2 verified LTO-5 tape drive listings tracked right now. Per the manufacturer's own documentation, an LTO-5 drive reads its own generation and the two before it and writes its own generation and the one before it. Cheapest tracked unit: $1095.00 (HPE, Used).
Updated
Reads: Its own generation and the two before it
Writes: Its own generation and the one before it
This generation still follows the older rule, since the narrowing only took effect starting at LTO-8: lto.org's own compatibility page states generations 1-7 read back two generations and write back one. Source: lto.org, "LTO Generation Compatibility Details", read 13 September 2026.
This site does not currently stock LTO-5 media, so we cannot price a first cartridge into this basket or compute a native $/TB figure for this generation - we are stating that gap rather than substituting a different generation's price. The drive, host bus adapter and cleaning cartridge total is still priced below.
Drive + host bus adapter (where the interface is SAS) + cleaning cartridge - no media line, because none is in stock. 2 items across 2 listings. In-stock listings only. Anything out of stock when this page loaded is named below rather than silently dropped.
| Item | Qty | Each | Line | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DriveHPE LTO-5 tape drive (Used) | x1 | $1095.00 | $1095.00 | Buy |
| CleaningIBM cleaning cartridge | x1 | $46.99 | $46.99 | Buy |
| Basket total | $1141.99 | |||
These are our current tracked prices. Amazon sets the seller and the final price at checkout - verify before you buy. Opening any item starts an Amazon session, and anything you add there is part of the same order - you do not need to come back here between items.
One or more listings above are used. Condition claims on a used tape drive are the seller's, not a manufacturer record - see buying a used tape drive before relying on a "tested" or "low hours" claim.
The generation question is settled by what tapes you already own, not by price or by what's newest. If your existing archive is on a generation this drive cannot read per the table above, buying it does not give you access to that archive - check the compatibility row before the price.
Both drives we track at this generation are HPE-branded and internal, half-height, 6Gb/s SAS (SAS-2) units - the same physical mechanism family, per HPE's own master QuickSpecs, which groups the Ultrium 3000 and Ultrium 3280 model numbers together as the same fifth-generation product line. The Ultrium 3000 (EH957B) is the new listing; the Ultrium 3280 is sold used.
Where the two genuinely differ, from what we could source: HPE's current documentation carries a full technical row for the Ultrium 3000 - form factor, interface, native and compressed transfer rate all stated. The Ultrium 3280 does not have its own row in the current edition of that same document, and we found conflicting evidence elsewhere (multiple resellers call it full-height, while a changelog note in HPE's own QuickSpecs hints an earlier edition had a dedicated full-height section later removed) - we are not printing a form factor for the 3280 rather than guess between those two signals. Its condition is also unverified beyond the seller's own "used" label - see buying a used tape drive below before treating either fact as settled.
Both read LTO-3, LTO-4 and LTO-5 media and write LTO-4 and LTO-5, per HPE's own quoted text: "Fifth-generation LTO Ultrium drives (Ultrium 3280, Ultrium 3000) read and write LTO-4 and LTO-5 media and also read LTO-3 media." That compatibility fact is confirmed for both model numbers by name, even though the interface and form-factor facts are not.
Check each listing's own interface in the table above before assuming a SAS card covers it - not every drive we track at this generation uses the same host bus.
See the HBA buying guide and IT mode page for which of our tracked cards are native HBAs out of the box versus which need reflashing, and check the drive's own documented interface generation against the card's before buying either.
All tape drives · Does tape pay for itself yet? · Buying used · Autoloaders · LTO tape media.
Per the manufacturer's own documentation for the drives we track at this generation: reads Its own generation and the two before it, writes Its own generation and the one before it. Check what generation your existing cartridges actually are before buying - the answer above is what this generation's drives do, not what any other generation does.
See the live basket below - the drive price alone is not the full entry cost once you add a compatible host bus adapter and a cleaning cartridge rated for this generation.
Not currently. We track LTO-5 drive hardware, but this site does not currently stock LTO-5 media, so we cannot compute a native $/TB figure or a break-even archive size for this specific generation - see the tape media hub for the generations we do stock.
Every LTO-5 drive we track is internal, per its own listing - it mounts inside a server or enclosure bay and draws power from that host.
Not on any published schedule we could source. The manufacturer documentation we read for cleaning cartridges describes cleaning as triggered by the drive's own error detection, not a fixed interval - keep a rated cartridge on hand rather than cleaning on a calendar.
See the drives hub for every generation we track, including ones without a dedicated page yet - a generation gets its own page once at least two independent listings verify it, and we say plainly which generations don't currently clear that bar.
Specification claims on this page were checked against the pages below on 4 August 2026. Where a widely-repeated figure did not survive that check, we report what the source says now and say so in the text rather than repeating the familiar number.