Another issue is the verification of tape over the long haul. Unlike disk archives that have the ability to perform routine data continuity checks, most tape systems do not have an automated verification or migration function; one would be needed to sustain a long-term archive.
My opinion is that tape may actually have a better role -- a role it is already serving -- as a medium-term backup target. A sample process could be disk-to-disk backup holding 30 to 90 days worth of backups, tape holding 90 days to two or three years and then disk archive holding everything else for the next 80 years.
The big problem with disk or tape archives is actually reading the data recovered 50 years from now. I'll have some thoughts on how to do that on another day.
George Crump is founder of Storage Switzerland , which provides strategic consulting and analysis to storage users, suppliers, and integrators. Prior to Storage Switzerland, he was CTO at one of the nation's largest integrators.
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