Tape archive

Cold data on tape, without the small-file problem

Arcois ships an LTFS tape service today. For Exera customers it is enabled per deployment, and sealed volumes go to tape on a schedule.

integrated on request

Cheapest per terabyte

A cartridge is paid for once and sits on a shelf. Twenty-year retention schedules were written with tape in mind.

Air-gapped by nature

Object Lock is a logical barrier. A cartridge out of the drive is a physical one, which is the difference ransomware planning cares about.

Hostile to small files

A drive is fastest when it is fed long sequential writes. Small files make it stop and reposition, which is slow and wears both head and media. Object stores are made of small files.

The service

What the Arcois tape service does

It manages TS4300 and TS4500 tape libraries: inventory, LTFS formatting, verification and cartridge bookkeeping, driven from a web UI, a command line and an API. Files are written as two copies across cartridge pools and read back on request, choosing between the copies if one fails.

It runs on a host with direct access to the library, outside the Kubernetes cluster, so no node needs privileged access to a tape drive. Clients on other hosts stream files to it over gRPC.

In one line each

  • Two copies per archive, placed on different cartridges.
  • Spans cartridges; never splits a file.
  • Archive, retrieve, verify, repair and reclaim over the API.
  • Survives a crash mid-job without trusting a half-written tape.
  • Keeps a cartridge mounted between jobs to avoid needless mounts.

With Exera

Sealed volumes, sent on a schedule

Exera already turns small objects into large sealed volumes. The tape integration sends those volumes to the tape service on a schedule you set, so a drive receives long sequential writes and streams.

Objects arrive as usualClients write small objects to Exera. They are packed into volumes and sealed with a manifest.
Volumes age in their placementLifecycle rules and storage classes decide which data is cold. Nothing changes for the client.
A scheduled job archives whole volumesAt the window you choose, cold volumes are streamed to the tape service and written as two copies. Each volume is one large sequential file, which is what a drive wants.
Retrieval brings a volume backAn object in an archived volume is restored by bringing the volume back from tape; the manifest says exactly what is inside.
Status. The Exera integration is enabled per customer deployment. Talk to us about your retention schedule and library model.

LTFS, an open tape format

Cartridges are formatted with LTFS, the open Linear Tape File System. The layout on tape is documented and vendor-neutral, and each archive job keeps a manifest of what it wrote and where.

What that means for you

Your archive is never held hostage by a proprietary catalogue. A cartridge's contents are described in a standard format that tape tooling understands.

Have a library already?

Tell us the model and the retention schedule. We will size the archive window with you.

Talk to us