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Assuring Data Integrity of Tape Storage with Spectra Libraries While you can count on data integrity being addressed through multiple mechanisms for disk, how do you address the data integrity issues that require attention but occur after the data is written to tape media? After data has been written to tape, confirming the integrity of data stored onto tape media has only been possible through labor and time-intensive manual testing of tapes—tasks which are rarely given priority.
 
Spectra's Suite of Features

To give you data integrity verification on tape, Spectra's BlueScale management interface offers a sophisticated suite of standard features that allow you to actively check data already written to tape. Each process is performed by the library independent of the application is used to read and write data to the tape.

PreScan ensures that tapes are usable and can accept data. PreScan checks each imported tape and verifies that the tape can be written to, scanning the tape for potential issues including broken or dislodged leader, poor media health and write-protected status.

QuickScan confirms that a single track (one direction) can be read. QuickScan scans a tape uni-directionally by reading the length of one track of the tape to provide a rapid indicator of integrity of data written.

PostScan checks an entire tape to ensure that all sectors can be read. PostScan confirms that there are no media errors on the tape by reading the entire length of the tape up to the end of the recorded data.

After the PreScan, QuickScan and PostScan operations are complete, the library stores the information into a database. Users can set triggers to check the health of tapes over an interval of time to ensure that the data is valid. Users can also verify a specific tape's data integrity on request. This process allows for rapid spot-checks of data integrity.

 
 

Spectra T-Series are the only family of libraries available that address the concern of data integrity stored on tape. Spectra libraries confirm data integrity using an integrated, intelligent and comprehensive set of features that can verify that your data has been properly written to tape.

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Data Integrity Verification tools are available as a standard feature on all Spectra T-Series Libraries.

“The tape market has taken significant steps to separate itself from disk in recent years and this feature is a great addition to that wave of improvements. Spectra is the first vendor to offer a solid data integrity assurance solution, which proactively mitigates potential issues that would otherwise be below the visibility line for end users.”

—Fred Moore, President, Horison Inc.

 
 

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