Instead of saving the measurement data in readable number columns in segment tables, it is also possible to keep the binary format when extracting DAT files into the database. Depending on the signal characteristics, lossless compression (only saving changes) saves a large amount of disk space and thus enables database processing of high resolution measurement data. To access this compressed data with third party applications, a decompression function is required, which has to be individually implemented.

Channel tables have a _IsBlob column, which states whether the corresponding _Segments column contains binary data. This column is created as soon as at least one profile is extracted as a BLOB regardless of the database provider used.

If you use ibaAnalyzer as an analysis tool, implementing BLOBs can be a very efficient storage solution. You can enable this option in the Archive profile assignment tab, see Archive profile assignment.