820
But that is all true.

848
00:43:08,360 --> 00:43:08,780
Right?

849
00:43:08,780 --> 00:43:12,530
So because that means it is
easy to put it somewhere else,

850
00:43:12,980 --> 00:43:13,220
right?

851
00:43:13,220 --> 00:43:16,190
Because of that unlimited bandwidth
because you can, you know, hand it to

852
00:43:16,190 --> 00:43:20,360
a FedEx person and magic happens and it
just shows up in a, in another place.

853
00:43:20,360 --> 00:43:20,660
Right.

854
00:43:21,350 --> 00:43:21,830
Um,

855
00:43:23,660 --> 00:43:23,930
What were

856
00:43:23,930 --> 00:43:24,500
you getting at?

857
00:43:24,920 --> 00:43:29,180
is the number one reason that people
are currently doing disaster recoveries?

858
00:43:29,330 --> 00:43:30,590
Oh, ransomware, because it's

859
00:43:30,590 --> 00:43:31,070
air gaped.

860
00:43:32,270 --> 00:43:35,180
tape is very ransomware proof,

861
00:43:35,285 --> 00:43:35,495
Yeah.

862
00:43:36,200 --> 00:43:36,560
right?

863
00:43:36,560 --> 00:43:39,860
We talk, when we talk about ransomware
a lot, we talk about immutability.

864
00:43:39,980 --> 00:43:40,340
Right.

865
00:43:41,090 --> 00:43:42,590
What is immutability Prasanna.

866
00:43:42,605 --> 00:43:45,455
It's once it's been written,
it's How difficult is it?

867
00:43:45,665 --> 00:43:49,415
Well, it shouldn't be able to
be erased or modified or changed

868
00:43:50,030 --> 00:43:50,600
Correct?

869
00:43:50,660 --> 00:43:51,170
Correct.

870
00:43:51,350 --> 00:43:51,800
Um,

871
00:43:51,995 --> 00:43:52,715
has elapsed.

872
00:43:53,120 --> 00:43:55,970
yeah, that's what immutability means.

873
00:43:56,000 --> 00:43:59,300
And tape is by design.

874
00:44:00,125 --> 00:44:04,355
Tape can be made to be
literally immutable.

875
00:44:04,505 --> 00:44:09,305
Uh, like even in the drive, it
cannot be overwritten, even if you've

876
00:44:09,305 --> 00:44:10,895
got physical access to the drive.

877
00:44:10,925 --> 00:44:13,565
It's, it's a truly immutable medium.

878
00:44:14,435 --> 00:44:21,395
And so, and, and even that feature aside,
it's a tape sitting on a shelf, right?

879
00:44:21,785 --> 00:44:24,545
And it, and it, and maybe even in
a, you know, you, you can secure

880
00:44:24,545 --> 00:44:25,805
it as much as you wanna secure it.

881
00:44:25,805 --> 00:44:27,635
You can put armed guards
in front of it, right?

882
00:44:28,415 --> 00:44:30,455
Um, and It.

883
00:44:30,725 --> 00:44:30,905
go

884
00:44:31,130 --> 00:44:32,420
it, does have a fatal flaw.

885
00:44:33,425 --> 00:44:33,935
Talk to me.

886
00:44:34,250 --> 00:44:34,850
Magnets.

887
00:44:38,900 --> 00:44:39,290
Okay.

888
00:44:39,290 --> 00:44:42,920
It for, for the record, it has to
be really, really strong magnets.

889
00:44:43,100 --> 00:44:47,960
It requires, so speaking as you know,
I work for a company, one of the things

890
00:44:47,960 --> 00:44:50,300
that we do is, is data destruction.

891
00:44:50,810 --> 00:44:53,960
Uh, it requires really big

892
00:44:53,960 --> 00:44:59,570
magnets in order to, in order to degausse
be the term to de to degausse tape.

893
00:44:59,600 --> 00:45:00,950
which is the same thing
with hard drives, right?

894
00:45:00,950 --> 00:45:03,080
If you get a strong enough magnet,
you're gonna have the same issue as well,

895
00:45:03,710 --> 00:45:04,700
Yeah, exactly.

896
00:45:05,090 --> 00:45:08,120
Um, and, um,

897
00:45:09,740 --> 00:45:10,040
but,

898
00:45:10,070 --> 00:45:15,140
but it, it's a, it's a hundred
percent immutable copy that is easy

899
00:45:15,140 --> 00:45:17,360
to get very far away from here.

900
00:45:17,510 --> 00:45:17,720
yep.

901
00:45:18,500 --> 00:45:18,950
Right.

902
00:45:19,370 --> 00:45:23,240
Um, you can have somebody completely
outside of your company holding onto it.

903
00:45:23,720 --> 00:45:24,830
You don't need to power it.

904
00:45:26,180 --> 00:45:31,790
This is, I think the, the, the, the
number one use case for tape in the.

905
00:45:32,240 --> 00:45:37,610
Backup and disaster recovery
arena today is Dr. Especially

906
00:45:37,610 --> 00:45:38,450
defense against ransomware.

907
00:45:39,125 --> 00:45:39,395
Yeah.

908
00:45:39,575 --> 00:45:44,495
And you don't even need to ship it
outside your site if you don't want

909
00:45:44,495 --> 00:45:52,085
to because of the fact that it is
an air gapped copy that is typically

910
00:45:52,085 --> 00:45:54,155
not available on the network.

911
00:45:55,790 --> 00:45:59,690
Well, I'm gonna say for
ransomware purposes, no,

912
00:45:59,765 --> 00:46:00,485
For ransomware.

913
00:46:01,220 --> 00:46:04,190
but when we start talking about
the other things, we do want that,

914
00:46:04,280 --> 00:46:05,570
that one copy somewhere else.

915
00:46:05,570 --> 00:46:05,900
Right.

916
00:46:07,220 --> 00:46:10,910
Um, what was the O-O-O-V-H?

917
00:46:11,300 --> 00:46:11,520
Yes.

918
00:46:13,550 --> 00:46:17,840
Just re just go listen to the episode
on the OVH disaster where they took

919
00:46:17,840 --> 00:46:25,130
out the fire, the very intensive fire
took out both the data center and the

920
00:46:25,130 --> 00:46:27,920
place where the, where the tapes were
because they were all in the same place.

921
00:46:28,740 --> 00:46:35,520
I remember the first time I went and I
saw someone else talking about backups

922
00:46:35,520 --> 00:46:36,780
and they were talking about tape.

923
00:46:38,040 --> 00:46:41,310
The title of the presentation was
basic, something along the lines

924
00:46:41,310 --> 00:46:43,500
of like, why tape sucks for backup.

925
00:46:45,360 --> 00:46:49,200
And it was this guy that had made a bunch
of tape backups and he had put them in

926
00:46:49,200 --> 00:46:53,940
a box and he had put the box on top of
the server and the server had caught

927
00:46:53,940 --> 00:46:56,580
fire and it had taken the tapes with it.

928
00:46:56,910 --> 00:46:58,440
And that's why tape backup suck.

929
00:47:02,190 --> 00:47:05,970
So there's a story I have
where someone, you and I know,

930
00:47:06,810 --> 00:47:07,320
Yeah.

931
00:47:07,440 --> 00:47:09,930
a developer working on a product for tape.

932
00:47:10,650 --> 00:47:10,830
Yeah.

933
00:47:10,905 --> 00:47:15,795
And, uh, he would basically, uh,
write the data out to the tape.

934
00:47:15,795 --> 00:47:18,375
He would take it outta the tape drive
because he was doing some testing

935
00:47:18,735 --> 00:47:19,875
and he would put it on his shelf

936
00:47:20,745 --> 00:47:21,195
Yeah,

937
00:47:21,195 --> 00:47:23,625
then he would go to go read the
tape again, and he'd have issues.

938
00:47:25,215 --> 00:47:26,415
He's like, what's going on?

939
00:47:26,415 --> 00:47:27,795
And he kept thinking, oh, it's my code.

940
00:47:27,795 --> 00:47:28,305
It's my code.

941
00:47:28,305 --> 00:47:30,435
He kept debugging it, taking
every look at everything.

942
00:47:31,425 --> 00:47:35,145
So apparently the shelf, he put his,
the tapes on underneath that was

943
00:47:35,145 --> 00:47:39,825
one of those lamps, lights, and it
stuck onto the thing with the magnet.

944
00:47:43,695 --> 00:47:44,625
that's pretty funny.

945
00:47:45,285 --> 00:47:45,825
Yes.

946
00:47:45,915 --> 00:47:50,535
So that was my first,
uh, intro into tapes.

947
00:47:50,865 --> 00:47:52,965
Is this a guy that rides
his bike to work a lot?

948
00:47:53,715 --> 00:47:54,345
That's what I thought.

949
00:47:54,375 --> 00:47:54,705
Okay.

950
00:47:54,795 --> 00:47:55,125
Yeah.

951
00:47:55,455 --> 00:47:57,225
Uh, so I know who you're talking about.

952
00:47:59,385 --> 00:48:01,245
Um, yeah, anyway.

953
00:48:01,275 --> 00:48:01,935
Interesting.

954
00:48:01,965 --> 00:48:02,535
Interesting.

955
00:48:02,535 --> 00:48:07,365
I, yeah, I'm trying to think if the, one
of the cooler stories that I remember that

956
00:48:07,365 --> 00:48:13,335
was like, that was, uh, that, um, there
was a, there was an offsite, like a, like

957
00:48:13,335 --> 00:48:15,135
a, what, what is it, what do we call it?

958
00:48:15,135 --> 00:48:15,555
The.

959
00:48:16,410 --> 00:48:17,400
Robo Right.

960
00:48:17,400 --> 00:48:18,810
Ramos branch office.

961
00:48:18,840 --> 00:48:22,590
And the solution for that
particular office was, they, they

962
00:48:22,590 --> 00:48:23,970
didn't have any IT people there.

963
00:48:24,090 --> 00:48:29,820
And so they had a security guard whose
job it was to take this, um, to take a,

964
00:48:29,825 --> 00:48:35,730
a, a case that was designed to hold a
single LTO tape, take out the LTO tape,

965
00:48:35,730 --> 00:48:40,530
put it in the case, FedEx the case back,
they would FedEx the other case back.

966
00:48:40,530 --> 00:48:42,660
And they, this is how
they did offsite tape.

967
00:48:43,440 --> 00:48:48,720
And it was months later that they
found out that he just found it easier

968
00:48:48,720 --> 00:48:50,580
to just not put anything in the case.

969
00:48:51,390 --> 00:48:52,590
It's So they were just shipping

970
00:48:53,190 --> 00:48:53,550
Empty

971
00:48:53,550 --> 00:48:54,690
tapes back and forth?

972
00:48:55,265 --> 00:48:55,845
Oh no.

973
00:48:56,280 --> 00:48:56,520
Yeah.

974
00:48:56,520 --> 00:49:00,510
They, and the way they, the way they
proved it, nobody thought to look at this.

975
00:49:00,600 --> 00:49:01,980
Nobody ever opened a case.

976
00:49:02,220 --> 00:49:02,280
yeah.

977
00:49:03,090 --> 00:49:03,510
Right.

978
00:49:03,840 --> 00:49:06,630
And so what they did was they went
and they looked back at the, uh, the

979
00:49:06,870 --> 00:49:07,470
The weight.

980
00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:08,520
weight.

981
00:49:08,660 --> 00:49:13,365
And the weight was, his weight is
always the, so he had never, ever put a

982
00:49:13,680 --> 00:49:14,820
Oh, no.

983
00:49:15,315 --> 00:49:15,645
Yeah.

984
00:49:15,645 --> 00:49:19,575
That another one, and another
one that I remember was, um, this

985
00:49:19,575 --> 00:49:24,675
woman that worked at a, this was
at a large, uh, aerospace company.

986
00:49:25,725 --> 00:49:33,015
And, um, she, they had a system where,
again, there were no IT people, but there

987
00:49:33,015 --> 00:49:37,185
was a tape there, and they would eject
the tape and she was supposed to pull that

988
00:49:37,185 --> 00:49:39,195
tape out and put another tape back in.

989
00:49:39,495 --> 00:49:41,535
She just kept pushing the tape back in.

990
00:49:42,135 --> 00:49:46,215
And so it, they had backups, but
they only had the latest backup.

991
00:49:46,755 --> 00:49:47,205
Right.

992
00:49:47,655 --> 00:49:51,435
And, um, and at the time that,
that turned out to be a problem.

993
00:49:51,540 --> 00:49:51,750
Yeah.

994
00:49:52,035 --> 00:49:52,255
Ugh.

995
00:49:52,605 --> 00:49:53,595
So, yeah.

996
00:49:53,595 --> 00:49:55,605
So tape, tape backup is not dead.

997
00:49:56,235 --> 00:50:00,105
Um, I will, oh, I, I now know
there was something that I,

998
00:50:00,105 --> 00:50:01,275
a point that I wanted to make

999
00:50:03,285 --> 00:50:06,165
while it is difficult,
near impossible, actually.

1000
00:50:07,035 --> 00:50:10,845
To do incremental backups directly to
tape, even if what we're talking about

1001
00:50:10,845 --> 00:50:15,015
is incremental backups once they have
been copied to some kind of disc medium.

1002
00:50:16,365 --> 00:50:21,105
Copying those backups to tape
should be easy peasy, right?

1003
00:50:21,105 --> 00:50:24,405
Because you should be able, and, and
that can be built into the design.

1004
00:50:24,795 --> 00:50:28,995
You can figure out what's the
speed of the, of the disc, right?

1005
00:50:29,085 --> 00:50:30,945
Uh, you know, and what's
the speed of the tape?

1006
00:50:30,945 --> 00:50:31,875
And you can match those.

1007
00:50:31,875 --> 00:50:33,945
It that should work.

1008
00:50:34,095 --> 00:50:36,915
You can build that into the design
and make sure that you've got

1009
00:50:36,915 --> 00:50:38,385
enough sufficient transfer speed.

1010
00:50:38,835 --> 00:50:40,635
Even if it's incremental
backups, it doesn't matter.

1011
00:50:40,635 --> 00:50:42,165
It should transfer to tape, no problem.

1012
00:50:42,675 --> 00:50:48,455
And so that's what that meant earlier
where I said when we back up to disc, uh,

1013
00:50:48,665 --> 00:50:51,575
I think the primary use of tape today.

1014
00:50:51,890 --> 00:50:59,630
In backup is that second copy, because
if we're using, let's say, a big D

1015
00:50:59,630 --> 00:51:07,910
dupe box for our operational backup and
recovery, it's very easy to make a copy

1016
00:51:07,910 --> 00:51:11,900
from that DDU box to tape and then ship
that even if you never used the tape.

1017
00:51:11,900 --> 00:51:14,270
It's still easy to do that
on a pretty regular basis.

1018
00:51:14,810 --> 00:51:14,990
Oh

1019
00:51:16,040 --> 00:51:17,780
What what, what, what, what is that?

1020
00:51:17,780 --> 00:51:18,830
What is this face?

1021
00:51:19,220 --> 00:51:21,350
I would never, sorry.

1022
00:51:22,100 --> 00:51:25,910
Depending on the architecture
of the deduplicate appliance

1023
00:51:26,390 --> 00:51:31,730
and how it's configured, doing
reads from disc to do take that

1024
00:51:31,730 --> 00:51:33,350
backup and run it off to tape.

1025
00:51:33,800 --> 00:51:36,470
Could be painful, slow, and slower,

1026
00:51:36,470 --> 00:51:39,410
in fact, than your initial backup speeds.

1027
00:51:41,090 --> 00:51:42,200
as I mentioned.

1028
00:51:43,085 --> 00:51:44,255
It should work.

1029
00:51:45,425 --> 00:51:47,255
You need to figure it into the design.

1030
00:51:47,765 --> 00:51:53,465
You may find that the DDU box that
you, that you want to buy or one

1031
00:51:53,465 --> 00:51:57,695
that you already own, that the speeds
with, which I would argue, I would

1032
00:51:57,695 --> 00:52:02,975
argue that if it's truly that slow
at transferring those backups out

1033
00:52:02,975 --> 00:52:05,075
to tape, it would also be truly slow

1034
00:52:05,405 --> 00:52:06,575
when doing a recovery.

1035
00:52:07,085 --> 00:52:09,305
'cause the operation is identical.

1036
00:52:10,085 --> 00:52:14,135
And so if that is a problem with
your d dupe device that you are

1037
00:52:14,135 --> 00:52:15,725
using, then you need to address that.

1038
00:52:16,925 --> 00:52:17,165
Yeah.

1039
00:52:18,695 --> 00:52:19,985
So we're on the same page there.

1040
00:52:19,985 --> 00:52:20,405
I think,

1041
00:52:20,420 --> 00:52:20,720
Okay.

1042
00:52:21,455 --> 00:52:23,495
uh, you know, I was
telling you about that.

1043
00:52:23,645 --> 00:52:26,435
I was telling you yesterday, I was
talking about that box that I worked

1044
00:52:26,435 --> 00:52:28,115
with a hundred years ago where

1045
00:52:28,785 --> 00:52:30,615
this was a long time ago.

1046
00:52:31,935 --> 00:52:33,165
The, the aggregate.

1047
00:52:33,915 --> 00:52:36,645
Backup speed, you know, to back up to it,

1048
00:52:37,245 --> 00:52:38,775
uh, or right speed, I guess you would say.

1049
00:52:38,775 --> 00:52:41,085
The aggregate right speed
was 400 megabytes per second.

1050
00:52:41,445 --> 00:52:44,805
The aggregate, uh, read speed.

1051
00:52:44,895 --> 00:52:49,425
So no matter how many backups you re
no ma, no matter how many restores you

1052
00:52:49,425 --> 00:52:54,495
ran, uh, it was 40 megabytes per second.

1053
00:52:55,330 --> 00:52:55,620
Ouch.

1054
00:52:57,735 --> 00:53:01,995
And, um, they, they, address
that, uh, in, in later designs

1055
00:53:01,995 --> 00:53:03,105
of that particular product.

1056
00:53:03,105 --> 00:53:07,455
But, um, yeah, you, you cannot assume
you, not only can you not assume, you

1057
00:53:07,455 --> 00:53:08,805
should probably assume the opposite.

1058
00:53:09,285 --> 00:53:13,605
You should probably assume that
reed speeds are gonna suck because

1059
00:53:13,695 --> 00:53:18,975
of the way that some DDU data gets,
uh, written down to, to, to disc.

1060
00:53:20,745 --> 00:53:23,595
Um, okay, so.

1061
00:53:25,200 --> 00:53:28,950
So tape's not dead, um,
not going anywhere soon.

1062
00:53:29,130 --> 00:53:33,270
It's still still the cheapest,
most effective way to, to,

1063
00:53:33,330 --> 00:53:34,710
to transfer data around.

1064
00:53:34,770 --> 00:53:38,010
Also great about storing data in
the first place holds onto it.

1065
00:53:38,670 --> 00:53:41,520
You just have to build that
into your design from a backup

1066
00:53:41,520 --> 00:53:42,600
and recovery perspective.

1067
00:53:42,600 --> 00:53:46,230
And so most people when designing
backup systems today, don't use tape as

1068
00:53:46,230 --> 00:53:49,890
a, certainly not as the initial copy,
but they might use it as a secondary

1069
00:53:49,890 --> 00:53:51,660
copy, and I have no problem with that.

1070
00:53:51,690 --> 00:53:51,930
Yeah,

1071
00:53:53,190 --> 00:53:55,800
Um, any final thoughts from you?

1072
00:53:57,660 --> 00:54:02,760
the only comment I had was when we were
talking about the hyperscalers and their

1073
00:54:02,760 --> 00:54:05,370
use of tape and offering
this low cost storage.

1074
00:54:05,395 --> 00:54:05,685
yeah.

1075
00:54:05,910 --> 00:54:09,150
Um, I know we always talk about
throw the data in there and never

1076
00:54:09,150 --> 00:54:11,400
touch it, because that's probably
what you're going to do, but

1077
00:54:11,400 --> 00:54:16,410
please make sure you at least test it
before you make that conclusion because.

1078
00:54:17,095 --> 00:54:17,385
yeah.

1079
00:54:17,715 --> 00:54:21,135
at least understand, because as we're
talking about the restore speeds of that

1080
00:54:21,135 --> 00:54:23,235
appliance you were talking about, right.

1081
00:54:23,235 --> 00:54:24,075
I was like, oh yeah.

1082
00:54:24,075 --> 00:54:28,755
People should probably test what the
restore performance looks like from that

1083
00:54:28,755 --> 00:54:35,775
copy if they are using cloud or deep
archive storage in the cloud, just to

1084
00:54:35,775 --> 00:54:37,875
make sure they understand
the performance of that.

1085
00:54:38,355 --> 00:54:40,590
I, I, I, I don't have any
problem with that comment.

1086
00:54:40,650 --> 00:54:44,040
I, and I, you know, and I, I would say
that's probably true of all parts of it,

1087
00:54:44,940 --> 00:54:45,300
right?

1088
00:54:45,720 --> 00:54:48,030
Anywhere, especially anywhere
where you're storing data.

1089
00:54:48,080 --> 00:54:50,540
So thanks, Prasanna for the conversation.

1090
00:54:52,150 --> 00:54:52,440
Okay.

1091
00:54:57,095 --> 00:55:01,565
You're hilarious and thanks to our
listeners, make sure to subscribe

1092
00:55:01,895 --> 00:55:03,725
so that you don't miss an episode.

1093
00:55:03,935 --> 00:55:05,165
That is a wrap.