Dell PowerVault LTO3-060 - Manual (Page 3)

Determines and initiates a head brush cleaning when needed as well as indicating the need for a cleaning cartridge
when required.
Intelligent Thermal Guard
Provides drive and media protection by monitoring the internal temperature. The drive will slow down or even stop
an operation if needed to avoid destruction of critical drive components or the media.
Smart Gripper
TM
Catches and holds the tape pin firmly avoiding "lost leader" problems
Variable Speed
Provides host transfer rate matching by dynamically selecting between five different transfer rates (12 - 24
MB/sec).
Capacity and Transfer Rates
Characteristic Value
Tape length (m) 609
Native capacity (GB) 200
Compressed capacity (GB) assuming 2:1 compression 400
Native transfer rate (MB/sec) 24
Variable speed transfer rates (MB/sec) 12, 15, 18, 21, 24
SCSI Bus Interface
The PowerVault LTO-2-024 tape drive is designed to operate with a burst transfer rate up to 160 MB/sec, and may be
attached to an Ultra160 or Ultra 320 low voltage differential (LVD) SCSI bus.
The tape drive features a high density 68-pin (HD-68) connector for attachment to the server or to the interface
connector in an external tabletop device.
Note: Dell recommends that you attach the tape drive to SCSI controllers that support the SCSI LVD interface only.
Attaching the tape drive to a non-LVD SCSI controller or an 8-bit narrow SCSI controller will degrade the
performance of your tape drive and backup operations. Performance will also be degraded if you attach non-LVD
SCSI devices on the same bus cable as your LVD connection. If you install an adapter, it is recommended that you
purchase a SCSI LVD controller kit that includes the SCSI cable and terminator.
Do not connect the tape drive to a disk RAID controller (disk RAID controllers are not supported). If, however, your
system is a Dell server with an embedded RAID solution that can be configured for RAID/SCSI operation, the tape
drive can be connected to the SCSI channel.
Tape Backup Software
You will need tape backup software that supports the Dell PowerVault™ tape drive. Note that native backup applications
(for example, the UNIX
®
.tar command) generally do not provide the required data streaming rate to get the full
performance out of your tape drive. (However, if for some reason you need to use the Microsoft
®
Windows
®
native
backup software, the drivers for your tape drive under Windows 2003 are included on the CD that came with the drive.)
Dell recommends using a backup application that provides improved memory management as well as other useful
features, such as TapeAlert.
See the User's Operating Guide supplied with your Tape Backup application. For the latest supported software versions, go
to the Dell Support website at www.support.dell.com or visit the support site of your backup software vendor.
Data Compression
Data Compression is a way to increase capacity on a storage device. Compression ratios are normally specified to be 2:1,
assuming that it is possible to store twice as much data on the tape as without data compression. However, the
compression rate is dependant on the type of data (i.e. ordinary text files can be compressed in a much higher rate than
program, media, and picture files).
There are two ways to compress data, hardware compression and software compression. Hardware compression means
that the data compression is done by the electronics in the storage device. Software compression means that an