Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] Reviews

The primary use case is to deploy all our production and documents. We have deployed Hyper-V on top of HyperFlex and the majority of our operation is on Hyper-V. Major workloads are our e-commerce website and applications that are hosted on it. We have deployed database servers and document management systems and a couple of app and web servers.

There is no specific storage person required for this solution. There are some slight cost advantages when you need fewer resources to manage it.

The fact that it's hyperconverged is what is most valuable about this solution. There is no specific feature which I can name because we have only been using it for a very short time. We just started using it.

It needs improvements in terms of I/O. Sometimes I have felt it is slightly slow while we are trying to provision VMs or access VMs. They should concentrate on that issue. At the same, time L2 switches are bundled in HyperFlex. If they make that the L3 switch, that would enhance the performance slightly better.

We deployed a couple of MySQL database servers and some portals which are connected and hosted outside on the internet and the deployment is still going well. So far it is stable and working fine. The deployment is still going on, the migration of further applications is happening.

Scaling, currently, is four nodes. Our plan is to add a couple of nodes next year.

So far, the technical support has been good, although we haven't faced many issues. While installing there were a couple of issues, otherwise everything has been fine and working normally.

This is the first hyperconverged solution we have used. We changed to HyperFlex because new requirements came in. Instead of moving towards a conventional infrastructure, we felt it was the time for us to look at, and to be involved with, the current trend in the market. These are the factors which made us look at this type of option.

The initial setup was very straightforward. After deploying the hardware, the engineer configured the HyperFlex software. On top of that, they gave us dashboard access where I could start deploying Hyper-V on those hosts and start provisioning VMs.

The deployment took a week. One person came from our Cisco partner. He understood our setup and planned what kind of support was required from our side. After providing the required information to him he started deploying the HyperFlex boxes.

It takes one person to maintain it after deployment. In our case he is a Windows administrator.

It was implemented by a Cisco partner from whom we got HyperFlex. Our experience with them has been good so far.

We negotiated with Cisco and we got some price benefit from that.

We looked at ScaleIO from Dell EMC and we also looked at Nutanix. We looked at those two options seriously. Finally, we settled on HyperFlex and we went with it. 

The one thing we clearly saw was that this was that this was what we need. ScaleIO was more a type of software-defined storage, but the hardware which is underlying it is not really tested or already satisfactory for optimized performance. HyperFlex is something that is designed to be hyperconverged and tested thoroughly, and was satisfactory for these operations. This was the decision-making point for us to go with the HyperFlex.

Go ahead and do it. It's a good product. Somebody with a similar environment and a similar experience should go ahead. But check thoroughly that fits your organization.

Our administration strategy is that one guy will be managing the complete dashboard. We are planning to see if there is automation where I can provide this through a DevOps tool. That's something I am looking at.

There is one main entity using it in our company. Our plan is to deploy this software to all other existing infrastructure as well. Within six months we should be fully implemented and deployed.

I rate the solution at eight out of ten because of the brand reliability in the market. They are the most trusted brand in the IT industry.

This is not the only product we use, so we have other solutions to compare it with. We can compare different products and different vendors and tell our customers which products have which advantages and disadvantages so that they can leverage these products in their own environment. This product helps us to understand the customer's needs and what issues they can run into.

The most valuable feature is the integration between our product and HyperFlex. We show our customers the integration between the backup and the deduplication solution that we offer and this CISCO hyperconverged solution.

The primary improvements should be made in the cluster storage controller VMs so that they don't break the upgrade process. 

I would like to see integration with multi-site ACI deployments so that we can span clusters between multiple sites, with ACI running within each site. 

The platform itself is very stable and robust, but when it comes to upgrading the system, it's not stable. The process of upgrading should be seamless so that the customer's data is not affected in any way. Nothing should happen to the customer's data during the upgrading process but we've had situations where the upgrade process did not go smoothly. We've had to open a tech case to solve the issues and sometimes we even have to evacuate the entire virtual machine clusters into another system. 

Scalability was kept in mind when they designed this product. We can scale from really small deployments to very large deployments. The scalability is not an issue with HyperFlex, it scales better than Nutanix and other vendors. 

Their technical support is really good. They are very professional, I cannot complain about the support. The only issue is that they will often only be available during time zones that don't work within European working hours. 

The deployment was not hard. We deployed the full server installation with CISCO HyperFlex. The original version that we tried to deploy was something like 2.2. We ran into a few issues but we managed to solve them on our own, without CISCO tech. If everything goes smoothly the entire deployment can take only a few hours. 

I did the deployment myself. 

We see ROI every day. The return on investment is fantastic and is the primary reason why we deployed these clusters all around our site locations so that our SE engineers can show the customers.

We also use Nutanix and Pure Storage. 

I would rate it an eight out of ten. Not a ten because of the issues with the upgrading process.

We use it in junction with unified communication solutions. It provides great flexibility for our customers to expand the solution. Also, the ease of management is why they use HyperFlex.

We have some large customer managing some large hospitals in Denmark and it's very easy to make changes and expand with solutions around the hospitals. The management of the system can be done in a centralized way which has been a benefit for us. 

Most of our users are Cisco customers, so it fits in within the suites we use. Primarily for me, as a solution architect, it's the technology and architecture that is the most valuable. I know from my technical colleagues that it's easy to use and for the customer, the uptime is the most valuable asset. It's running and has low failure which is why we use it.

We are moving further out with more cloud solutions, so we need HyperFlex to be more cloud-connected. They should develop more connection to Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud because our customers use their services and are moving in that direction.

We've had some downtime, but it's 99.5% stable. They can trust it. Hospitals are 24/7 driven, so we need to have a high uptime which is why we use HyperFlex.

It's a very scalable product because they have about 150 commercial services, so the scalability is very high, and the uptime is great. 

We use technical support if we have any issues or trouble with it. Cisco is always awesome. It's very easy to work with a Cisco tech.

Our customers know its time to switch solutions because of the demands from their users to deliver faster and to be more prepared for meeting their customer's needs. They're using my company and myself as a solution provider and a trusted technical adviser, so we work very closely with our customers in the decision making.

Our customers definitely see ROI. Cisco is involved each time we do a business case, and the customers today are very cost sensitive so they're looking for return on investment. That's also why they use Cisco because they can either expand the products or they can trade the products back to Cisco and get credits and then buy new products.

We also considered IBM and Dell EMC. They go with Cisco because they're using Cisco in most of their environments so it's the easy choice. As long as Cisco provides the technology and the features that the customer needs, they don't have the need to look elsewhere.

I rated this solution an eight out of ten because there's still a little room for improvement. 

I would advise someone considering this solution to connect with Cisco, use the resources that Cisco has. Be open, discuss with Cisco, discuss the architecture the customer designed, the customer demands, include Cisco all around, both the account managers, their technical solutions, the SEs, and so on. Use Cisco.

Our primary use case is for the distributed computing system in several data centers. 

It has reduced the time it takes to put the servers in production by half the time.  

The flexibility and scalability are the most valuable features. 

They should have more blade options and more configuration flexibility. Also, the price is expensive. It should be cheaper but it is worth the price. 

It's very stable. 

The scalability is one of its main features.

Technical support is very good. 

We switched because we wanted more flexibility, more features and because the global PoC price is better. 

The initial setup was complex because our engineers had some problems with putting it into production but it was fine after they solved the issue.   

I would rate it an eight out of ten. The features that it has are balanced with customer's needs and the price. In order to make it a ten, they should lower the cost.

I would advise someone considering this solution to explore all of the feature options. The solution's value is in its features. 

We use this solution for virtualization. 

Its simplicity has been a benefit for our organization. 

The most valuable feature is that it is scalable. It has many resources and is easy to expand. 

They should improve the price. A lot of people complain that the price is an issue. For smaller countries, this solution is too expensive. 

The stability has not really improved. Also, their upgrades are complicated. This is something that needs to be fixed, which I'm sure they'll do. 

Scalability is easy and simple. 

Their technical support is very bad. We had an issue where instead of an engineer we got a PDF "doctor" that didn't know anything about our problem which was very frustrating.  

The setup is simple. We understand how it works so it's not a problem for us but I can imagine that for somebody who doesn't know UCS so well, the setup can be complex. 

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten. The solution is not so bad. To get a ten, the upgrades should be smoother and without any problems so that we're not scared to do them. It could also be more traditional. It's hard to trust the new product especially because we've had issues with the upgrades. It may take some time but it is getting better. 

You should try this solution, you won't regret it. 

Our primary use case of this solution is for data center virtualization.

There's high commodity stuff but nothing is very useful inside. The automation is a valuable feature, it's interesting. 

Mostly documentation needs to be improved, we need strong documentation. We also want to not need to open a tech case every time we need to troubleshoot. Stability and storage need to be improved. 

Stability is really poor, especially the storage stability. We lost data. There were disruptions of clusters and that's one big pain point of the solution. It's not stable enough, the documentation is not good, there's not much documentation available. We need a tech engineer for every call. 

Scalability was cool on the marketing site but the two node clusters crashed. I'm not willing to build large scale infrastructure with this product because it's not stable enough.

Technical support is good but we need it for every piece we do. For every change, we need technical support. They are quick to respond and help us solve the issue. 

We switched solutions because the market drives us, mostly Cisco drives us. They have high goals. Normally, we build up a classic converged infrastructure but now Cisco wanted us to deploy hyperconverged.

The initial setup is very complex. 

We are partners so we integrate it ourselves. 

We did not look at other solutions. We only focus on Cisco. We love Cisco and hopefully,  HyperFlex will become a better product. 

I would rate it a four out of ten. I would advise someone considering this solution to be careful. 

Our primary use case is to reduce our hardware storage and to make it virtual so we use vSAN and HyperFlex.

The most valuable features are scalability and the easy operation - if it works. You can configure everything from just one window.

They can't get a POC to work because there are big latencies between the two sites we have. Even though we have a private fiber connection and everything else works well, they can't get the two products to talk to each other. They are not able to build it up. It looks like it's a firmware issue. They said it isn't but now it's looking like it is. I hope we can sort it out. 

In terms of the stability, we can't get it to work. We have one or two VMs online but nothing we could say to get an overview of it.

In terms of scalability, we can add servers, storage servers or computing servers, and we're much more flexible with block-based storage.

We had one other block-based storage just run out of support and service so we thought we'd go with migration. We have a dual-vendor concept and so we wanted to go with vSAN and something else in storage so we chose HyperFlex.

The setup is pretty much is straightforward. The issue is that it doesn't work afterwards.

We integrated directly through Cisco. 

I would rate this solution a three out of ten. I would advise someone considering this solution not to spread it over two data centers.

Our primary use case is for desktop infrastructure.

The most important benefits that we've seen from this solution is that it reduces the cost of management and it has easy monitoring systems.

The most valuable features are that you can easily scale up and compute.

A stretch function is really needed. Germans think that because of the high availability and the security that two data centers are better but we want edge all in one cluster. This is a needed feature, the cluster feature, and we'd also like to see a possibility for ROBO offices.

We had some trouble during the implementation, but it was one of the first versions and everything is fine now. Stability was only an issue at the beginning.

Scalability is really great because you can adjust the HyperFlex node. If you need more storage, you can add some more drives when it's not full at the beginning. Also, you have the possibility to edge the compute resources with the plates. 

The first version was complex to set up because there were some open questions within the workflows. Now, the new installer is great. It's really great, really fast, and it's easy to set up.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.