Patent ID: 8321379

Claim:
An apparatus for selecting storage media scaling to improve data access performance, the apparatus comprising: a processor coupled to a memory; a reception module implemented in software stored on a memory device for execution on a processor and configured to receive a dataset for storage on a magnetic tape storage medium with a storage instruction that does riot direct that the dataset is stored with scaling; an identification module implemented in software stored on the memory device for execution on the processor and configured to identify storage characteristics of the dataset, wherein the storage characteristics comprise compaction, expiration dates, and media interchange specifications; and a scaling module implemented in software stored on the memory device for execution on the processor and configured to select a scaling storage instruction using a pre-defined look-up table that determines whether each dataset is to be scaled using the scaling instruction and communicate the selected scaling storage instruction to a storage controller, wherein the scaling storage instruction comprises an instruction to scale the magnetic tape storage medium to a predefined capacity for optimal data access performance and the storage controller stores the dataset on a magnetic tape storage device in response to the scaling storage instruction.