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NSMıs CD jukeboxes have always been among the fastest and most reliable on the market. However, the largest jukebox made by the company until recently was the 150-slot Mercury. Although the speed was there, the capacity was not. Now all that is changed with the introduction of the Galaxy. With up to 620 slots filled with DVD-RAM discs (2.9 terabytes), the Galaxy is easily one of the highest-capacity jukeboxes available today.

I travelled to NSMıs Duluth, GA, headquarters to get a first-hand look at the Galaxy. Large for a CD/DVD jukebox, the 51ı x 26ı x 14ı, 186-pound Galaxy is the only NSM jukebox mounted on wheels. As compared to MO jukeboxes it is incredibly compact. MO jukeboxes with similar capacity can dominate a computer room.

The front panel of the Galaxy shows four accessible 15-disc magazines and a mail slot. There is a two-line display, six menu navigation buttons and a ten-digit keypad. Disc magazines are accessed from the control panel by entering three digit codes. This is somewhat different from the menu-driven interfaces found on other peripheral devices. Itıs faster to perform jukebox functions on discs and magazines by entering numeric codes than by toggling through multiple layers of menu items. You will, however, need to keep some sort of ıcheat sheetı listing the numeric codes identifying discs and magazines in the jukebox.

Internally, the Galaxy combines components from both the Satellite and Mercury jukeboxes. The four removable magazines in the front of the unit are all taken directly from the Satellite. Each of these magazines holds 15 discs for a total of 90 discs. These removable magazines are feature rich. No other jukebox in the Galaxyıs size class permits removal of disc magazines while the jukebox is on line and operating. When you press the button next to a magazine to remove it, the jukebox makes sure that all the magazineıs discs are parked before you can pull it out. Each magazine is barcoded and each has a half- megabyte chip. Storage management software can use the information on this chip to avoid inventorying every disk in the magazine. This and the barcoding make off-line disc management a breeze. These features, too, were carried over from the NSM Satellite.

There are 14 half-height bays in the back of the Galaxy that can accommodate either drives or non-removable 15-disc magazines. With one drive, you have 13 magazines accommodating 195 discs. For each additional drive you sacrifice another 15-disc magazine. There are seven 50-disc magazines borrowed from the Mercury jukebox. These magazines are removable, but only by removing one of the side panels from the jukebox. They do not have any of the special mount or dismount features of the four magazines accessible in the front of the jukebox. However, they have a higher disc storage density than the 15-disc magazines and, when filled, help the jukebox reach terabyte storage levels. The total slot capacity of the Galaxy is 90 removable slots in front, 350 slots (semi-removable) from the side, and up to an additional 195 slots (non-removable) in the back of the unit. If there is one fault in the Galaxy, it is this potentially confusing array of removable, semi-removable and non-removable slots.

By making the Galaxyıs robotics as light as possible and by carefully controlling robot movement, NSM has been able to engineer very fast swap times. Swap time on the Galaxy ranges between two seconds for a horizontal swap up to six seconds for the longest throw of the robotics over the entire height of the unit. NSM plans to add an additional motor within two to three months to further reduce swap time. NSM says current jukeboxes will be field upgradable.

The Galaxy uses another technique to speed the mounting of discs. Normally, a DVD or any other kind of disc can take several seconds to mount on top of the swap time. The Galaxy can coordinate with jukebox management software so that the software stores the identity and directory of each disc. In this way, the directory can be loaded just as the disc is mounted in a drive. This can reduce disc mount time to as little as half a second.

The Galaxy uses multiple SCSI ports and a serial port that can optionally be used to control the jukebox robotics. Three SCSI ports are standard and up to six are possible. Multiple SCSI interfaces are essential when recording CDs. Too much activity on a SCSI bus can interfere with CD recording. NSM recommends no more than three CD-R drives per SCSI bus. However, DVD-RAM drives use packet writing and are more immune to packet collisions on a SCSI bus. A SCSI bus can be maxed out with seven DVD-RAM drives. However, NSM recommends that drives in the jukebox be spread out over all the SCSI buses available.

The Galaxy gives you the option of using an ordinary serial port for controlling the robotics. The serial port gets traffic off the SCSI bus when recording CDs. However, the bandwidth needed to control the robotics is slight and, according to NSM, most users will opt for controlling the robotics over the SCSI bus. It makes for simpler wiring and the bandwidth needed to operate the robotics is irrelevant when used with DVD-RAM drives.

The Galaxyıs key components were proven in NSMıs smaller models. Jamming should not be a problem. However, if the worst happens, the side panels unscrew and can be removed while the jukebox is running. You donıt have to shut down your server and cycle the jukebox to open the unit to clear the robotıs path.

Special effort was made to keep debris away from the moving components. The drives do not have fans and the robotic areas are sealed off from airflow to keep dust to a minimum. Heat is drawn away using conduction through the metal parts of the jukebox into ducts that run the height of the unit on both sides. Fans in the two redundant power supplies keep air moving through these ducts.

NSM jukeboxes require that the drives be extensively remanufactured. Only the circuit board, transport and optics are kept. The entire loader mechanism is replaced with NSMıs own design. Modification of the loader mechanism is essential for any jukebox, not just NSMıs. The standard Toshiba DVD-RAM drive loader mechanism is rated for just 30,000 loads. A jukebox will exceed that inside a year. NSMıs replacement loader mechanism is rated for 300,000 loads - enough for 9 to 10 yearsı service.

The Galaxy has a lot of features not found on many other jukeboxes. It puts far more storage in less space than most other DVD jukeboxes and all other MO jukeboxes. It has one of the fastest swap times of any jukebox in its class. It has off-line disc management features not found anywhere else. It is priced a bit higher than many competing jukeboxes, but most of the higher cost is associated with additional disc drives; the Galaxy can hold more drives than any other jukebox except the huge Disc MO jukeboxes. Features, speed, awesome storage capacity and compactness are what earns this jukebox its Editorıs Choice.

-- Lowell Rapaport

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