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A Way for Search Engines to Improve
Wouldn't it be nice if the search engines could comprehend our impressions of search results and adjust their databases accordingly? Properly optimized web pages would show up well in contextual searches and be rewarded with favorable reviews...
Free eBook: Business Domain Names
Since every website needs a name, Dr. Steve Baba has written a free ebook that will help you obtain a brandable, memorable domain name at a reasonable cost, which will contribute to your brand equity and profits. The ebook, downloadable from...
Free Software for Newbies and Web Developers
Here is some free software tools to help you build your own websites and create web products.
Learning new skills is not difficult. It just takes a bit of willingness to give it a go. You will feel great satisfaction knowing that you can do...
How to transfer Autocad drawings for use in Solidworks software
How to prepare Autocad drawing borders for use in Solidworks. If you have begun using Solidworks for your 3D modeling it’s quite likely you have amassed lots of Autocad drawings over the years. More than likely, you would like to continue using the...
The 3 Minute Auction and Minute Auction Explained
Am I the only person who doesn't know what a 3 minute auction is? Looking for fresh content for my site, I discover that "minute auction," or even a 5, 10 and 30 minute auction is a popular item. Some auction sites may refer to a minute auction...
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Choosing a Tape Drive
Tape drives remain the leading technology used by organizations for backup and archiving. However, the plethora of tape drives on the market can make choosing the appropriate tape drive a confusing task. How do you select a tape drive that satisfies your needs without blowing the budget? The following are just some of the main factors to consider.
1. Capacity.
Select a tape drive that has sufficient capacity to store your backups. Tape drives are able to compress data so that more data may fit on the tape, which is why manufacturers specify both a native capacity and a compressed capacity, usually with a compression ratio at 2:1. However, highly-compressed files such as those in video and sound formats are hardly compressible at all. For this reason, do not heed the specified compressed capacity when choosing a tape drive.
A good way to determine the size of the backup job after compression is to study logs of past backups. If these are unavailable, it is safe to assume that the data can be compressed at a ratio of 1.4:1, unless the hard drive contains an usually large number of highly-compressed files.
2. Transfer rate.
The transfer rate of the tape drive is becomes important when there is limited "window of opportunity" in which backup jobs may run. It is often desirable for backups to take place during the night when network use is at its lowest. Select a tape drive that is capable of completing a backup job within your window of opportunity. For instance, to back up 400GB per night, you will require a transfer rate of about 30GB/hour.
A little known fact about tape drives is that data must be supplied to them at a sufficient rate in order to keep them streaming, or else the tape suffers from start-stop motion. This motion severely degrades the life of the drive and tapes and the reliability of backups.
There are two usual reasons why tape drive are not be supplied with data at a sufficient rate. Firstly, the rate at which data is read from the hard disk of the server is insufficient.
This rate is dependent on the sizes and locations of the files on disk and is generally unpredictable, but can be determined by the use of specialised software.
Secondly, if data is being transferred over a network of computers to a backup server, the network may be incapable of supplying data at a sufficient rate. The maximum throughput of a network is predictable and easy to measure, based on previous network performance.
Consider a network using 10BaseT Ethernet. This transfer rate through this type of network cannot exceed 10MB/s, so it is immediately apparent that a tape drive requiring 20MB/s is inappropriate.
3. Reliability and duty cycle.
A simple way to gauge the reliability of a tape drive is to find out the Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) as specified by the manufacturer. You should note, however, that the MTBF is usually specified at a certain duty cycle. For example, consider a Travan tape drive with a MTBF of 370,000 hours at 20% duty cycle. The drive will only have an average of 370,000 hours between failures if it is run less than 20% of the time (about 4.8 hours per day), and running the tape drive for any longer will significantly reduce the reliability of the drive.
4. Price
There is no point purchasing the highest-range tape drive if it's simply too expensive. Consider how much value-for-money the tape drive will give you. Are you willing to pay more for extra performance? Or do you need to sacrifice some performance to save on costs?
If you choose wisely, you should end up with a tape drive that fulfils your organization's needs, without blowing the budget.
About the Author
Linus Chang is a backup expert and the lead developer of BackupAssist -- tape backup software that is simple and affordable, and perfect for small and medium businesses. Protect your Windows servers, including SQL Server and Exchange Server, to tape, REV drive, hard drive, NAS and more, at a fraction of the cost of other backup software. The product website is at http://www.backupassist.com
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Tucows Downloads - Download Freeware and Shareware Software |
Download freeware, shareware, and demos. Maintains over 45000 software titles that are tested, rated, reviewed and ready to download. |
www.tucows.com |
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Free Software Downloads and Software Reviews - Download.com |
Download shareware, freeware and Demo software for PC, Mac, Linux, and Handhelds categorized into categories, plus software reviews. |
www.download.com |
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Computer software - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
This includes application software such as a word processor, which enables a ... Application software is often purchased separately from computer hardware. ... |
en.wikipedia.org |
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Shareware.com - Search for shareware programs and free software ... |
Search for shareware programs from more than a dozen downloadable software directories. |
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Jumbo: Free & Shareware MP3 files, Games, Screen Savers & Computer ... |
Source of free and shareware computer programs and utilities for PC and Mac. Evaluate software and read product reviews. Download games and screen savers. |
www.jumbo.com |
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Computer Software in the Yahoo! Directory |
Browse categories featuring sites devoted to computer software, including shareware and freeware download sites, operating systems, desktop customization, ... |
dir.yahoo.com |
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IEEE Software |
IEEE Computer Society's magazine covering all aspects of software, including software engineering. |
www.computer.org |
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Free Downloads on ZDNet | Shareware, Trialware, Evaluation Software |
ZDNet's Software Directory is the Web's largest library of software downloads. Covering software for Windows, Mac, and Mobile systems, ZDNet's Software ... |
downloads.zdnet.com |
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FSF - The Free Software Foundation |
Free software is a matter of liberty not price. Think of "free" as in "free speech". |
www.fsf.org |
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Apple - Software |
Software products for your digital life. ... The perfect addition for professional review. QuickTime Broadcaster. Encoding software for live events. ... |
www.apple.com |
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Open Directory - Computers: Software |
In Partnership with AOL Search. about dmoz | report abuse/spam | help. the entire directory, only in Computers/Software. Top: Computers: Software (38471) ... |
dmoz.org |
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freshmeat.net: Welcome to freshmeat.net |
About: The Web browser is probably the most frequently used software today, ... Web professionals can use the software for functional testing and regression ... |
freshmeat.net |
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Software - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation (FSF) |
Listing of the GNU software packages. |
www.gnu.org |
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Sun Software |
Get enterprise-class software--Solaris 10 OS, the Java Enterprise System, ... Sun Java StorageTek Software reduces cost and complexity with a single, ... |
www.sun.com |
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Internet Real Estate.com -- owns and operates a portfolio of the ... |
SOFTWARE.COM · SWEEPSTAKES.COM · PHONE.COM PODCAST.COM ... Software.com | Sweepstakes.com | Phone.com | Podcast.com | Shop.com | Safety.com ... |
www.internetrealestate.com |
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Joel on Software |
A weblog by Joel Spolsky, a programmer working in New York City, about software and software companies. |
www.joelonsoftware.com |
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Amazon.com Software: Computer & video games, business, accounting ... |
Online shopping for computer & video games, business & office productivity software, software from Microsoft, Apple, Adobe & more; accounting, antivirus, ... |
www.amazon.com |
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IBM Software - Home Page |
IBM home page for all of its software products, including Lotus and Tivoli, with keyword search, category browse and AZ product names. |
www.ibm.com |
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Opera web browser: Homepage |
Copyright © 2006 Opera Software ASA. All rights reserved. Skip navigation. Opera Software ... Copyright Opera Software ASA . All rights reserved. ... |
www.opera.com |
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Google Directory - Computers > Software |
Search only in Software Search the Web ... Software Categorized by Letter: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z ... |
www.google.com |
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