Travan
Tape Data Recovery - Travan
Travan is a magnetic tape cartridge design introduced by the 3M Company. The technology uses the standard 8-mm tape 750 feet long. Travan is standardized under the quarter inch cartridge (QIC) body. Examples of similar formats include Digital Data Storage (DDS), Advanced Intelligent Tape (AIT) and VXA. Travan is designed for computer backups and mass storage.
3M developed subsequent versions of Travan providing increased data capacity, while retaining the standard configuration of the tapes. However, in a few models, 3M used 740 feet tape instead of the 750 feet tape.
Generations
There are seven generations of Travan released so far. The first one, TR-1, released in 1995 offered native data capacity of 400 MB and maximum speed of 0.25 MB/s. it used QIC-80 media format. Subsequent models improved on both on capacity and speed. The last version, TR-7, released in 2002, offered a data capacity of 20 GB and maximum speed of 4 MB/s.
TR-2 cartridges with an 800 MB native capacity used QIC-3010 media format. This model was never marketed. Travan TR-3 cartridges offered a 1.6 GB native capacity with a 0.5 MB/s transfer rate using the QIC-3020 media format.
TR-4 cartridges offered a 4 GB native capacity and used the QIC-3095 media format. Imation HP Colorado 5 GB is a 460 ft variation on the TR-4 standard. It offered 2.5 GB native capacity and 1 MB/s data transfer rate. Travan NS20 (TR-5) cartridges offered a 10 GB native capacity with a 2 MB/s transfer rate. TR-6 was never released.
