I'll echo Paul's comments with one additional: SDLT is not helical scan,
AIT and SAIT are.  SDLT uses serial serpentine as well, but their basic
technology is different.  LTO3 wins the day from a market share
standpoint, though the newest SDLT have higher capacity at a lower cost
(when you're getting killed in the market, this is what you do...).

I would not even consider AIT or SAIT for TSM.  TSM does too much work
on tapes (compared to other products) for helical scan sanding! 


Kelly J. Lipp
VP Manufacturing & CTO
STORServer, Inc.
485-B Elkton Drive
Colorado Springs, CO 80907
719-266-8777
lipp AT storserver DOT com

-----Original Message-----
From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On Behalf Of
Paul Zarnowski
Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 1:01 PM
To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Tape Drive Choices: What, and why?

At 10:36 PM 8/2/2006, Allen S. Rout wrote:
>Hi, all.
>
>I'm looking into what choices folks have made for their tape drives, 
>and why they picked what they did.


We've been using LTO1 and LTO2 and have recently added LTO3.  We've been
happy with the LTO1 and 2.  Too early to tell on LTO3 yet.  We went with
LTO over 359x because of cost.  LTO is much cheaper.  In the past, we've
used DLT (many versions up to DLT8000).  Had tons of problems with DLT
in a TSM environment.  Will never go there again.  I haven't heard of
problems with SDLT, but I'm still raw and saw no reason to go back to
helical technology.  IMHO, the two technologies deliver similar
price-performance, but LTO seems to be winning market-share and there
are more vendors playing in the LTO field.

..Paul



--
Paul Zarnowski                            Ph: 607-255-4757
Manager, Storage Services                 Fx: 607-255-8521
719 Rhodes Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853-3801    Em: psz1 AT cornell DOT edu