Patent ID: 8665542

Claim:
A device, comprising: a buffer; logic adapted to accumulate data sent from a higher order device in the buffer; logic adapted to, in response to a command sent from the higher order device, selectively perform either: a first operation to write the data accumulated in the buffer to a regular recording region of a tape medium without an accompanying backhitch; or a second operation to write the data accumulated in the buffer to a temporary recording region of the tape medium without an accompanying backhitch, and to subsequently write to the regular recording region a data group that includes the data written to the temporary recording region that has any gaps between data eliminated prior to writing to the regular recording region; an acquisition component adapted to acquire a first volume of first data, at a time that the first data has been written to the regular recording region, by either the first operation or the second operation having been performed in response to the command; a prediction component adapted to predict a second volume of second data to be written in response to a command which is sent after the first data has been written to the regular recording region; a judgment component adapted to judge whether or not the first volume acquired by the acquisition component exceeds a first threshold, and to judge whether or not the second volume predicted by the prediction component exceeds a second threshold; and a control component adapted to: control such that when the judgment component has judged that the acquired first volume exceeds the first threshold and the predicted second volume exceeds the second threshold, in response to the command sent after the first data has been written to the regular recording region, the first operation is performed for the second data; and control such that when the judgment component has judged that the acquired first volume exceeds the first threshold and the predicted second volume does not exceed the second threshold, in response to the command sent after the first data has been written to the regular recording region, the second operation is performed for the second data.