Yesterday I saw some article about how magnetic tape was much cheaper per TB than hard disks (and you could drop them like SSDs, which is always nice), and this has made me consider if I should perhaps switch...
But its really hard to get any reliable info on the matter, which is why Im making this post.
- Is magnetic tape actually cheaper? Some older reddit posts say that this is not the case (and indeed, the latest LTO tape is much more expensive per TB than a hard drive), but at the same time, random websites on the internet seem to pitch some wild prices, such as this one (or the same one from another site) (or the same one from amazon, wait wtf why are all the cheap ones the same model), which comes at about 6 bucks per terabyte of data. This is way better than even a used hard drive.
- Are there any hidden costs or technical issues that one could expect? Or does it just behave like a hard drive but with much lower speeds? Do they wear out or are they expected to last more than hard drives? Is there any issue with buying used?
- Is it even possible to encrypt this data (in particular with Veracrypt)? This is kind of a dealbreaker for me otherwise, as I greatly value data security.
I generally store lots of random data across many folders, in the form of a digital library. Generally books/films by category. Plus random family pictures and work documents here and there.
Speed is not much of a concern, nor is having the storage cold. My hard drives usually take all night to sync, then they stay disconnected until needed again.