Business issues
Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center was doing open system backups from smaller libraries that had extended capacity. They were out of capacity and were looking at upgrading. Their mainframe tape libraries were going off-lease. They were experiencing extensive media failures, extensive hardware failure and drive failure. They also wanted to consolidate open systems and mainframe backups in order to streamline the management process. They were concerned about the number of tapes that they had on the floor. And they needed higher system availability so that end users could serve patients.

Solutions
StorageTek provided solutions to centralize nightly backups for more than 260 systems. All the backups have been centralized into one unit. This shaved hours off backup times, providing more hours of system availability. By integrating a Virtual Storage Manager® (VSM®) system with highspeed tape drives, Manager of Technical Services Bob Massengill, has decreased the number of tapes needed, increased backup speed and improved systems availability.

Financial benefits
Tape usage decreased from 30,000 to 600 tapes, thus saving on media costs. The data center has regained much-needed floor space now that it no longer needs to store thousands of tapes. By completing the migration to the StorageTek drives within a six-week time frame, the Medical Center avoided additional lease payments on older units.

Business benefits
Users at the Medical Center have access to systems more hours per day, so early patient admission processes run more smoothly. Massengill’s staffers are now able to invest their time in system monitoring, proactive maintenance and furthering their education on new systems and software. Media failures no longer compromise data integrity. Massengill praised StorageTek’s Professional Services for help during the installation process. “They were here every day, whenever we needed them. They always made sure we got what we needed.”

Technology benefits
By implementing the PowderHorn and the VSM, backup time was reduced from 60 minutes to seven minutes or less. Implementing the PowderHorn and the VSM reduced media failure by about ninety percent. The MVS batch programmers were mounting 1,000 to 1,200 tapes each day. Now the staff has considerably fewer tapes to handle, and mount times have been reduced from three minutes to a fraction of a second. “Now,” adds Massengill, “with the FlexLine™ 600 Series storage system, we will be implementing a disk-to-disk backup solution.”