ADIC Advanced Digital Information (MM)

Advanced Digital Information Corporation (Nasdaq:ADIC), the leader in Intelligent Storage(TM) solutions for the open system market, announced today a major new tape library platform, the Scalar(R) i500, that is the first in the industry to offer growing midrange environments the flexible scalability and integrated intelligence they need to improve the effectiveness of their backup. The Scalar i500 offers several industry firsts for midrange libraries, all designed to make backup more reliable and easier to manage. It is the first midrange library to use ADIC's iPlatform(TM) architecture and iLayer(TM) management approach to provide advanced integrated management functions while eliminating the need for external library control servers or software. It is the first midrange library to combine flexible, modular scalability with a single, continuous robotics system to meet the needs of users from smaller workgroups through midrange data centers. It is also the first midrange library to integrate SMI-S support, allowing it to be managed directly by third-party SRM tools. "Tape provides security, portability, and value that are critical for midrange data protection and compliancy requirements, but up to now library vendors have not designed libraries to meet the full set of requirements for this segment," explains Bill Britts, ADIC Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing. "The most common approach suppliers have taken is to try to meet midrange needs by stacking separate small libraries together and connecting them with elaborate pass-through systems -- and offering none of the management features that midrange environments require as they grow. "ADIC has taken a different approach with the Scalar i500. It is the first library to offer midrange users flexible, modular growth and a single robotics system, and it is the first library to integrate advanced management and diagnostic features previously available only in an enterprise system into an easy-to-use midrange solution. The Scalar i500 is designed to meet the full range of midrange backup needs today and long into the future as user needs change and evolve." Easy, Flexible Growth For physical scalability, the Scalar i500 combines flexible, modular growth with the reliability and performance of single, continuous robotics. Users can start with one of three, preconfigured base systems, and then grow them simply and easily as their needs change by adding expansion modules or by activating capacity-on-demand tape positions using a software key. The full range is from 1 to 18 LTO drives, and from 36 to 404 tapes. The entire library is served by a single, continuous robotics system for industry-leading performance, reliability, simplicity, and value. With the Scalar i500, modules can be located in any position in a rack; they install easily and quickly; and there are no pass-through ports or tape-transfer elevators required. Integrated iLayer Management The Scalar i500's management is also designed specifically to meet midrange needs. It includes easy self-guided installation and service wizards, built-in partitioning, I/O management, hot swap drives, and support both for mixed media and mixed connectivity. It also uses the same proactive monitoring and intelligent remote diagnostics that ADIC uses in its enterprise libraries to reduce service calls by 50% and speed up issue resolution by 30%. With the Scalar i500, the library automatically stores and synchronizes logs, retains drive and media usage records, analyzes event patterns, and automatically emails alerts to users and the ADIC service team. The diagnostics can even extend out into the storage ecosystem around the library to pinpoint fault conditions and increase the overall reliability of the entire backup process. First to Offer Full SRM Support In addition to providing management of the library, the Scalar i500 is the first midrange library to offer full support for SRM tools via integration of the SMI-S management standard. This support means that standard SRM tools, like the EMC ControlCenter(TM), can discover and manage multiple Scalar i500s in any locations around the world using a single, common tool. It is the first time in the industry that users will be able to manage their midrange libraries alongside their disk and fabric resources with a single management interface. "With the Scalar i500 ADIC has done a superb job of designing an innovative library platform, one obviously built from the ground up to solve midrange backup problems," commented Brian Garrett, an industry analyst with the Enterprise Strategy Group. "Midrange backup is hard. Users have to provide short-term protection and long-term retention, their data is growing rapidly, and they need help managing the process. ADIC's Scalar i500 allows users to start small and increase capacity over time easily and affordably, and it provides the right management tools, including SMI-S support, that will let IT departments handle midrange backup tasks more effectively -- and spend less time managing them." "We have built the Scalar i500 to provide long-term protection of user investment," added Mr. Britts. "It not only grows with data, but its software-based management platform is designed to add new functions over time to meet new challenges. The Scalar i500 is also designed to easily integrate with disk backup products, like ADIC's Pathlight VX disk backup solution to provide users with next-generation mixed-technology data protection. "Together, ADIC's Scalar i500 and Scalar i2000 iPlatform libraries now give users a common library architecture and a common, iLayer management approach for a range of backup needs that extend from a single terabyte up to more than a thousand terabytes." Scalar i500 base systems are available in three sizes: 5, 14, and 23 rack units in height. The 5U systems offer up to 2 drives and 36 tape positions; 14U systems offer up to 6 drives and 128 tapes; 23U systems can scale to 10 drives and 220 tapes. Expansion units, 9U in height with up to 4 drives and 92 tape positions, can be added to any base system to build an extended library of up to 18 drives and 404 tape positions. Pricing and Availability The Scalar i500 will begin shipping in November 2005 through ADIC and ADIC channel partners worldwide. Contact your ADIC representative for pricing and availability of specific options and configurations. About ADIC Advanced Digital Information Corporation (Nasdaq:ADIC) is a leading provider of Intelligent Storage(TM) solutions to the open systems marketplace. ADIC is the world's largest supplier of automated tape systems using the drive technologies most often employed for backing up open system, client-server networks(1). The Company's data management software, storage networking appliances, and disk-based backup and restore solutions provide IT managers innovative tools for storing, managing, and protecting their most valuable digital assets in a variety of disk and tape environments. ADIC storage products are available through a worldwide sales force and a global network of resellers, OEMs and partnerships, including Apple, Dell, EMC, Fujitsu-Siemens, HP, IBM, and Sun. Further information about ADIC is available at www.adic.com. (1) Market Share: Gartner Dataquest, Tape Automation Systems Market Shares, 2004, F. Yale, August 2005. ADIC and Scalar are registered trademarks and Intelligent Storage is a trademark of Advanced Digital Information Corporation. All other trade or service marks mentioned in this document should be considered the property of their respective owners.