LTO-9 tapes hit the shelves with a supposed 45TB compressed capacity //

LTO-9 cartridges offer 50% more capacity than LTO-8 tapes, with 18TB native capacity per cartridge, supposedly rising to a whopping 45TB compressed (at a 2.5:1 ratio). Fujifilm says these gains were achieved using barium ferrite (BaFe) particles, which are carefully distributed across the surface of the tape, creating a smooth magnetic layer. //

The next generation tape is also faster than its predecessor, reaching transfer rates of up to 1,000MB/sec compressed (and 440MB/sec native), as compared with 750MB/sec (360MB/sec native) on offer with LTO-8.

New LTO-9 drives are fully backward compatible with LTO-8 cartridges, which should make data migration relatively simple for storage administrators. //

With LTO-9 tapes finally hitting the shelves, questions will also be asked about the long-term future of the hard disk drive, the largest of which have a capacity of 18TB. The archival market is dominated by high-capacity tape and the falling price of SSDs has applied pressure from the opposite direction, squeezing hard drives further into niche markets.

The constraints of physics suggests hard drive capacity cannot keep up with the evolution of tape. According to the LTO Program roadmap, LTO-10 tapes are set to offer an incredible 90TB capacity per cartridge, and tapes as large as 580TB have even been created in lab settings.

LTO-9 cartridges offer 50% more capacity than LTO-8 tapes, with 18TB native capacity per cartridge, supposedly rising to a whopping 45TB compressed (at a 2.5:1 ratio). Fujifilm says these gains were achieved using barium ferrite (BaFe) particles, which are carefully distributed across the surface of the tape, creating a smooth magnetic layer. //