IBM Puts Big Data in the Palm of Your Hand

IBM (NYSE: IBM) researchers announced Monday they have demonstrated a new record of 85.9 billion bits of data per square inch in areal data density on low-cost linear magnetic particulate tape — a significant update to one of the computer industry’s most resilient, reliable and affordable data storage technologies for Big Data.

At this areal density, a standard LTO size cartridge could store up to 154 trillion bytes (154 terabytes) of uncompressed data — a 62 fold improvement over an LTO6 cartridge, the latest industry-standard magnetic tape product.

To put this into perspective, 154 terabytes of data is sufficient to store the text from 154 million books, which would fill a book shelf stretching from Las Vegas to Seattle, Washington.

This new record was achieved using a new advanced prototype tape, developed by FUJIFILM Corporation of Japan.

This is the third time in less than 10 years that IBM scientists in collaboration with FUJIFILM have achieved such an accomplishment.

IBM scientists break Big Data into four dimensions: volume, variety, velocity and veracity and by 2020 these so-called Four V’s of Big Data will be responsible for 40 zettabytes (40 trillion gigabytes) of data.

Much of this data is archival, such as video archives, back-up files, replicas for disaster recovery, and retention of information required for regulatory compliance.

Because tape systems are energy efficient and more cost-effective than hard disks they are the ideal technology to store, protect and access archival Big Data, says IBM.