Exabyte Introduces World's First Expandable Tape Drives

Exabyte announced the world's first and only tape backup drives to offer expandable Capacity On-Demand. The VXA-172 Packet Drive and VXA-172 PacketLoader 1x10 build on Exabyte's VXA Packet Technology.

For $699 (estimated U.S. street price), customers can purchase a plug-and-play 172-gigabyte system that can be upgraded later to near double the capacity via a simple electronic update. Tape cartridges for the VXA-172 products are the only tape products available in two sizes: the X6 at 80 gigabytes and the X10 at 172 gigabytes selling for prices of $15 and $29 respectively (estimated U.S. street price).

The standalone VXA-172 Packet Drive provides a small business with a simple tape device that accepts one tape cartridge at a time, with 172 gigabytes of capacity today and 320 gigabytes Capacity On-Demand tomorrow. For organizations wanting unattended backup, the VXA-172 Packet Loader has ten cartridge slots and a robotic mechanism for automatic, unattended operation. The VXA-172 Packet Loader offers up to 1.7 terabytes of capacity today and up to 3.2 terabytes Capacity On-Demand tomorrow and a standard barcode reader to manage cartridges.

VXA-172 is compatible with all major backup software vendors, and Exabyte will offer the drives with three interface options: Ultra2Wide SCSI is available immediately. Serial-ATA and FireWire connections will be available later this year.

Exabyte VXA-172 products are shipping to computer resellers this week. The VXA-172 Packet Drive is available for $699 and the VXA-172 Packet Loader is available for $1699. The capacity-on-demand electronic upgrades will be available for around $349 for a drive upgrade and $599 for the PacketLoader upgrade (all estimated U.S. street prices).

Source: Exabyte

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