IBM TS4500 R4 Tape Library Guide

by Larry Coyne, Michael Engelbrecht, Simon Browne

Released March 2018

Publisher(s): IBM Redbooks

ISBN: 9780738442976

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Book description

Abstract

The IBM® TS4500 (TS4500) tape library is a next-generation tape solution that offers higher storage density and integrated management than previous solutions.

This IBM Redbooks® publication gives you a close-up view of the new IBM TS4500 tape library. In the TS4500, IBM delivers the density that today's and tomorrow's data growth requires. It has the cost-effectiveness and the manageability to grow with business data needs, while you preserve existing investments in IBM tape library products.

Now, you can achieve both a low cost per terabyte (TB) and a high TB density per square foot, because the TS4500 can store up to 8.25 petabytes (PB) of uncompressed data in a single frame library or scale up at 1.5 PB per square foot to over 263 PB, which is more than 4 times the capacity of the IBM TS3500 tape library. The TS4500 offers these benefits:

High availability dual active accessors with integrated service bays to reduce inactive service space by 40%. The Elastic Capacity option can be used to completely eliminate inactive service space.

Flexibility to grow: The TS4500 library can grow from both the right side and the left side of the first L frame because models can be placed in any active position.

Increased capacity: The TS4500 can grow from a single L frame up to an additional 17 expansion frames with a capacity of over 23,000 cartridges.

High-density (HD) generation 1 frames from the existing TS3500 library can be redeployed in a TS4500.

Capacity on demand (CoD): CoD is supported through entry-level, intermediate, and base-capacity configurations.

Advanced Library Management System (ALMS): ALMS supports dynamic storage management, which enables users to create and change logical libraries and configure any drive for any logical library.

Support for the IBM TS1155 while also supporting TS1150 and TS1140 tape drive: The TS1155 gives organizations an easy way to deliver fast access to data, improve security, and provide long-term retention, all at a lower cost than disk solutions. The TS1155 offers high-performance, flexible data storage with support for data encryption. Also, this enhanced fifth-generation drive can help protect investments in tape automation by offering compatibility with existing automation. The new TS1155 Tape Drive Model 55E delivers a 10 Gb Ethernet host attachment interface optimized for cloud-based and hyperscale environments. The TS1155 Tape Drive Model 55F delivers a native data rate of 360 MBps, the same load/ready, locate speeds, and access times as the TS1150, and includes dual-port 8 Gb Fibre Channel support.

Support of the IBM Linear Tape-Open (LTO) Ultrium 8 tape drive: The LTO Ultrium 8 offering represents significant improvements in capacity, performance, and reliability over the previous generation, LTO Ultrium 7, while they still protect your investment in the previous technology.

Support of LTO 8 Type M cartridge (M8): The LTO Program is introducing a new capability with LTO-8 drives. The ability of the LTO-8 drive to write 9 TB on a brand new LTO-7 cartridge instead of 6 TB as specified by the LTO-7 format. Such a cartridge is called an LTO-7 initialized LTO-8 Type M cartridge.

Integrated TS7700 back-end Fibre Channel (FC) switches are available.

Up to four library-managed encryption (LME) key paths per logical library are available.

This book describes the TS4500 components, feature codes, specifications, supported tape drives, encryption, new integrated management console (IMC), and command-line interface (CLI). You learn how to accomplish several specific tasks:

Improve storage density with increased expansion frame capacity up to 2.4 times and support 33% more tape drives per frame.

Manage storage by using the ALMS feature.

Improve business continuity and disaster recovery with dual active accessor, automatic control path failover, and data path failover.

Help ensure security and regulatory compliance with tape-drive encryption and Write Once Read Many (WORM) media.

Support IBM LTO Ultrium 8, 7, 6, and 5, IBM TS1155, TS1150, and TS1140 tape drives.

Provide a flexible upgrade path for users who want to expand their tape storage as their needs grow.

Reduce the storage footprint and simplify cabling with 10 U of rack space on top of the library.

This guide is for anyone who wants to understand more about the IBM TS4500 tape library. It is particularly suitable for IBM clients, IBM Business Partners, IBM specialist sales representatives, and technical specialists.