Category: Storage

Review: SanDisk Pro-Blade Ecosystem

by davidhague178181403, posted in Reviews: Hardware, Reviews: Other (not under any other category), Storage, Today

The concept is stunningly simple in its execution.

Imagine a “memory stick” on steroids capable of holding 1TB and with units available up to 4TB. To get data on and off it, there is an aluminium cradle affair that looks like, and is about the same size as, say a 10K mAh Powerbank.

This means you can have a couple or more of these “memory sticks”, and safely have data such as video or mass numbers of stills backed up safely from the camera / camcorder medium. To add icing to the cake, the Mags are hot swappable too.

This is called the SanDisk Pro-Blade Ecosystem, comprising the Pro-Blade Mags (the memory sticks) and the Pro-Blade Transport (the cradle). Also included (optionally) is the Pro-Blade Station which can carry 4 Pro-Blade mags at once, simultaneous offloading and super-fast speeds up to 3000MB/s read and write.

The Pro-Blade Transport in contrast can “only” read and write 2000MB/s.

It’s not only technically very impressive, but looks the goods too, all stylish and science-fictiony in ribbed gun metal.

The Mags start at AUD$329 for the 1TB units, the Transport is a further $149. The Station will be released in a few weeks, and we’ll have a price then.

One area this will be of interest to many is the ability for this unit to be plugged directly into a camera such as the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera Pro 6K. Instead of having to swap out drives when they are full (which does not take long in RAW); you can just switch out a Mag and replace it with a new one on the fly.

But before you race out the door to get one (I can imagine any number of people that will be dribbling over this), there is a catch and a ‘gotcha’.

The ‘gotcha’ first. Unless I am as blind as a bat, nowhere in the documentation I got is there mention that ALL SanDisk products are preformatted as the Mac OS. This means that if you try and get it working on a Windows PC, it simply will refuse. The fix to that is here.

And that catch is that USB 3.2 Gen 2 x 2 is needed to be able to read / write at maximum speed.

My workhorse desktop is a 4-year-old Dell XPS, and while this will read the likes of Samsung T5s and T7s, it wouldn’t have a bar of the Pro-Blade. Sure, you get the customary beep when connected, but while showing in Disk Management under Windows 10, it will not mount as a working readable / writeable drive.

4 years in the life of a computer is a long time, so I wasn’t overly surprised, if not a tad disappointed. But not to worry, my 12-month-old Gigabyte Aero laptop will no doubt be up to date enough?

Nope. Same result.

I had to interrupt the proceedings to go into town, and as an afterthought, took the Pro-Blade Mag and Transport with me. One of my errands was next door to the local Hardly Normal, and so popped in there to see what they had on display that would read it (without going to the exorbitant costs of some of the gaming machines on show).

None of them is the short answer.

It took my wife’s up to date iMac she uses for creating music with Logic Pro to finally break the impasse.

And now that it has been broken, the Pro-Blade system IS impressive. There is not really a lot you can say about it really, as it does exactly what it says it’ll do. And bloody fast at that!

But even then, it is still only running at ½ the capable speed as far as I can tell, with not even this mighty Mac giving the full USB 3.2 Gen 2 x 2 support.

You see, USB 3.2 2×2 supports 2 lanes of data going at 10Gb/s both ways to reach the maximum speed of 20Gb/s. Macs however (and still many PCs) can only support one lane of data flow through USB 3.2 2×2 cables and devices though and so you will only get USB 3.1 Gen 2 speeds on a Mac i.e. 10Gb/s via one single lane.

I do stand to be corrected if I have missed something by the way.

Now I don’t pretend to be a technical person as such. I get the gist of most stuff but prefer plug ‘n’ play to going back to the bad old days. In my researching of all this, I was fortunate enough to get sent a chart of info by Ray Shaw from Cybershack that gave me serious assistance as per below, so thanks Ray.

  • USB-A 1.0 1.5-12Mbps half-duplex (< half-speed both ways)
  • USB-A 2.0 480Mb/s half-duplex
  • USB- A 3.0 5Gb/s. half-duplex (has a Blue tongue and likely on PCs post-2010)
  • USB-C 3.1 Gen 1×1. 5Gbps half-duplex (PCs post-2015)
  • 3.1 Gen 2×1. 10Gbps (full-duplex approx. full speed both ways. PCs post-2018)
  • 3.2 Gen 2×2, 20Gbpps (full-duplex likely on PCs post-2020)
  • 4.0 Gen 2×2, 20GB/s (full-duplex. PCs late 2021)
  • 4.0 Gen 3×2, 40Gbps (full-duplex) but rare
  • Thunderbolt 3, 40Gbps and backwards compatible with USB-C 3.2 Gen 1 (or may require a dongle/dock
  • Thunderbolt 4, 40Gbps and backwards compatible with USB-C 4.0 and 3.2 Gen 2

The end result of all this is that I have decided to bite the bullet and buy a new computer to future proof at least the next 4 years. These days that is a mammoth task in itself with so many permutations available, even if you discard laptops and all-in-ones.

Last time I bought online (the Dell), and after trawling around the displays at hardly Normal, JB Hi-Fi and Officeworks etc, I have decided to revisit that method (at least 3 people assured me that I only needed 8GB RAM for video editing).

It turns out a PC (no monitor or keyboard) to match all the specs needed is going to cost about $3299.

So, this turned into a slightly expensive review!

Review: Kyno Asset Management

by davidhague178181403, posted in Reviews: Other (not under any other category), Storage, Today

In our quest to find the perfect – or as near to perfect as possible – clip manager to catalogue and tag the thousands of video files, stills and images we have created, shot or otherwise obtained over the years, our journey took us to Kyno, available for both the Mac and the PC.

At AUD$229 to buy with one year of updates and licences for three computers (for one person), it is not a deal breaker for the individual by a long shot; a “premium” version for the corporate types is still only AUD$509 (again for one year). Updates after this period are at your discretion and are AUD$115 and AUD$245 respectively per annum.

The Interface

The main interface is like the usual File Manager / Finder style work area with a Devices section showing all of your internal hard drives, external USB drives, plugged in SD cards and the like plus an extra section for Jobs.

The Workspace area is automatically set up – under Windows it is your username but can be any folder you also wish to drag in to that section.

Jobs contains all the current background tasks Kyno is running.

When you select a folder in devices, you can display files by either thumbnail, list or detail. Thumbnail is the default, List displays all the details of all files in a list mode and Detail shows a single file inside Kyno’s own video player. A filter button lets you select exactly which files are to be displayed.

A nice touch is to filter by file modification, useful for those who don’t remove files from SD cards or you are not one of those who clean up files very often.

A second button lets you sort by different criteria, and we found that the list view is the best way to use this option, letting you see the sorting options much more clearly, such as clip length for example.

Detail mode is the most – well – detailed, with not only the ability to play clips, but display all of the metadata attached to a file. You can also transcode or export a file from Detail view and perform various other options from a drop-down menu.

On the right-hand side of the clip player, there is a separate tabbed section. The Metadata tab lets you add your own metadata such as a description, date shot, take number, angle, camera used and any tags you’d like to apply to the clip. The Content tab shows a visual multiple thumbnail overview of the clip’s content. The SubClip tab shows any subclips you have created from this clip and the Tracks tab contains metadata from the tracks in the file.  Finally, the Histogram tab shows the clip’s Histogram in real time as the clip is played.

Note that subclips are only shown AFTER they are defined in Kyno, not ones you have created in your NLE. Bummer but there you go. (But I understand the limitation subclips in NLEs offer making this option almost impossible)

One nice touch is that when an SD card is inserted, it is automatically detected and when opened, is in a “drill down” mode meaning that all files on the card are displayed, not just the ones in the root directory. For those unfamiliar with folder hierarchies on SD cards, this saves a whole lot of clicking around to find the files you are after.

The “drill down” mode can actually be added to any device or folder listed in Devices if you wish, which is a major bonus.

Files can be renamed either individually or in a batch mode using presets, and the destination of renamed files changed to a folder you designate. This alone I reckon is worth the price of Kyno!

The Player

The clip player in Kyno is pretty straightforward with a few extra features. In and out points can be set, and you can enable looping between these when playing back in the player. You can also zoom into a clip using the mouse or trackpad to check the quality of your footage.

If shooting slo–mo footage, the player can be set to play back the footage at your final project settings. Eg if you have shot footage at 120p, you can play it back at 24fps to see exactly how it will look.

You also have a zebra and wide screen filter available to check footage. Markers can be set with titles and descriptive text and then used as navigated points, mark issues, still points to export and much more.

Transcoding

Transcoding (converting) couldn’t be easier. Simply select a file or files, right click and choose convert form the drop down menu and select a preset. Presets are listed in different categories making it nice and easy to choose the one you want. Transcoding works in the background.

Once you have chosen to transcode a file or files, these will then appear in the jobs section of the workspace. If you have set in and out points in a clip, these will be honoured during the transcoding process and the file trimmed accordingly.

I found this useful for GoPro recordings especially, where there is a lot of “head and tail” footage you don’t want.

Output folders and filenames sent for transcoding can all be individually specified.

Other Functionality

Just the basics alone mean Kyno is super powerful, but there is other stuff too. You can create export lists of files with timecodes, marker points and subclip info included directly from Kyno into Excel format so that another editor can quickly go through the clip to quickly find the points referenced, and there is a client reporting section built right in for example.

A BIG feature in my book is the ability to select a clip, whether it be image or video, complete with any meta tags, and send it straight to either Photoshop for editing or into the media pool of Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve. You can also play back clips in Kyno that have been encoded with Blackmagic RAW.

This feature alone is a damn fine reason to switch to DaVinci Resolve or of course, Adobe Creative Cloud if your prefer that workflow style.

 If you are an AVID Media Composer user with Kyno 1.8 Premium Edition, Avid Media Composer workflows are supported through ALE export as well as copy and paste for markers between Kyno and Media Composer.

Conclusion

As always, we recommend that you download and have a play with the trial version of Kyno and see how it fits in with your workflow.

For the social media / videoblog folk, I suspect the freebie MYNC is more than is necessary, but if you need a bit more – or a lot more – grunt that this offers, Kyno is a well-constructed, easy to learn and use and extremely powerful piece of software for clip management with a very affordable price tag.

You can get the trial version at www.lesspain.software.com.

 

 

Memory? Who needs memory? Well your camera will soon. And lots of it.

by davidhague178181403, posted in Features, Reviews: Hardware, Reviews: Other (not under any other category), Storage, Today

As we speak, Dr David Smith is reviewing a Blackmagic URSA 12K camera for  Australian Videocamera. Yep, that’s right, 12K. Makes my little(?) Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 6K Pro sound tiny, doesn’t it?

We hope to have the full review available shortly, but the major reason for this piece is to highlight an issue that is going to be more and more front and centre as camera and optics technology goes forward.

Recordable memory.

Not that long ago, a 256GB SD card was classified as “yuge” and cost a pretty penny. The trouble is, if I put one of those in the BPCC 6K Pro and shoot at maximum resolution, I’ll get around 16 minutes. And it costs around $350 for the 128GB version that is fast enough to record at the full 6K in Blackmagic RAW.

As this camera also supports CFast cards, how do they compare cost wise then? A bit more expensive as it turns out, although you can get them up to 1TB (which’ll set you back over a grand!).

The best option then seemingly is to go for an external SSD. But not all USB-C drives are equal as it turns out.

Thankfully, Blackmagic Design has a useful section of their website detailing exactly what SSD’s (and SD and CF cards) are supported. Sadly, and my mistake, I only discovered this after the fact, and blew some $ on a non-supported Samsung drive instead of the supported Samsung T5 1TB unit. Never mind, that now acts as a storage drive for the Blackmagic Design ATEM Mini Pro and is doing a Stirling job there

So I got the T5 (seems I was lucky to find it though as they seem as rare as rocking horse poo), and it set me set me back just over $130 on special, and while is adequate, for general purpose shooting, is not usable at the full 6K Blackmagic RAW 5:1 up to 50 fps, being limited to 6K 2.4:1 Blackmagic RAW 5:1 up to 60 fps and lower. Trap for the unwary; it is easy to think that if you cannot find a T5, a T7 will suffice. Not so. Blackmagic tells me there are reports of “issues” with these at present.

For the full beans, I was pointed to a LaCie Rugged SSD Pro at around $600 and this is doing a champion job.  Being small. I am currently working out a way of adapting a phone holder to contain it and it’ll then mount on the Miller Air 75 Solo tripod nicely.

As I stated at the start, as the tech of cameras gets better and better, having to use this amount of memory for recording is going to become the norm. My suggestion therefore is if you are about to fork out hard earned cash for SD cards or the like, go as high in capacity as you can as in the not-too-distant future, you are going to need it. 128GB will be as laughable in a year or so as 16GB is now.

Oh and for reference, the test files David Smith shot for his review – and these are JUST test files – amounted to 900GB!

Seagate Serves Edge Security Applications with New SkyHawk AI 20TB Advanced Video-Optimised Drive

by davidhague178181403, posted in Storage, Today

AI-enabled video imaging and analytics systems require support for heavy workloads that process and analyse multiple streams and thousands of hours of video data. Seagate® Technology Holdings plc (NASDAQ: STX), a world leader in mass-data storage infrastructure solutions, launched the new SkyHawk™ AI 20TB hard disk drive (HDD). The mass-capacity HDD adds to the company’s leading line of video imaging and analytics (VIA) devices.

Purposely designed for network video recorders (NVRs) enabled with AI for edge security applications, Seagate’s SkyHawk AI 20TB HDD intelligently adapts to the scale of the users’ AI environment, supporting up to 64 HD video streams and 32 AI streams. With this capability to support scalable AI workloads, SkyHawk AI meets the growing needs of advanced VIA systems to analyse and record video footage while simultaneously supporting GPU analytics. 

Built with ImagePerfect™ AI firmware, the drive delivers zero dropped frames while supporting heavier workloads. An enterprise-class drive, the new SkyHawk AI 20TB features high reliability with two million hours mean time between failures (MTBF) and a 550TB/year workload rate, supporting over three times the workload of standard VIA drives.

The drive comes equipped with SkyHawk Health Management to actively protect users’ VIA storage by monitoring environmental and usage conditions and recommending preventative actions if necessary. With three years of Rescue Data Recovery Services, SkyHawk AI gives users the power to recover data from unexpected loss due to power outages, user error, and more. 

Qualified and tested by Seagate’s VIA partners earlier this year, SkyHawk AI 20TB is available now in Australia for AUD$1059 and available to order in New Zealand for NZD$1219 with five-year product warranty via Seagate authorised distributors

Blackmagic Design Announces New Cintel Scanner Light Source

by davidhague178181403, posted in News, News: Accessories - Audio, Gimbals, Tripods etc, Storage, Today

Blackmagic Design today announced a technology demonstration at NAB 2022 of a new high intensity light source for Cintel film scanners that lets customers get better quality from scanned film and much higher film scanning speeds.

The new light source for Cintel Scanner will be demonstrated on the Blackmagic Design NAB 2022 booth #N302.

The new light source technology is much higher power than the light source used on the previous generation of Cintel film scanners. It consists of a square array of 576 high power LEDs arranged into a grid pattern, and then focused onto the film using a new light cylinder. This new design provides more than twice the silicon area for generating light and the result is much more light is directed at the film.

The new light source technology allows much faster HDR film scanning. This is because the new light source is 6 times more powerful, and there are tens of kilowatts of power contained in the illumination flash when each frame of the film is scanned. Previously HDR film had to be scanned at a slower rate of 10 frames per second. Now the film can be scanned at 30 frames per second. That’s up to 3 times faster than before.

There is also a new film inspection mode. This lets customers check the condition of the film, so they can see if there is any dust or scratches. The customers simply need to press and hold the stop button and the light source will be adjusted so the light is more single direction and then dust and scratches can be seen. On the current generation Cintel film scanners, the spherical light source can not change the direction of light as it is always diffused. The light source can be fully controlled in software, which means the customer gets better control and can check the film before scanning.

“We are excited to discuss this new technology with film customers at the NAB 2022 show,” said Grant Petty, Blackmagic Design CEO. “We plan on using this technology on a new model of Cintel film scanner and we are excited get customer feedback before committing to the new model’s release!”


OWC Announces Release of SoftRAID 6.2 for Mac

by davidhague178181403, posted in Press Releases General, Storage, Today

SoftRAID is said to be the most powerful, intuitive RAID management software on the market for macOS and Windows. It has impressive features like multiple RAID options and predictive disk failure monitoring that provide a level of performance that you can’t get with hardware RAID. The all-new SoftRAID 6.2 builds on this solid foundation with new technology and features, making it the most powerful RAID utility available.

What’s New in SoftRAID 6.2 for Mac

Compatible

SoftRAID 6.2 adds support for the all-new macOS 12 – Monterey.

APFS

For the first time ever, SoftRAID supports the creation, management, and monitoring of APFS volumes and enables access to encrypted APFS volumes created with Disk Utility1

Incredibly Quick
The re-engineered SoftRAID driver features a new method of handling TRIM commands on SSDs. The new mechanism is 3x faster than before. What does this mean in the real world? For example, using SoftRAID with an OWC Accelsior 8M2 PCIe card enables continuous data transfer over 10GB/s! This level of performance isn’t possible in previous versions of SoftRAID and is impossible with RAID volumes not using TRIM commands, like Apple RAID.2

“SoftRAID is for anyone who needs to safely store and backup important data, including audio/video pros, photographers, archivers, families, and small businesses,” said Tim Standing, OWC VP of Software Development – Mac. “SoftRAID offers vast advantages over hardware RAID and makes catastrophic data loss a thing of the past.”

At SoftRAID’s core are RAID creation and management technology that has been finely tuned over 20 years of development. Multiple RAID levels give you maximum volume capacity, optimal drive efficiency, data protection, or a combination of attributes. SoftRAID is perfect for anyone who needs to store and back up massive amounts of data safely.

SoftRAID Highlights:

  • Universal: SoftRAID works with both Mac and Windows and built-in OWC MacDrive technology lets you seamlessly move SoftRAID volumes between OSes
  • Advanced: Create RAID 0/1/4/5/1+0 (10) with Macs, RAID 0/1 with Windows machines
  • Streamlined: Disk tiles are grouped together by enclosure making it easier to keep track of multiple drives
  • Licensing: Easily activate, deactivate, and add additional discounted seats
  • Protected: SoftRAID Monitor constantly watches your disks and alerts you if problems are detected 
  • Validated: Volume validation ensures sectors can be read and parity is correct  
  • Certified: Checks disks before use to ensure they are safe for data storage
  • Vigilant: Error prediction helps protect against unexpected failure

SoftRAID is powerful yet easy-to-use RAID software that maximizes drive capacity offers faster performance and protects against data loss. It’s ideal for voluminous data roles, including audio/video production and editing, photography, graphic design, database servers, financial applications, and more. It is the brain for running, maintaining, and protecting your RAID arrays.  

Pricing & Availability

SoftRAID 6.2 is a free upgrade for current SoftRAID 6 users and discounted upgrades are available at the OWC Software Store (https://software.owcdigital.com) for SoftRAID 5 users. SoftRAID also ships with select OWC enclosures including ThunderBays, ThunderBlade, Express 4M2, Mercury Elite Pro Quad, Mercury Pro U.2 Dual, and Accelsiors. As always, you can test drive SoftRAID for yourself, FREE, with the full featured 14-day trial.

Compatibility

SoftRAID 6.2 for Mac is compatible with macOS 10.12 or later including macOS 12. Apple silicon (M1) Macs require macOS 11.3 or later. SoftRAID 2 for Windows works with Windows 10. SoftRAID is licensed per computer, additional discounted seat purchases are available https://software.owcdigital.com.

1 SoftRAID can create unencrypted APFS volumes, one volume per container. SoftRAID cannot create encrypted volumes but does support volumes encrypted by Disk Utility.

2 TRIM commands allow the file system to tell SSDs when a file is deleted and allows SSDs to erase the flash memory, which corresponds to the deleted file in the background, so it is ready for subsequent writes to the volume. For more information on SoftRAID and TRIM visit https://www.softraid.com/using-softraid/ – ssd.

 

FUJIFILM Launches Sustainable Data Storage Initiative To Drive Sustainable Practices In Data Storage

by davidhague178181403, posted in News, Press Releases General, Storage, Today

FUJIFILM Corporation has announced the creation of the Sustainable Data Storage Initiative to highlight how tape technology can significantly reduce electricity consumption and CO2 emissions related to data storage. The initiative launches with a white paper, Accelerating Green Datacentre Progress with Sustainable Storage Strategies, published by technology research firm IDC, and sponsored by Fujifilm, providing an in-depth analysis of the significant energy savings and resulting environmental benefits of moving more data to tape storage.

“We’re proud to launch the Sustainable Data Storage Initiative to help spread awareness of today’s modern data tape technology as a solution to reducing CO2 emissions from data storage operations while simultaneously  being very cost-effective,” said Hironobu Taketomi, President, FUJIFILM Recording Media USA Inc. “Beginning with this study, Fujifilm’s global initiative will help companies around the world make smart decisions when assessing their storage options with sustainability objectives in mind.”

As the world faces a climate crisis, and the amount of stored data continues to grow unabated due to digital transformation and development of next generation technologies, data centres are under increased scrutiny for consuming large amounts of energy that result in increased CO2 emissions. The goal of Sustainable Data Storage Initiative is to spread awareness of the solutions that can reduce the environmental impact of data centres.

The IDC whitepaper summarises findings on how to enhance the sustainability of data storage. Following are key highlights from the paper:

  • Reporting from several major data centres found that energy consumption increased by 31% from 2017 to 2020, and the amount of data stored in data centres is expected to grow by 27% each year through to 2025.
  • Relying on renewable energy alone is not enough to keep up with rapid growth in data centres’ power consumption. Water, wind and solar power also have their own associated impacts on the environment (i.e., disposing of wind turbines and solar panels).
  • To negate this growing issue and protect the environment from further damage, IDC estimates that strategically migrating more data storage to tape can reduce CO2 emissions by 43.7%, or 664 million metric tonnes, by 2030.
  • Tape storage offers additional security benefits such as immutability, encryption features and offline “air gap” protection against cyber criminals.
  • Tape is the most cost-effective storage media on a cost per gigabyte basis, requires minimal power to operate and is reliable for storing data for periods exceeding 30 years with an excellent bit error rate (BER).

In addition to implementing renewable energy and tape solutions, the whitepaper discusses other ways organisations can reduce their environmental impact, including investing in AI-influenced cooling control, increasing transparency into resources with real-time monitoring and control, and improving IT utilisation rates through virtualisation and containerisation technologies.

To learn more, you can access the full whitepaper here.

FUJIFILM launches ultra-fast, 45TB LTO Ultrium9 Data Cartridge

by davidhague178181403, posted in News, News: Camera Hardware, Press Releases General, Storage

FUJIFILM has launched its new, ultra-fast 45TB FUJIFILM LTO Ultrium9 Data Cartridge (LTO-9). The new LTO-9 data cartridge complies with the ninth generation LTO Ultrium*2 standards for magnetic tape storage media, suitable for backing up and archiving large-capacity data. LTO-9 uses FUJIFILM’s proprietary technology to offer up to 45TB in storage capacity (18TB for non-compressed data) which is 1.5 times larger than LTO-8*3.

Magnetic tapes are attracting an increasing attention as storage media that provides long-term storage of large-capacity data safely at low cost. In addition, it has a significantly lower environmental impact as there is no need to have it constantly powered on during data storage, thereby mitigating the amount of CO2 emissions generated during data storage by 95%*4 compared to hard disk drives (HDDs).

The high capacity, achieved in the new LTO-9, caters to the surging data storage demand amidst the rapid development of IoT technology and acceleration of Digital Transformation, and contributes to mitigating CO2 emissions, an urgent task that must be addressed globally.

The amount of data generated worldwide has exponentially increased in recent years with the introduction of 5G networks and high-definition 4K / 8K video, development of IoT, information and communication technology, and the use of Artificial Intelligence for Big Data analysis. This includes “cold-data,” or data that was generated a long time ago and rarely accessed, which is estimated to account for more than 80% of all data.

The utilisation of accumulated data, including cold data, is rapidly increasing for developing next-generation technologies, and so is the need for reliable and cost-effective long-term storage of such data for future use. Yet, consuming a large amount of electricity for using and storing high-volume data amounts will lead to increased CO2 emissions.

Major data centres and private enterprises are actively adopting renewable energy to satisfy their electricity demand, or building a data infrastructure with minimal power use, in their efforts to address climate change, which is one of the major social issues.

The new LTO-9 features barium ferrite magnetic particles (BaFe magnetic particles), formulated into fine particles with Fujifilm’s proprietary “NANOCUBIC technology*5”, evenly distributed to coat tape surfaces, forming a smooth and thin magnetic layer with minimum unevenness. This has resulted in the maximum storage capacity of 45TB (18TB for non-compressed data), some 1.5 times the capacity of LTO-8.

The new tape also delivers high-speed data transfer reaching 1,000MB/sec*6. (400MB/sec. for non-compressed data) for advanced convenience. Furthermore, there is no need to have it constantly powered on during data storage, thereby reducing the amount of electricity consumption in the process compared to HDDs.

Magnetic tapes can also be stored offline, creating “air gap” as a form of protection to minimise the risk of data damage / loss in cyberattacks. The fact that the storage media provides long-term storage of high-capacity data safely, has made magnetic tape a preferred choice of major data centres and research institutes for many years.

As a manufacturer of computer-use magnetic tapes with the top global market share*7, FUJIFILM will continue to develop and supply high-performance and high-quality media and services that satisfy customer needs and expectations, thereby addressing social issues.

Main features of the LTO-9 data cartridge

(1) Incorporates unique BaFe magnetic particles to achieve the maximum storage capacity of 45TB

The new LTO-9 features BaFe magnetic particles, formulated into fine particles with Fujifilm’s proprietary NANOCUBIC technology*5, evenly dispersed to coat tape surfaces, forming a smooth and thin magnetic layer with minimum unevenness. The data recording density has also been improved to record 8,960 data tracks in 12.65mm-wide tape to achieve the storage capacity of up to 45TB (18TB for non-compressed data), 1.5 times the capacity of the LTO-8.

(2) Advanced level of convenience and reliability

  • LTO-9 allows for high-speed data transfer at up to 1,000MB/sec. (400MB/sec. for non-compressed data) for exceptional convenience
  • It provides high-quality read back signals and low error rate. In addition, material design has been optimised for highly-accurate tracking performance and excellent operational durability for the magnetic heads in the tape drives, boosting reliability and stability in reading and writing data.

(3) Safe, long-term storage capability at low cost for energy-saving data storage

  • The LTO-9 has superior TCO*8 to HDD, capable of holding a large amount of cold data at low cost.
  • It creates “air gap” data protection, physically isolated from the network, thereby minimising the risk of data damage or loss caused by system failures, infection with computer viruses and cyberattacks to ensure the safety of valuable data.
  • An accelerated life test*9 has indicated that magnetic tape using BaFe magnetic particles maintains stable magnetic characteristics for over 50 years.
  • The LTO-9 can store data with lower power consumption than HDD does, contributing to the designing of storage system with a significantly lower environmental impact.

Main specifications of the new LTO-9 data cartridge

Maximum capacity (uncompressed)

45TB (18TB)

Maximum transfer rate (uncompressed)

1,000MB/sec*10. (400MB/sec.)　

Number of tracks

8,960 (32 track heads in the serpentine format)

Cartridge memory

Internal EEPROM with 32kB electromagnetic induction antenna

Tape width

12.65 mm

Tape thickness

5.2 μm

Tape length

1,035 m

 

Model numbers and packaging formats

 

Model number

Packaging format

Price

LTO FB UL-9 18.0T*7

5 cartridges x 4

Open

LTO FB UL-9 WORM 18.0T*11

5 cartridges x 4

Open

LTO FB UL-9 18.0T ECO*12

20 cartridges x 1

Open

LTO FB UL-9 18.0T LP20*12

20 cartridges x 1

Open

 

*1　Source: Brad Johns Consulting, LLC “Improving Information Technology Sustainability with Modern Tape Storage”

*2　Linear Tape-Open, LTO, the LTO logo, Ultrium and the Ultrium logo are the registered trademarks of Hewlett Packard Enterprise, IBM and Quantum in the United States and other countries.

*3　FUJIFILM LTO Ultrium8 Data Cartridge that complies with the eighth generation LTO Ultrium standards

*4　When saving 100PB (petabytes) of data for ten years, storing it on magnetic tape generates 95% less CO2 emissions (approx. 2,400 tons) during the storage than doing so on HDD. (Source: Brad Johns Consulting, LLC “Improving Information Technology Sustainability with Modern Tape Storage”)

*5　Fujifilm’s nanotechnology-based magnetic tape technology with thin coating to achieve high-density magnetic data recording. It consists of the “nano-particle technology” for formulating magnetic particles into nano-sized particles, “nano-dispersion technology” for evenly dispersing and arranging nano-sized magnetic particles, and “nano-coating technology” for achieving the coating of the ultra-thin layer.

*6  Depends on the drive interface.

*7　Manufacturer share, according to FUJIFILM and “Re-writable type” that allows data to be re-written

**8 Total Cost of Ownership, which encompasses all costs associated with the introduction of a storage drive, server, etc., including initial cost, cost of maintenance and cost of electricity consumed.

*9 According to the Tape Storage Technical Committee of JEITA (Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association)

*10 Depends on the drive interface.

*11　“Write Once, Read Many (WORM) type” that allows data to be written just once so as to prevent data tampering or accidental deletion

*12　The “ECO pack” / “Library pack” of Re-Writable cartridges in minimum-required packaging that does without the use of individual plastic cases.

Tiger Bridge solutions enable cost-effective, open way of archiving

by davidhague178181403, posted in Press Releases General, Storage, Today

FUJIFILM has announced a joint marketing alliance with Tiger Technology to provide business customers with a long-term, secure, and scalable storage management solution for the seamless movement of data from a primary storage tier to tape storage.

Integrating FUJIFILM’s Object Archive software with Tiger Technology’s Tiger Bridge software offers active archiving to tape while preserving the entire chain of custody. The resulting environment provides a complete archiving solution to simplify the management and archive of unstructured data, and its movement into low-cost, long-term storage. 

So, how do the two software solutions work together?

The Tiger Bridge solution monitors and manages selected areas of the local file system, then identifies data based on metadata attributes to move it to the FUJIFILM Object Archive platform. Aging content can be actively archived – meaning that aged files no longer reside on local disk space, yet remain fully visible and accessible to users and applications. Once this content is archived, FUJIFILM Object Archive software provides a secure, long-term archival copy on tape, with a physical air-gap, while permitting continued access to the data. This provides immutable data copies that can help prevent a ransomware or cryptolock attack on a network. 

Working together, Tiger Bridge and FUJIFILM Object Archive software products provide a comprehensive archive solution that scales seamlessly as archive needs increase. The combined environment offers secure data protection for sensitive digital assets while minimising the total cost of managing long-term data.

“Successful long-term archiving is achieved when you have confidence in immediately accessing your data, even when today’s technology fails you,” says Lance Kelson, executive vice president at Tiger Technology. “Using an open tape format is the essential first step, but one must still be wary of archiving software that encapsulates your content in a proprietary wrapper. The Tiger Bridge solution stores files in their native format when moving data to FUJIFILM Object Archive software, thereby preserving the chain of custody and avoiding vendor lock.”

GoPro now offers unlimited Cloud storage

by davidhague178181403, posted in Features, Press Releases General, Storage, Today

If you are a GoPro user, then you have probably heard of the GoPro Quik app.

For $14.99/year, Quik subscribers will benefit from automatic video creation, premium themes, GoPro Original music, exclusive filters and premium editing tools to take thir photo and video content to the “next level” as GoPro calls it. Today, subscribers can add unlimited mural backup at 100% source quality to that list.

More depth info and a review is here.

If you are a subscriber – and at $14.99 pa or $2.99 pm it’s a bargain – and now can get unlimited cloud storage at no extra cost.

Unlimited mural backup is unlocked in Quik v8.11, available today on Android and coming soon to iOS. Quik is free to download and use on a trial basis