I don't know about LTO1, we have LTO2. They are fragile, but we have not had problems as others have described... I have dropped a few myself, and I can testify that a drop from as little as a foot can ruin an LTO2 cart. I have also dropped them from waist-height (about 3 feet) with no damage. The problem I have seen is that if the cart lands on the corner where the tape comes out, there is a thin point in the plastic where the leader pin slips in... this is a weak point that can bend which causes the cart to widen slightly at that point... but it's enough to prevent the cart from loading. If the damage is bad enough, the pin will fall out of its place. I have 7 or 8 carts (out of 5600) that have failed this way. Interestingly, I don't recall having any come back from the vault damaged... and we do not use the jewel cases, we just load the carts into red turtle cases for transport. Pretty nice cases, though... foam lined, they hold the carts pretty firmly. We can fit about 36 carts in one case. We usually ship 25-30 offsite each day.
Robin Sharpe Berlex Labs Tab Trepagnier <[EMAIL PROTECTED] AITRAM.COM> To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Sent by: "ADSM: cc: Dist Stor Subject: Manager" Alleged LTO fragility <[EMAIL PROTECTED] .EDU> 02/10/2006 12:51 PM Please respond to "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" This is a tape media question. We are considering moving from DLT8000 to LTO-1 for offsite tape storage. Our local IBM guys told us that LTO tapes should not be dropped more than 1/2 inch or they risk being damaged. If you've ever watched a vault vendor handling tapes, you know that 1/2" is pretty optimistic. So, is that true? Would our offsite data be at risk if our vault vendor dropped an LTO cartridge a whole inch? Thanks. Tab Trepagnier TSM Administrator Laitram, L.L.C.