ejk@uxh.cso.uiuc.edu (Ed Kubaitis) (08/15/90)
Am working on an application (Unix workstation backup) that will require hundreds of 8mm cartridges. Would appreciate information on suppliers, brands, prices, and quality. Would also be interested in experience with failure modes when low cost video-quality cartridges are used: irrecoverable write errors, lower data rates due to excessive error recovery, irrecoverable read errors, drive or head damage? Will summarize. Thanks in advance. ------------------------- Ed Kubaitis (ejk@uxh.cso.uiuc.edu) Computing Services Office - University of Illinois, Urbana
rkh@mtune.ATT.COM (Robert Halloran) (08/16/90)
In article <1990Aug15.132943.17261@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> ejk@uxh.cso.uiuc.edu (Ed Kubaitis) writes: >Am working on an application (Unix workstation backup) that will require >hundreds of 8mm cartridges. Would appreciate information on suppliers, >brands, prices, and quality. > >Would also be interested in experience with failure modes when low cost >video-quality cartridges are used: irrecoverable write errors, lower data >rates due to excessive error recovery, irrecoverable read errors, drive or >head damage? Exabyte (currently the only 8mm drive mfr) only sanctions the use of their own 'certified' tapes (at $30 each) or Sony consumer tapes (at about $7-8 for 120 minute/2 Gb). We had tried Maxell tapes and had had problems with dropouts, unreadable backups, tape jams, etc. We have had almost no such problems since converting to Sony blanks. I DON'T speak officially for AT&T here; just as a user of 8mm drives and having tried different brands of tape in same. Bob Halloran ========================================================================= Internet: rkh@mtune.dptg.att.com UUCP: att!mtune!rkh Disclaimer: If you think AT&T would have ME as a spokesman, you're crazed. Quote: "How do you know when a politician is lying? His lips move." - M-m-max Headroom "Read my lips - no new taxes..." - G. Bush, 1988 =========================================================================
ejk@uxh.cso.uiuc.edu (Ed Kubaitis) (08/22/90)
Here is a summary of responses to my query last week. Thanks again to all who repsonded. ORIGINAL QUERY: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Am working on an application (Unix workstation backup) that will require hundreds of 8mm cartridges. Would appreciate information on suppliers, brands, prices, and quality. Would also be interested in experience with failure modes when low cost video-quality cartridges are used: irrecoverable write errors, lower data rates due to excessive error recovery, irrecoverable read errors, drive or head damage? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everyone seems to use Sony commercial grade cartridges (P6-120MP). One (very large) site has started using Fuji commercial grade as well. Price range: $5 < x <$9 depending on supplier and volume. Problems with other brands (except Fuji) were cited. Nobody used expensive ($30) "certified" cartridges. Few problems with Sony commercial grade cartridges were mentioned except an occasional (~1 out of 40) "bad" tape exhibiting high write error rates. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- EDITED RESPONSES (please assume standard disclaimers for all): ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: rkh@mtune.ATT.COM (Robert Halloran) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Exabyte (currently the only 8mm drive mfr) only sanctions the use of their own 'certified' tapes (at $30 each) or Sony consumer tapes (at about $7-8 for 120 minute/2 Gb). We had tried Maxell tapes and had problems with dropouts, unreadable backups, tape jams, etc. We have had almost no such problems since converting to Sony blanks. I DON'T speak officially for AT&T here; just as a user of 8mm drives and having tried different brands of tape in same. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: hanson@fnal.gov (Steve Hanson) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Well, here at Fermi we use thousands of 8mm tapes for data collection, mostly on VMS boxes, but also on UNIX boxes. Some of the people here did a tape study and as far as I know what they found out was that Sony and Fuji were both much more reliable than the other brands. We are on a continuous merry-go-round with getting revisions to the drives, etc. Apparently we have about 5% of the Exabytes in the field, so we are in close contact with the Exabyte people. We seem to have a lot more trouble with bugs in the drive firmware acting up under VMS than UNIX. Anyhow, what people who did the stuff here say is buy Sony or Fuji tapes and you should be okay. We use the plain old ordinary consumer models of both the Sony and Fuji tapes. We tend to buy a few thousand at a time, so we get pretty good pricing on them. Lately we've been getting Fuji, I think just on price basis. I personally have used the Maxell and TDK tapes, and have found that they work but you seem to be more likely to have more soft errors, which I would take as a bad sign. The tests they did here seemed to concur. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Bob Jewett <jewett@hpl-opus.hpl.hp.com> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I use Sony P6-120MP. Rumors against other brands keep me from trying them. I buy from CCD, San Leandro CA, phone 1-415-352-3202. Cost is < $6/tape. I have seen between 0.2 and 20.0 write errors per megabyte with the Sony tapes. I think the change in data rate is insignificant. I allow for possible expansion of the data due to the correction blocks when writing an archive. For the first 60 or so tapes, I read back every one. There were no uncorrectable read errors. I've given up checking every tape, and only check samples now. [not an official statement of HP, no warrantee express or implied, etc.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Richard Seymour <seymour@milton.u.washington.edu> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- we've gone thru about 100 consumer-grade Sony P6-120MP tapes ($5.90 at our local VideoOnly store) on a TTI exabyte system on a pair of VMS microVAXes. the TTI system has a display showing retry counts and ECC recovery on readback. we usually see fewer than 0.10 percent in either read or write. occasionally (1 tape per 40?) we'll have a downright BAD tape (error rate usually above 10.0 percent) The first records of many tapes often show errors on first write-use, but do not show them on readback. Our use involves write once, read-many and appending-to-tail operations. the consumer grade tapes easily excel over the 9-track tapes i used to buy for our "real" tape drives. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: fed!m1rcd00@uunet.UU.NET (Bob Drzyzgula) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We use Sony tapes exclusively. I have heard varying reports of success or lack of success with other brands, but have never heard of trouble with Sony tapes. This is not too suprising, since Sony makes the drive that Exabyte puts circuitry around. When we need a supply, we tell our procurement people that we need 100 tapes or whatever, say they *have* to be Sony, and let them bargin. They tend to check around with local video and audio tape suppliers, and can usually get a pretty good price on such a large batch. Last time they came from a local store called Saxitone. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: tankus@hsi.com (Ed Tankus) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ...have been using Sony 8mm p6-120mp tapes with great success. I pay $8.63 from Computerware Data Products in Eden Prairie, MN ... in LARGE quantites even BIGGER discounts. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------