SONY

Considering Recycled Tape... Think Again

There have been many papers written on the subject of recycled tape but none have
actually evaluated the tape and documented the results. For the purpose of this paper,
recycled tape refers to tape that, after first being purchased as new by the original owner
and used for an unspecified amount of time, is then resold to another user. In this paper we will
share our evaluation results based on a small random sample of Sony DLT-IV tapes that were
purchased as recycled tape and acquired by Sony.

It is important to realize that recycled tape, in most cases, is tape that is removed from
circulation because it has been deemed to have nearly reached the end of it's useable life
by the original owner/purchaser. If you consider why you are backing up your digital assets
to begin with, i.e. to save your company from catastrophic loss, you will quickly realize that a
thorough risk analysis is in order before moving forward with recycled tape. The question you
want to ask yourself is, 'What impact would it have on my business if I was unable to retrieve the
most valuable assets my business owns?'

The most important part of a reliable backup system is the media/tape on which you
store your valuable digital assets. Areas that impact the reliability of the tape are brand
integrity/quality, care & handling of the tape and probably most important, but often forgot
about, the maintenance of the hardware/drives it was used with while it was in it's prime.