Info on Online/Optical needed

Dear Informixers, we have several hundred MB of data stored in a mainframe that will be discontinued within this year. We are now looking for a way to transfer these data into our Online database. The mainframe data are static, we only need read access. Our server doesn't have enough harddisk space for the all of the old data. Increasing the number of harddisks is NOT an option, since the server machine (SNI RM400-10) cannot hold more, and a peripheral cabinet is probably not available any more. Online/Optical came to my mind, since the data are static and read access doesn't happen very often and is mostly done by batch processes, so speed isn't too important. We'd have to find a way to transfer the data from the mainframe onto Online/Optical media. We've exported data from the mainframe before and imported them into our Online database, but then we had more disk space. What media does Online/Optical support? How are the data written onto these media? Do we have to import the data into Online first and then write them out using Online/Optical? We do have a CD-ROM drive in our machine, and we have access to a CD-ROM writer in our regional computing center. Is there a way to somehow write our data to a CD-ROM image and let the recorder write the CD-ROM for later use with Online/Optical? This would save us from having to buy a MO drive, which might not be available for our machine (our dealer is presently checking into this). Thanks for any info, Richard -- +----------------------------+-------------------------------------------+ | Dr. Richard Spitz | INTERNET: spitz@ana.med.uni-muenchen.de | | EDV-Gruppe Anaesthesie | Tel : +49-89-7095-3413 | | Klinikum Grosshadern | FAX : +49-89-7095-8886 | | 81366 Munich, Germany | | +----------------------------+-------------------------------------------+