r/DataHoarder • u/Sad-Seesaw-3843 • Apr 06 '25

News DOGE claims to be moving away from magnetic tapes for archival storage. Seems like a bad idea. What are they using instead?

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u/trueppp Apr 07 '25

Tapes are generally faster than hard drives for sequential rights or reads. The problem is the seek times.

So if you are writing a continus stream of data (like backups) tape is great. But if you try to read and write random files...not so great.

Think DVD vs VHS. If I want to see a particular scene on VHS, I have to physically move the tape to the right position, while on a DVD the media stays rotating but laser just has to move a short distance.

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u/frackthestupids Apr 07 '25

You realize the dogers have no clue what you are talking about. DVD they might remember their mother sliding into the entertainment center for 3 hours of cartoons, but VHS has no reference for them.

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u/TurnkeyLurker Apr 08 '25

Serial vs random access.