XenData ships hybrid archive appliance

XenData has taken the wraps off its new X10 Media Archive Appliance, which connects to one or two external LTO drives and can manage an “unlimited number” of offline LTO cartridges.

It has both a file-folder interface and a web interface, which provides previews of video and image files. “The X10 is a very cost-effective way to manage a highly scalable media archive,” the company says.

XenData X10 Media Archive Appliance
XenData X10 Media Archive Appliance

The web interface can be securely accessed by on-premises and remote users. They can search and browse for archived files and then play video previews and view low-res versions of image files for all the content held in the archive, including files stored on offline LTO cartridges. The web interface uses HTTPS, and it supports Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Safari browsers.

The X10 appliance runs a Windows 11 Pro operating system and can be used standalone or connected to a local network. Although optimized for media files, the X10 will archive all file types and file names supported by Windows. It includes a mirrored 4 TB cache volume, “enhancing write and read performance,” said XenData, while being used to store the media file previews.

XenData LTO Archive

The archive file system can be accessed as a standard network share that adheres to the standard Microsoft security model based on Active Directory, and can be easily added to a Windows Domain or Workgroup.

Advanced functionality includes automatic LTO cartridge replication, end-to-end logical block protection, and the creation of LTO cartridge contents reports and the issuance of email alerts. It can also be configured to write to rewritable LTO cartridges using the LTFS interchange format, and can support writing to unalterable LTO WORM cartridges.

Phil Storey, XenData
Phil Storey

“The X10 can manage hundreds of LTO cartridges stored ‘on the shelf’, and allows users to easily find the content they want and bring it back online, even for a very large archive,” said Phil Storey, XenData CEO.

The X10 appliance will be available at the end of this month, priced from $6,950.

XenData introduced its Media Portal viewer to its on-prem and public cloud tape archive library last May so users can see previews of archived image and video files to select content for restoration.