Philips are also making IBM 3490c drives and want to use the same mechanism with new heads to support NTP cartridges. The decision is hoped to be made in late December with an order placed soon after. Disk - Contact Les Robertson CERN had been buying disks based on an acquisition won by Falcon and providing Seagate disks. CERN was very satisfied with this arrangement and was getting good support. Recently the contract was won by SGI who provide Quantum disks, The disks are bought in cabinets, and there have been many problems with connecting the disks up.
Reliability is the main issue rather than transfer rates.
Disk performance and connectivity, according to Les, has kept up with most CPU requirements. Les seemed uninterested in using RISC for high performance. Solaris is now fully supported since it is stable and needed to support new hardware. The support for AIX is outsourced to a full-time AIX administrator. There appears to be no move to support Linux, though it is attractive to universities and appears to have good free support via the Internet.