[Info-vax] lower-cost bulk eraser for high-coercivity tape media (DAT, DLT, Ultrium etc)?

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 02/16/2018 05:07 PM, terry-groups at glaver.org wrote:
> On Friday, February 16, 2018 at 4:44:58 PM UTC-5, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> I use a cheap Radio Shack tape eraser for clearing old disks
>> for reformatting.  I would not do this for security reasons.
>> I would run them thru a shredder.  I would recommend pulling
>> the tape out of the cartridge and running it thru a shredder.
> 
> I wouldn't depend on a degausser that wasn't specifically designed for the type of tape. I've seen people run modern media through various old-school degaussers and the media isn't affected at all.
> 
> As far as pulling (all) of the tape out, modern LTO media has over half a mile of tape in the cartridge. You'll be there for a while. Plus, you'll end up with a much larger pile of loose tape.
> 

Break the cartridge and it all comes out at once.  :-)
You could always burn them but that would not be environmentally
friendly.

bill