Tape Backup Software and Tape Backups Are Not Dead - Yet!. By Steven C

The supporters are getting together to save the tape backup software dinosaur from extinction. They need not, the backup universe still revolves around the tape, but the fear is genuine, and rightly so. The virtual tape libraries are catching up fast, though the tape backups are not dead yet, it is just in its later stages.

In many of the bigger corporations, disk based backups are being increasingly used for faster backups as well as specific file recoveries that were accidentally deleted by users. It's true that the tape backup software still remains the backup choice for many; however, the trend is going to change soon due to retrieval convenience, afforded by block level backups, offsite capabilities, and emerging virtualization technologies that allow a backup system to be more than just a backup device in the event of a disaster.

One of the big problems with tape backups and tape backup software is their failure rate. Not even touching on the subject of human intervention, tape backups simply fail. Analysts estimate that anywhere from 42 to 71 percent of all tape backups fail. Magnetic tapes just do not stand the test of time or multiple writes all that well. Tapes, in contrast to disk, are physically delicate and easily compromised by environmental factors such as heat, humidity, and magnetic interference.

Tape backups and tape backup software also take a considerable amount of time to restore in comparison to a disk-based backup solution. Tape backup software is usually painfully slow. Time is a crucial consideration when a server, application or network drive goes down as each hour that goes by can be quite costly to almost any business.

While disk-based backups are notably more efficient than tape-based systems, they are not the end-all-be-all solution. Simply migrating to a disk-based backup solution does not alleviate the network administrator or small business owner of monitoring and managing backup processes, encrypting and safeguarding backed up onsite and offsite data, restoring data to new hardware and other functions.

There are many considerations a small business owner needs to make when developing a solid backup plan. While the tape backup and tape back software market is not completely dead yet, it seems that anyone implementing or thinking about a backup plan might want to consider a disk-based backup solution. Another worthy consideration is adding offsite storage.

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