If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. That’s the verdict of some technology consultants on the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) recent decision to move away from the use of magnetic tape in the US General Services Administration (GSA).
On April 4, DOGE claimed on X that it saved GSA’s IT team $1 million per year by converting 14,000 magnetic tapes, which it described as “70 yr old technology for information storage,” to an alternative storage method.
Old, but gold. The post threw some experts for a loop, as magnetic tapes, though old, are still an invaluable storage option. Coughlin Associates President Tom Coughlin told IT Brew that magnetic tapes are still a great long-term backup storage option because of their inexpensive nature. He said that roughly $90 can purchase a linear tape-open (LTO), an open-format magnetic tape technology, with 18 terabytes of native storage, a much cheaper option compared to storing the equivalent on a hard disk or a solid-state drive (SSD). While an 18 terabyte hard disk will run on average anywhere from $300 to $500, currently SSDs storing even 15 terabytes cost over $2,000.
He added that when stored correctly, tapes can have a shelf life of about 30 years. In comparison, hard disks have a lifespan of about 3–5 years, while SSDs have one of up to10 years.
“It’s one of the least expensive means for storing data long term,” Coughlin said. “That’s the reason why people use it.”
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David Boland, VP of cloud strategy at Wasabi Technologies, added that new versions of LTO technology are continuing to be pumped out, a sign of the storage device’s viability in the industry.
“We should see a new version announced sometime the next few weeks to June…so the LTO manufacturers believe there’s a lot of life left in it, for sure,” Boland said.
Permanent modern digital records? The other part of this equation that has some stumped is the new medium that the temporary federal agency indicated would now be used by the GSA, which it describes very cryptically as “permanent modern digital records.” Neither DOGE nor the GSA immediately responded to IT Brew’s request for comment on the storage method.
Coughlin told us that magnetic tape is often viewed as a permanent digital storage for its lengthy lifespan, making it unclear what the alternative could be.
“I don’t understand. If they’re moving away from magnetic tape, what are they moving to that’s going to be less expensive?” Coughlin said. “I guess that’s the bottom line.”
Coughlin speculates that DOGE might have meant they converted old tape formats to newer ones. He added that it could also be possible the agency switched to storing data in the cloud versus locally. However, both scenarios ironically still involve the tape storage device it professes to be moving away from.
“Most of the big data centers do their archiving on tape,” Coughlin said. “The hyperscalers, they use tape.”