Features - Storage Innovations:

StorageTek ANNOUNCES AVAILABILITY OF QUANTUM SDLT 320 DRIVES

Reaffirming its commitment to significantly increase the performance of customer's existing data protection architectures, StorageTek (Storage Technology Corp), the storage services and solutions expert, has announced the availability of Quantum's SuperDLT (SDLT) 320 tape drives for StorageTek's L-Series tape libraries. This coupling of the industry's fastest, highest-capacity mid-range tape drive technology with StorageTek's premier L-Series tape libraries ensures unmatched reliability, ease of management and scalability for customers seeking the best overall value and performance from their data storage infrastructures.

"As we continue to deliver on our road map of integration with Quantum's industry leading Super DLTtape drive technology, our extensive base of loyal L-Series library customers are enabled with first-class data reliability, flexibility and overall storage management agility to protect their critical business data repositories," said Pete Koliopoulos, StorageTek director of Marketing, Automated Tape Solutions. "With more than 125,000 DLTtape drives installed in StorageTek libraries to date, our customers are well positioned to leverage the leadership of the Super DLTtape family now and in the future."

The new SDLT 320 tape drive is one of the most advanced and powerful tape drives available today, storing up to 160 gigabytes of data with speeds of up to 16 megabytes per second to deliver 60 percent more capacity than its nearest mid-range competitor. This additional capacity translates to the lowest cost-per-gigabyte storage solution on the market.

The SDLT 320 is backward read compatible with previous generation drives including the DLT 4000, DLT 7000, DLT 8000 and DLT1. The SDLT 320 is also backward read and write compatible with the SDLT 220 drive, using the same Super DLTtape I media, helping to preserve customers' investments in the DLTtape technology platform. With the addition of the SDLT 320 in the L-Series libraries, StorageTek offers exceptional flexibility in terms of mixed drive/media capabilities and scalability to grow with your enterprise.

Super DLTtape is specifically designed for the high duty-cycle requirements of mid-range to high-end automated environments and is rated by Quantum at 250,000 hours mean time between failures (MTBF) at a 100 percent duty cycle. When leveraged with StorageTek's L-Series tape libraries, the SDLT 320 is optimized to handle server backup, restore and archival applications in even the most data-intensive environments.

"The SDLT 320 delivers the performance, reliability, cost efficiency and investment protection that IS/IT professionals need," said Andy Grolnick, vice president, Marketing, Quantum DLTtape Group. "We are confident that our industry leading SDLT 320 drives in tandem with StorageTek's premier L-Series tape libraries spell a powerful solution to meet today's data protection and storage management challenges across all sizes of the enterprise."

Availability

The SDLT 320 tape drive for StorageTek L20, L40, L80, L180 and L700e tape libraries is available worldwide starting September 4, 2002. StorageTek enterprise tape storage products are available through a network of value added distributors, value added resellers and partners as well as direct through local StorageTek sales teams. StorageTek Global Professional Services provides a comprehensive methodology to deliver assessment, design, implementation and management services for StorageTek's tape systems and management software. Installation, training and support are available from StorageTek Global Professional Services and from certain StorageTek trained service partners. For more information, visit www.storagetek.com.

About DLTtape & Super DLTtape Products

With an installed base of nearly 2 million DLTtape drives in use today, more than 80 million DLTtape media cartridges, and now tens of thousands of Super DLTtape drives shipped to date, DLTtape technology is the de facto standard for backup and archiving of business-critical data in the mid-range, open systems environment.

The latest generation of Super DLTtape drives is the SDLT 320 drive. The SDLT 320 represents the second major milestone on the Super DLTtape roadmap. Quantum's SDLT 320 delivers 160 GB of native storage and a transfer rate of 16 MB/s. Future generations of Super DLTtape drives will store more than one terabyte of capacity per data cartridge. Like previous generations of DLTtape drives, Super DLTtape products are compatible with all major systems, platforms and Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). Find out more about Super DLTtape products at www.superdlttape.com.

About StorageTek Automation

As one of the leading tape automation providers across drive technologies, StorageTek offers enterprise-class reliability and flexibility for mission critical installations worldwide. StorageTek offers true mixed media in all of its L-Series libraries and allows its customers the ability to scale from a single terabyte to thousands of terabytes. StorageTek's L-Series Tape Libraries empower businesses of all sizes to experience boundless growth, maximize productivity and ensure the quality of their businesses.

About Quantum

Quantum Corp, founded in 1980, is a global leader in data protection and network storage systems, meeting the needs of business customers with enterprise-wide storage solutions and services. Quantum is the world's largest supplier of tape drives, and its DLTtape technology is the de facto standard for backup, archiving, and recovery of mission-critical data. Quantum is a leader in the design, manufacture and service of automated tape libraries used to manage, store and transfer data. In addition to having the largest installed base of Network Attached Storage (NAS) appliances of any NAS supplier, Quantum is the leader in the workgroup NAS market category. Quantum sales for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2002, were approximately $1.1 billion. Quantum Corp, 501 Sycamore Dr, Milpitas, CA 95305, 408- 944-4000, www.quantum.com.

About StorageTek

StorageTek (Storage Technology Corp), a $2 billion worldwide company with headquarters in Louisville, Colorado, delivers a broad range of storage solutions for digitized data. StorageTek solutions are easy to manage and allow universal access to data across servers, media types and storage networks. StorageTek is an innovator and global leader in virtual storage solutions for tape automation, disk storage systems and storage networking and is a voting member of the SNIA. Because of StorageTek, customers can manage and leverage their digital assets as their businesses grow and can maximize IT productivity to ensure enterprise-class business continuity. For more information, see www.storagetek.com, or call 800-786-7835.

Contact: Jason Knadler, Senior Product Marketing Manager, StorageTek, 303-673-5520, jason--knadler@storagetek.com.