Can't get enough format war? Wait for Blu-ray vs HD DVD enterprise storage!
By Erik Hanson 
posted Jun 26th 2007 6:16PM
posted Jun 26th 2007 6:16PM
We just know no one ever tires of discussion about the format war between HD DVD and Blu-ray, so why should something as obscure as enterprise storage get overlooked? Top Tech News has a short intro piece on archival storage and how the two formats are attempting to get ingrained there, with Blu-ray touting its larger layer size, and HD DVD showing off its perceived lower cost to switch from DVD or other optical formats. We've certainly heard these arguments before when it comes to video storage (although thankfully codecs don't matter here!), but the article mentions that with the costs of disk- and network-based storage being so low, might business even notice which side "wins?"
Neither format is sufficient for Enterprise storage. While many laud Blu-ray's 40Mbps data rate for video this is absolutely abysmal performance for backup storage which needs more like 40MBps.
Optical is declining as a archival storage medium. HP hacked their UDO lineup and most companies are moving to a nearline/offline strategy which incorporates a backing up to disc and then archiving to tape or utilizing a Virtual Tape Library (VTL) which emulates various tape products.
Tape doesn't sound sexy but you can't argue with the 800GB of storage and 576GB specs of a StorageWorks Ultrium 960 drive. The roadmap looks good here too with Ultrium 4 jumping up to 1.6TB of data and faster speeds.
Optical has always had promise but the performance never matched existing technologies. I'm sure someone will bring up the 300GB Holographic vaporware but that's substandard by today's standard in archival tech. I'm tired of waiting for optical promises.
My own home backup system will consist of Time Machine snapshots from OS X Leaopard to an external hard drive. Instant user restore and the ability to do off site backup are better than nothing and I get this for the price of an OS upgrade and storage...a win/win.
Agreed. Optical lost the storage battle years ago. Disk is too cheap and the software that powers it is too good at protecting against failures. And tape is never going away.
@ hmurchison:
What about Holographic discs? Would they work better? Rumor has it they should start becoming available in 2008, affordable by, say, 2010?
Just out of curiousity. Being that Holographic Disc could supposedly hold terabytes of data. Is it conceivable that future laptops, for instance, could contain a non-removable Holographic Disc replacing existing HDD's as the main source of data storage?
Not the Elusive Magical Holographic Disks Again... Yeesh..
I will keep the 1.6TB 240 Megabyte/Sec LTO-4 Drive and Tapes in my 2008 Budget.
Yeah, both formats were designed too much with consumer video in mind.
Holographic storage exists. It's called the Tapestry 300r. 300GB a disc, 20MB/sec. Slow. Expensive. $18k for the drive, $160/disc for 300gb. Optical is for archival storage; it (supposedly) outlasts tape. For immediate backup needs? No way. Tape rules. Ultrium rocks.
Because HD DVDs fall far short of a BD in terms of storage capacity, fewer BD discs would be required to house large databases than required by HD DVD. The fewer the discs, the lower the cost, eventually negating the perceived cost advantage of HD DVD. I'd rather have a slightly higher initial investment with room to expand than a less expensive investment which requires I purchase more storage more frequently.
I don't see where you cost advantage for HD-DVD's comes in. I see your point, but blank blu-ray disks are already cheaper than HD-DVD. You might have to shop around a little and wait for specials, but I've been averaging around $7 per 25GB blu-ray disk the cheapest 15GB HD i've seen was $9. Just go look on the web there's just more blu-ray disks out there.
You see this is where you see HD-DVD propaganda to it's fullest. Yes the current DVD manufacturing equipment could be easily switched to make HD-DVD's, but this equipment is already being used to make DVD's. Manufacturers don't have all this equipment just laying around just waiting to be used by HD-DVD. They try to run as close to capacity as possible. DVD demand isn't expected to drop, level off maybe, but not drop for at least a few years. The equipment needed to manufacture blu-ray disks can also make dvd's, HD-DVD's and blu-ray. It can also do it faster and cheaper. So if they're going to buy new equipment anyway why not get the equipment that can make blu-ray.
I'm not sure where HD-DVD fits into the enterprise archival scheme, or how they are pushing for a "stronghold" there. There aren't any HD-DVD burners! Sheesh... add to that the *data disk* capacity and rate differences, and it's... ?? *shrug*
#1 - What you fail to notice is that the data rate of MOVIE content is not the same as that for data content. The 40mbps is for films, not for archival storage. You have heard of 2x,4x,8x,16x, DVD-Rs, haven't you? :)
Blu-Ray was actually designed as a read-write format from the beginning, with archival data always a stated goal. Contrary to Internet-speak, those 200GB Blu-Rays are for a reason... and it's NOT video playback. Sony is pushing these sizes for archives.
Will they keep up with HDD sizes? Will it be viable in an enterprise environment? It indeed seems questionable. But for the consumer market, a SIMPLE, inexpensive (hopefully), quick and "permanent" (perceived) solution has tons of potential. Let's face it, TAPE satisfies NONE of these requirements.
I've told people from the start of the format war, Sony can lose, but still win -- with Blu-Ray as a data storage solution.
-Pie