We performed a comparison between NetApp AFF and Pure Storage FlashBlade based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two All-Flash Storage solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."Offers excellent features like efficient data reduction, a reliable SafeMode, and a great support model for continuous assistance and updates."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use."
"The Pure1 component is most valuable at this point in time when comparing it with EMC. Pure1 is where you can have your diagnostics in the cloud, so you can look at things from your mobile phone."
"It's incredibly easy to use and greatly simplified our ability to both deploy and manage our storage subsystems."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe will quickly overcome all the hurdles you face, including network and latency issues."
"One of the best features is the support, which is excellent."
"We're able to get higher-density workloads on the same infrastructure, and we have a smaller physical footprint. The performance is excellent – during our test the bottlenecks are never on the X array, it just keeps picking up the pace to match what you need. The real-time visibility is a differentiator in my opinion."
"Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution."
"The most valuable feature is the support. If we have any issues, we can call into NetApp and their support is really good."
"It has improved performance for our enterprise applications, data analytics, and VMs. These improvements are a result of all-flash, throughput, reliability, compression, etc."
"It is a stable solution."
"The scale up version of it is the most valuable feature. You can go to 24 nodes, which is very cool."
"The most valuable features are high performance and encryption. It also provides aggregate level dedupe."
"Easier to manage with the clustered system and everything with the newest ONTAP 9."
"Organizations can reduce data storage footprint and lower power and cooling costs, helping to adopt "Green IT.""
"Performance. Mostly with our default settings it's good. All of the factory settings are fine. We don't have to tune it."
"The product is scalable and easy to expand."
"The solution provides many controllers."
"It is very easy to use, and it is very fast."
"The most valuable features are the Metro clustering, and disaster recovery."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the rewrite speed and the nonstop services."
"The tool's most valuable features are data warehousing, speedy recovery, and analytics. Its latest release is cost-effective."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is performance."
"The onboarding and integrated monitoring tools are pretty good."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"We need better data deduplication."
"Right now, the box itself is just strictly working as a backend storage system. It would be fantastic if we could access it directly like a NAS device through network access or SIS drives. I think they have an interface, but I am not sure how good it is. If we could address a box directly on the network without having to go through a server, it would be great. The replication schemas could be improved. We are not using replication on the storage level right now. We use a different type of replication. If their replication would be as good as the one that we have, I would probably run the replication schema because it might be faster, but I don't know that for a fact. So, I cannot say that they have good replication. All I can say is that they need to inform us better."
"We have run into a couple of instances recently where we are running out of space. So we have had to buy some more packs for it and they have deployed fine and it has increased smoothly."
"We've seen that when we create a POD in synchronous mode, it increases the latency."
"In terms of what needs improvement, the dashboard and management could be simplified."
"There is room for improvement in catering to midrange storage needs, especially for customers seeking Enterprise-class features."
"The software layer has to improve."
"The quality of technical support has dwindled over time and needs to be improved."
"The product should be more competitive and come up with additional features. They should keep the client always in mind and as the top priority. This would be the best way to compete with other solutions."
"Another issue is that for smaller customers, NetApp doesn't have enough disk sizes. You begin with a 980-gigabyte disk and the next size is 3.8 terabytes. There aren't any disk sizes in between. Competitors have more choices in disk sizes."
"The ONTAP S3 implementation is not feature-complete as compared to StorageGRID. We had to move our lakeFS instance from ONTAP S3 based on AFF to StorageGRID."
"There is room for improvement in terms of support. I have noticed that if I sometimes call their customer care for a particular issue, they will give me another number and ask me to call that other team. It would be better if they could do a warm transfer. That would save customers time from calling all the numbers again and speaking to another team."
"I think for us, improvement would probably be the changes in how the flash is actually used inside the system and how we manage the actual disk and stripes within the system."
"Offering the ability to actively write data on a single volume spanning multiple clusters is significant."
"I just got through the session where it looks like they are going to support Oracle running on Linux with SnapCenter. That is one of the main things that we are hoping to get integrated."
"File storage needs a lot of improvement. Mainframe connectivity also needs improvement because it requires additional components to be integrated with Pure Storage FlashBlade. If you want to keep your backup data, then this becomes an even more expensive solution because Pure Storage FlashBlade will not be able to meet your backup needs."
"They need better integration with public clouds along with a better hybrid solution."
"We haven't been able to use much of the cloud area of Pure Storage. We have a storage server and it would be better if it could integrate with other cloud features of this solution."
"There could be improvements in public cloud integration."
"There is some room for new features related to authentication and integration with Kubernetes, and other solution using S3 Bucket."
"Pure Storage FlashBlade should improve on more cloud integration."
"I would also like to see better support for CIFS workloads."
"An area for improvement in Pure Storage FlashBlade is its price. It could be reduced. The technical support for Pure Storage FlashBlade also needs improvement. It used to be good, with more experienced engineers. Nowadays, it isn't, and it takes longer for support to solve problems."
NetApp AFF is ranked 2nd in All-Flash Storage with 281 reviews while Pure Storage FlashBlade is ranked 16th in All-Flash Storage with 31 reviews. NetApp AFF is rated 9.0, while Pure Storage FlashBlade is rated 8.8. The top reviewer of NetApp AFF writes "Since switching, our clients have reported improved performance and reduced latency". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Pure Storage FlashBlade writes "A high-performing and scalable solution that improves data performance for S3 workloads". NetApp AFF is most compared with Dell PowerStore, Dell Unity XT, Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series, Pure Storage FlashArray and VMware vSAN, whereas Pure Storage FlashBlade is most compared with Dell PowerScale (Isilon), VAST Data, MinIO and Pure Storage FlashArray. See our NetApp AFF vs. Pure Storage FlashBlade report.
See our list of best All-Flash Storage vendors.
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