Wells, Somerset-based M4 Data Ltd has announced its first 36-track tape drive, the Twin Peaks M490E. The company, which is using minority shareholder Storage Technology Corp’s heads in Twin Peaks, says that the drive brings mainframe technology into the mid-range market, offering users reliable and fast data back-up or data interchange. Twin Peaks is the result of three years of development in which the company has invested ú5m. It takes standard 3480 and 3490 cartridges, reading both 18 and 36 track media, so enabling personal computer users to access mainframe-stored data. The tape drive has an SCS Interface, with 4Mb buffer, and the older FIPS interface to enable direct connections to mainframes. The drive is 5 high and fits the 8 form factor. M4 Data claims two metres per second tape speed, double that for fast search, and says it is working to double these speeds in the near future. There is an RS232 library attach port enabling the drive to be addressed or attached to other libraries, although M4 Data has also introduced the Workhorse M490L Library, compatible with Twin Peaks, which takes two magazines, each containing seven cartridges, to provide continuous operation and a manual load slot for individual cartridges. But the company says the key feature to the product is the loading mechanism: tests have not been completed but M4 Data says it has achieved more than 100,000 tape mountings. Part of the mainframe technology that M4 Data has brought to Twin Peaks is the air bearings system and the pressurised head technology that are both designed to minimise tape wear. Air bearings move the tape on a cushion of air, reducing the force used by the ceramic guides and preventing stiction, when the tape adheres to the head. M4 Data, which was created by a manag ement buy-out of the Thorn EMI Plc subsidiary in the late 1980s, has specialised in nine track half inch tape drives. In 1990 StorageTek bought an 19% stake in M4 Data (CI No 1,642), partly to aid its entry into the mid-range market. The launch into the 36-track market is an attempt to capture the middle of the IBM Corp mid-range market, AS/400 and RS/6000 users and the like. But it thinks Twin Peaks will be attractive to more advanced Unix sites that are looking for reliable, fast, back-up using traditional media, or access to legacy data. In fact, the company is so confident about the product that it believes it will be able to double its ú8m annual turnover within the next two years. M4 Data recently opened sales and service offices in Peking and Bangalore, India. It already had offices in Frankfurt, San Diego and Cocoa, Florida. The new drive alone will cost around ú12,000 and the library ú15,000. Production is planned to start later this quarter.
