Damaged tapes? Missing data? Tape media unsupported by your current storage infrastructure? We can help!

No tape recovery is too big. Let our experts save you time on recovering data from tape so you can do more important tasks.

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We recover from all tape media.

LTODLTIBM
STKQIC8mm
4mm9 Track 

Common causes of tape failure and data loss.

Corruption: operational error, expired tapes, mishandling of the tape or accidental overwrites caused by inserting or partially formatting the wrong tape

Physical Damage: broken tapes, dirty drives and damage caused by fire, flood or other natural disaster

Software Upgrades: inability for data on tape to be read by new application or servers

Even though tape has a great longevity for data storage, a lot can happen to make the data on them inaccessible. Our engineering team has seen it all. Some examples of successful recoveries include:

  • Overwritten tapes (including DLT)
  • Quick-erased or partially overwritten data from LTO (Ultrium) tape media
  • Snapped or burnt tapes
  • Tapes damaged by chemicals and smoke
  • Software problems or backup failures
  • Tapes immersed in flood water and mud
  • Intentional or accidental physical damage
Tape failure and data loss

Tape data recovery experts

A proven process for tape recovery

Our Ontrack Data Recovery R&D team has been building their knowledge of tape recovery and resources for over 25 years. Our process below has proven successful.

  • Tape recoveries are performed in dust-free cleanroom environments
  • Tapes and tape drives are carefully dismounted, examined, and processed
  • Proprietary tools are used to read and recover around any physically damaged areas
  • We are able to quickly image failing tapes to ensure the most complete data recovery possible

Warning: Attempting to recover tape data on your own, or through an inexperienced data recovery provider, may lead to further damage. Select a data recovery provider with the resources, expertise and experience you can trust.


Extensive solutions for all of your tape recovery and storage needs.

Our tape services consist of four straight-forward steps that make managing your archived tape an easy job.

 

Audit

Find out if your data is physically accessible with the Ontrack tape audit service. We can also provide visibility on what has been stored past its retention period.

Tape auditing

 

Migration

Whether you're migrating from your IT service provider or found that your tape formats are no longer supported, Ontrack can help migrate to a new system or storage medium.

Tape migration

 

Cataloging

Organizing archive tape data can seem like a daunting task. Let us catalog your legacy data efficiently and make it easier for you to manage.

Tape cataloging

 

Restoration

Ontrack can help you quickly retrieve granular information from your tape archives ensuring you are able to comply with legal and government requests.

Tape restoration

Forensic tape recovery services

Forensic Tape Recovery

Do you have an urgent restore request for upcoming litigation? We recover legally sound data from tape media to satisfy litigation requests. Tapes contain a snapshot of data which was present on a system at a point in time.

This could include information which is no longer available in 'active' storage, especially if – in the anticipation of an investigation - efforts have been made by a suspect to manipulate or remove potentially incriminating evidence from the live system. However, this evidence can still be found via a forensic investigation of the tapes. We can recover forensically sound data quickly when urgent restore requests arise.


A trusted provider.

Managing archived data is critical to reducing risk and cost in your business.

By working with Ontrack, you’ll have peace of mind that you can access what you want, when you want it while keeping your archive costs as low as possible.

By trusting us to help manage your legacy data, you will not only be able to quickly react to requests, better manage what data you keep and where you store it, but also reduce storage and maintenance costs.

Tape Data Recovery Exoerts

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Tape Case Studies

Ontrack recovers over 230 million files from Commvault database.

Feb 20, 2020

The Situation

A large North American based manufacturer of building materials experienced a serious data loss due to a corrupt database file on their Commvault Media Server.

The client’s data storage solution consisted of the Commvault server as well as a Media Agent under the Commcell® management system. A Commvault Simpana® 9 was used for backup and archiving. The company lost access to media files crucial to the operation of their business.

The client attempted to open one of its virtual tape library backups only to find the MediaAgent database file, the gateway to the files on the media server, was corrupted and showed zero bytes in size.

The virtual tapes and the files stored inside the media server were still intact, but were not able to be accessed. The client contacted Commvault support and they attempted to retrieve the missing data from the media agent volume residing on the deployed Dell® MD1200 storage using the Commvault Media Explorer Tool. Their efforts proved to be unsuccessful. More than 3500 virtual tapes and 25 tape-sets were lost resulting in over 230 million inaccessible files. Fortunately, the client was able to copy the entire volume from the Dell server to external disks by using the Commvault Simpana 9 and sent them to Ontrack to recover the data. Unfortunately, the metadata containing the shortcuts leading from the database towards the files was not transferred with the media agent volume; therefore the files still could not be reached. Intensive investigation was necessary in order to discover the data mapping.

The Solution

Ontrack engineers were able to rebuild the original structure of the virtual array with the information contained on the external hard disks.

To reconstruct the data mapping used by the Commvault system, Ontracks internal software development team researched how Commvault distributes files, over the whole storage system and the built-in disks. After determining the custom mapping used by Commvault and decoding the virtual array, another challenge arose when the engineers discovered the virtual tape backup sets were also de-duplicated. The Ontrack software developers and data recovery engineers were able to create custom tools to

read the files from the system, rebuild the missing catalog and mapping information, and gain access to the file data. The engineers were then able to restore the files upon extraction and remove the de-duplication.

The Resolution

In the end, Ontrack engineers were able to recover the missing tape libraries as well as tape-sets with the 230+ million files included in just a couple of weeks.

The client was amazed at the success and speed of the recovery. With the insights gained into the Commvault system and the newly developed tools, the data recovery specialists at Ontrack are able to retrieve data even faster from all Commvault-based systems.


Join over a half million people and businesses who have trusted Ontrack to recover their data.


  

Start your data recovery now with a free consultation.

Contact our team of experts. Ontrack accommodates everyone – from the largest government or enterprise organization to an individual who may have lost their digital photos and everyone in between.

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