I had thought I had decided on getting DDS-4 but now am considering
DDS-3 in its place, for use with a Retrospect backup of mostly Mac
clients and a few PCs.
My previous experience with DDS-2 was very unhappy -- too much
maintenance, too much downtime, too many ever-changing
recommendations about what brand of media to use, etc.
I have been assured by several DDS-4 users on this list (thanks!)
that DDS-4 is much more reliable and easy to deal with.
However, I'm now thinking about going DDS-3 instead. I can't do a
full backup of my environment with a single DDS-4 tape anyway (it
would take two) and with DDS-3 it would take three, so either way I
will have to deal with multiple tapes. (The only single-tape solution
in my price range is VXA, which sounds very nice, but there is NO WAY
I will go with a new, single-vendor solution...)
LaCie DDS-3 from MacWarehouse costs about $800 compared to $1150 for DDS-4.
DDS-3 media seems to cost about half as much as DDS-4 media, even
though it holds more than half as much data. (12GB vs 20GB)
When I look at the prices of the drives and media, it appears that I
would save a considerable amount of money by using DDS-3 instead of
DDS-4.
Cost and day-to-day reliability are very important to me. Also
crucial is future support (2 - 4 years down the road) for drive
repairs and availability of media.
Speed, dealing with a few extra tape cartridges, and the ability to
read anyone else's DDS-4 tape are NOT important to me.
Can anyone think of a reason why I should get a DDS-4 instead of a
DDS-3, given these conditions?
In terms of reliability, is DDS-3 more like DDS-2 or DDS-4?
Thanks for your advice. -Steve
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