Obviously not, I wouldn’t go that far myself. However, there is something extremely intriguing in tape drives (and tape libraries) that no other piece of hardware in the data center can emulate.Perhaps it’s because of the convergence of highly sophisticated mechanical and electric engineering. Perhaps it’s because of its whirling and purring but I find a tape drive several order of magnitudes more interesting to watch than other IT stuff.Anyhow, if you are only mildly interested in tape drives don’t miss this new one from Sun StorageTek, the T10000. Here is what the T10000 looks like but the photo doesn’t tell how impressive its specs are.A complete data sheet is here but don’t overlook that the T10000 can store 500 GB on single cartridge without compression, which, even though surpassed by other tape drives is still a remarkable capacity. However, its transfer rate, 120MB per second without compression is first class. You can buy one now for $37,000, I hear from Sun, but a mainframe version should be available later this year.