Looking to unload new and/or used LTO-4 tape? Big Data Supply, Inc. (that’s us) pays the highest dollar possible for new and used tape.

Our streamlined buyback program assures each and every one of our customers that they are gaining the very best deal without compromising their data. We can either provide cash or credit that can be applied toward newer tape formats and other data storage products.

We also buy other LTO formats, 3592, 8mm AIT / AME / VXA / 3590 / 9840 / 9940 /SLR / MLR / QIC and many other formats.

To assure that all data on used tapes is completely destroyed, we utilize our proprietary method for data destruction – assuring that you will comply with industry regulations as set forth by Sarbanes-Oxley, SOX, HIPAA, the SEC, and more.

There are numerous reasons as to why selling your new and used tape is the right thing to do, including:

• You can collect some quick cash.
• It’s the environmentally conscious thing to do.
• It’s quick and easy.
• You’ll comply with industry regulations for data destruction.

For more information on selling your new and used LTO-4 tape and/or other formats, contact our buyback team at 800-905-7329 or support@bigdatasupply.com

If you are considering the migration of data, you may have already realized the process is much more complex than you could have ever imagined. Don’t get down on yourself in case you get overwhelmed, as the effective handling of important data (and the many forms it comes in) is no laughing matter.

To help you take the right data migration steps, we hope the following tips will help:

• Find the right experts and partners. It is an excellent idea to develop a team that fully understands the data migration process and can walk you through the process. This includes getting the right people within your organization involved (i.e. technology specialists, data maintainers/managers, marketing teams, organizational leaders, and more) and seeking out a data migration expert for help and advice.

The earlier you take this step, the less likely you will make costly and time-consuming mistakes.

At Big Data Supply, we offer comprehensive data migration services for organizations of all sizes. We invite you to call our offices to discuss your needs.

• Get to know your data. It is very likely that you have a variety of data types/forms. The more you understand your data and its exact purpose, the more effectively you can develop a winning plan to meet your organization’s true needs. This will also save valuable time during the data migration process.

• Define your budget. Make sure you know exactly how much you can spend and what your return on investment will be as result of data migration. Without a clear understanding of your budget, you will be amazed at how much money you’ll burn through in a short amount of time.

When working with a data migration expert, it is best to be honest about your budget. This will allow for the suggestion of the very best methods and technologies to serve your interests.

• Develop a clear and concise plan. It is essential that you move into a data migration effort with a defined roadmap. This will reduce the work developers need to accomplish, while saving you both time and money.

• Think about the future. Make sure you build out a data management system that will last for years to come and can be expanded to meet your future needs. It’s no secret that technology is continually evolving – so create a flexible system that takes many different scenarios into mind. Refer to your experts for best practices, while sharing with them how you expect the business to change and grow.

• Get rid of unnecessary data. Once you become familiar with the multitude of data that has been collected over the years, you will be amazed at how much isn’t ever used or needed on a daily basis. Get rid of as much data as possible and/or figure out an inexpensive way to store legacy data (LTO tape may be an excellent option).

The secret to your success is careful planning and assuring you have the very best resources to migrate your data. Dare to find the very best ways possible to make your data work for you. Please feel free to connect with the Big Data Supply team for expert advice!

Big Data Supply, Inc. offers secure data destruction on tape media and hard drives like used HP hard drives and used Toshiba hard drives.

Is the organization you are affiliated with seeking to destroy data that is no longer needed? Or have you recently upgraded to a newer data storage infrastructure and have data on older tape media that needs to be discarded?

In today’s world, it is essential that you understand the importance of completely expunging valuable data and/or complying with industry regulations.

For instance, in the world of healthcare, HIPAA states that that all sensitive data must be cleared or purged by “degaussing or exposing the media to a strong magnetic field in order to disrupt the recorded magnetic domains.” Media can also be destroyed through “pulverization, melting, incineration, or shredding.”

At Big Data Supply, we believe that tape should be degaussed/erased or overwritten, rather than tapes being pulverized or incinerated. The reason for such logic is quite simple:

1. Incinerating tape is toxic to the environment.
2. Pulverizing tape leads to unneeded waste.
3. Perfectly good tape is wasted -- when it could be reused again.

On the other hand, the degaussing and resurfacing of tape makes it possible to comply with FACTA, HIPAA, Gram-Leach-Bliley, SEC, DOD, SOX, Sarbanes-Oxley, and other regulatory bodies, while responsibly keeping perfectly good tape out of landfills…and toxins out of the air (when considering incineration).

The sad fact is that only 3 percent of tape is recycled. This is why we have developed a streamlined process for organizations to either recycle and reuse their tape media or sell their used tape to recoup their initial data center investment.

As you consider what to do with old tape, it is vital that you never dispose of data-filled cartridges into a dumpster. Doing so usually results in the violation of industry regulations. Using HIPAA as an example once again, the disposal of used tape media can only be done if each and every tape has been rendered unreadable.

And once again, why throw away perfectly good tape when you can have it recycled? And when you can make some cash in the process through our buy-back program?

To learn more, contact the Big Data Supply team at 800-905-7329 or support@bigdatasupply.com. We will walk you through the process, while providing you a full education on data eradication and tape recycling.

Curious of all this LTO LTFS talk and want to see how LTO-5 and LTFS are being utilized by a real-world organization?
The following video is a case study presented by IBM. Learn how one of their customers in Athens, Greece has simplified their archival process and cut costs significantly:

We buyback LTO cartridges in new and used condition, if you would like a free value audit on what you have please send us a list of what you have.

LTFS - Linear Tape File System in LTO Ultrium generations 5 and above.

According to a recent analysis by the Compliance, Governance, and Oversight Counsel, 69 percent of the data saved by organizations have little or no value whatsoever. The wild part of the equation is that organizations pay a substantial amount of money to store this data and make it readily available at any moment in time.

If the majority of data is stored digitally, the costs can grow to astronomical levels. Thus, organizations are faced with either continuing to pay for data that is never going to be used or they are tasked with the challenge of sorting through the data in order to eliminate and/or move it to a more cost-effective storage system.

This objective can be extremely time-consuming and difficult, given the huge amounts of data that most organizations generate on a regular basis.

David Hill, Tech guru and writer for NetworkComputing.com, suggests that tape offers a cost-effective alternative to disk drives. What’s more, LTO tape’s recent adoption of the LTFS (Linear Tape File System) makes writing to tape as easy as writing to disk.

Thanks to IBM, the LTO Consortium – which is comprised of HP, Quantum, IBM, and other key brands – LTFS became a reality. This makes tape much more functional and realistic for organizations seeking to access important data 24 x 7.

The next step for IBM in the world of LTO tape is the integration of the General Parallel File System (GPFS) with LTFS. The company announced at EDGE 2013 in Las Vegas that now customers can effectively move data from hard disks directly to tape. This makes the transfer of massive amounts of data more plausible.

Hill suggests that organizations consider storing their “no-value” data on LTO until their leaders can decide on what data to keep and what data to discard. This allows for HDDs to be freed up for the most relevant data.

To take advantage of LTFS, you must invest in either LTO-5 or LTO-6. Earlier LTO formats didn’t include LTFS. Regardless of what brand of LT0-5 or LTO-6 you choose, you can be sure you are gaining technology that will last for decades.

If you are considering the idea of recycling your electronics and/or purchasing recycled goods, we hope the following will inspire you to make the best decision for planet earth:

1. 80 to 85 percent of electronics are discarded into landfills or incinerated (releasing toxins into the air).
2. Between 20 and 50 million metric tons of e-waste is disposed of worldwide each year.
3. E-waste represents 70 percent of the toxic waste in the U.S. Sadly enough; lead found within electronics can contribute to central and peripheral nervous system damage.
4. Did you know that cell phones and other electronics devices often contain high amounts of precious metals such as silver and gold? Americans alone dump an estimated 60 million in gold/silver each year.
5. Most LTO tape can be recycled, earning a substantial amount of cash.
6. Recycling one million laptops has the power to save energy equivalent to more than 3,600 homes in the U.S. a year.
7. The majority of what is labeled “e-waste” can be reused. Thus, it isn’t waste at all.
8. Did you know it takes 539 pounds of fossil fuel to manufacture a single computer and monitor?
9. The majority of equipment used within a data center can be recycled including tape, disk array, tape drives, and peripherals.

At Big Data Supply we take e-waste very seriously. This is why we regularly educate the general public as to the importance of correctly disposing of and/or recycling electronics.

Our recycling team recommends the following with regard to your electronics:

1. Consider each and every item you own recyclable until you are told by a professional it isn’t. And even then, you may want to get a second or third opinion.
2. Realize that your old electronics may be work money. For example, we pay competitive rates for working data storage tape, tape disk drives, peripherals, and more.
3. Tell your friends about the importance of recycling. If you see a friend throwing away electronics, either educate them on e-waste or offer to find a recycler for them.

We invite you to contact our offices if you have any questions about recycling. And once again, please pass on the above e-waste statistics.

It’s about time we human beings take the health of the planet seriously! Join us in our effort to make people and organizations more aware.

Numerous organizations and individuals turn to Big Data Supply to let go of their used tape, as they know they can trust our ability to expunge their legacy data and ready their tapes for reuse. Beyond tape, we offer top dollar for disk array, no matter the model or brand – both new and used.

Selling your used disk array can benefit you and the environment in many ways, including:

1. You can recoup a portion of the money you initially invested in your data storage system.

2. Your recouped cash can be reinvested to upgrade your current data storage environment.

3. You have the power to save space if you are planning to keep your disk array stored.

4. You will save your equipment from landfills and/or incineration.

5. Other organizations can benefit from buying your used disk array.

As mentioned prior, we are willing to take all brands and models. Common brands purchased include (but aren’t limited to) Dell, Hitachi, Fujitsu, IBM, Infotrend, SGI, HP, NetApp, Xyratex, and Sun.

If you are local to our offices, our team can arrange a pick up for your disk array, tape, and any other electronic devices you would like to recycle.

Once we have obtained your devices, we will offer a quote and arrange for payment. We can also offer credit toward the purchase of newer, more robust equipment.

Other items Big Data Supply will buy back and recycle:

• Tape
• Tape drives
• Tape libraries
• Hardware
• Peripherals
• Telecom equipment

For more information on selling disk array or any of the above items, we invite you to contact our team today.

Data migration is the process of transferring data between various device types, formats, and computer systems. Without a doubt, the process of transferring data is usually extremely tedious and can be both resource and time consuming – not to mention expensive.

A growing number of organizations are finding that data migration is essential in order to keep up with industry regulations and work to pull together data that has been collected via many different formats/technologies.

For example, in the world of medicine, it is quite common for an organization to have different formats of technologies they would use across various departments. One medical specialty may have decided on one mode of operation, while others chose to employ a variety of different methods.

This may have worked in the past -- however, because of regulations and pending reforms it is becoming more and more important to allow for data to be easily shared throughout the organization. This means a lot of work must be done.

To accomplish this feat, the following usually must occur:

• All tapes, disk drives, arrays, and other equipment must be gathered and labeled.

• The old system is mapped to the new system, making sure that data extraction and loading is done in a systematic manner.

• The new system must be properly assembled and ready to accommodate the data to be migrated.

• Data moved to new storage formats must be reviewed/tested to make sure that all data has been perfectly transferred.

Because this process is very tedious and time consuming, a number of our clients depend on our data migration services.
The Big Data Supply data migration team works around the clock to make sure that data is effectively preserved and moved to a format that can be used organization-wide.

Once data has been successfully moved to the new and improved format, our clients then turn to our buyback and tape recycling programs. The buyback program helps our clients recoup a percentage of their initial data storage investment, while our recycling program keeps equipment out of landfills or from environmentally toxic incineration. Earn some green while being green!

Plus, other organizations can truly benefit from purchasing used technologies. It’s definitely a win-win scenario for all involved.

Without a doubt, one of the biggest concerns of our customers is data erasure for their used/old tape. This is to be expected, as proprietary data should be guarded against all odds. This is why we as an organization have developed a winning solution.

Our executive engineering partners spent more than five years investing in research and development for the best possible method of data eradication for LTO cartridges. The technique completely erases each LTO Ultrium tape, rather than re-writing a test pattern over existing data.

To successfully accomplish this task, we actually degauss tapes between the servo bands without destroying them. This allows for them to be reused again by the same or a different organization. Our LTO Tape Erasure and Reconditioning process meets the rigorous demands of major regulatory bodies such as HIPAA, SOX, SEC, Sarbanes-Oxley, and more.

Additionally, our process is environmentally friendly. Because we completely wipe LTO tape free of data and make them ready for reuse, numerous tapes are kept out of landfills and kept from incineration. Recycling is a responsible action that can be taken by organizations large and small.

How Our Reuse Process Works

To give you a deeper understanding of how our process works, the following steps are employed as we recondition LTO tape:

1. All data is completely expunged from pin to hub by “localized” degaussing. (DO NOT USE A TRADITIONAL DEGAUSSER) (see video:
2. The entire tape surface is cleaned.
3. The media pack is exercised and precision retentioned.
4. The tape reference edge is laser scanned and evaluated for quality.
5. Each tape is performance evaluated for age, wear from usage, data errors, servo track errors, and drive interface issues.
6. A separate drive read/write data test and reset to blank tape action is performed.
7. A permanent marker is recorded onto the tape memory to date and reveal our process has been performed.
8. A complete record is kept by Big Data Supply as proof that each tape has undergone erasure, is reset, and is high quality.

There are many benefits surrounding LTO Data erasure. Not only is it eco-friendly and does it help organizations meet various regulations where data is concerned, it has the power to generate cash.

If for any reason you don’t want to hold on to your old tapes, our buy-back program pays cash for recycled tape.

Feel free to ask our team as many questions as you’d like on both data erasure and our buyback program. We live to educate our clients!

Info@BigDataSupplyInc.com / Toll Free 800-905-7329 / Local (714) 647-9000

 

 

As you may already be aware, the Linear Tape Open Consortium made LTO-6 tape technology available to the market in the latter part of 2012. Defying the ridiculous claims by data storage experts that tape would be dead by now, the LTO community was thrilled at what they had accomplished with the LTO-6.

To give you an idea of their accomplishments, we will outline a handful of facts you should know about the impressive technology:

• LTO-6 holds up to 6.25TB of compressed data. Wildly enough, the medium’s capacity has more than doubled and its throughput boosted by more than 40 percent. This is excellent news for organizations wanting to keep their tape storage costs down, while accommodating massive amounts of data.

• LTO-6 Drives Offer 400MBps Performance. This means that it uses a 2.5:1 compression ratio and allows for up to 1.4TB of data transferred per hour. Now data management is much easier and time effective.

• Industry leading brands now ship LTO-6. Organizations with major data storage systems can rely on HP, IBM, Quantum, Fujifilm, Hitachi, Maxell, Imation, Sony, and TDK for their LTO-6 products. These brands understand the true value of tape and are committed to making it readily available to the world.

• LTO-6 includes encryption and WORM. These features were also offered in LTO-3, LTO-4, and LTO-5. Encryption helps secure important data, while WORM allows for organizations to store data in a non-rewritable format. They both help organizations meet compliance regulations as set forth by the SEC, Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, SOX, and more.

• LTO-6 Includes Partitioning Functionality, also known as LTFS. The Linear Tape File System is much of the reason data storage experts are eating their previous words that went something like “tape is dead.” Now it is possible to drag and drop files, which makes tape work in a very similar manner as a removable disk drive.

On a daily basis our team is asked by organizations to help them make cost-effective choices for their data storage infrastructures. We can’t be more thrilled with the LTO Consortium and the technologies they have made available in the recent months and years. Not only is LTO-6 impressive from a technical standpoint, it is very durable and can last for 30 or more years.

It has been said time and time again that “the steady horse wins the race.” In our minds, tape is the steady and reliable horse for safely storing data for decades to come.