IBM's current mid-range modular tape library, scaling from a single 40-slot module to 16 modules and up to 25.6 PB physical capacity with LTO 9 or LTO 10 drives.
- Status
- Current, active IBM/Lenovo product
- Form Factor
- 3U base module, vertically expandable to 16 modules
- Cartridge Slots
- 40 slots per module plus 5 I/O slots; up to 640 cartridges (LTO 10) or up to 280 cartridges (LTO 9, six expansion modules)
- Drive Options
- LTO 9 or LTO 10, full-height (up to 16) or half-height (up to 48)
- Native Capacity
- Up to 40 TB per cartridge (LTO 10 native), up to 25.6 PB physical library capacity
- Interfaces
- Fibre Channel and SAS, model dependent
- Typical Replacement For
- TS3100, TS3200, and earlier TS4300 LTO 7/8 configurations
The TS4300 is IBM's current mid-range tape library for AS400 and IBM i backup environments, sold under the IBM/Lenovo partnership. It replaced the older TS3100 and TS3200 libraries as IBM's entry into mid-range tape, and it is the library most AS400 shops land on when they outgrow a single autoloader like the TS2900 but do not need the frame-scale capacity of a TS4500.
Capacity scales in 3U modules: a single base module holds 40 cartridge slots plus 5 dedicated I/O slots, and up to 15 expansion modules can be added vertically. With LTO 9 drives and six expansion modules, that reaches roughly 280 cartridges; with LTO 10 drives and the full 16-module stack, IBM rates it up to 640 cartridges and 25.6 PB of physical capacity. Drive counts scale the same way, up to 16 full-height or 48 half-height LTO drives depending on configuration.
For an IBM i shop still running SAVLIB/SAVOBJ jobs to physical tape, or backup software like BRMS or Robot Save pointed at a tape device, the TS4300 is a drop-in replacement path off older hardware without changing the backup process itself, only the target library and, in most cases, the LTO generation.
LTO 9 vs LTO 10 on the TS4300
The TS4300 ships in both LTO 9 and LTO 10 configurations. This matters more than it used to: LTO 10 introduced a new tape format that is not backward compatible with LTO 9 media at all, unlike the LTO 8-to-LTO-9 transition where drives could still read the prior generation. See the LTO Generation Guide for the full compatibility table before choosing a drive generation for a TS4300 order.