Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] vs VxRail comparison

Cisco and Dell Technologies are both solutions in the HCI category. Additionally, 89% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 93% of Dell Technologies users who would recommend it.

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [...

Read 90 Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] reviews

89% willing to recommend

VxRail

Read 129 VxRail reviews

25,830 Views
16,619 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [...

VxRail

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] and VxRail compete in the hyper-converged infrastructure solutions category. VxRail holds an advantage due to its advanced features and overall customer satisfaction.

Features: Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] is appreciated for its integration capabilities, flexibility in scalable environments, and attractive pricing. VxRail stands out with robust performance, automation, and seamless integration with VMware ecosystems, making management notably easier.

Room for Improvement: Cisco HyperFlex [EOL] requires enhancements in stability, improved documentation, and a simpler deployment process. VxRail needs improvements in networking flexibility, update processes, and better post-sales support due to mixed reviews.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] has a complex deployment impacting setup time, but customer service is efficient and supportive. VxRail offers streamlined installation for quicker deployment, though post-sales support receives mixed feedback.

Pricing and ROI: Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] is known for competitive pricing but has concerns about ROI due to setup costs. VxRail, while more expensive, is justified by comprehensive features which enhance ROI, making the higher investment worthwhile.

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HCI

December 2024

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Categories and Ranking

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [...

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

VxRail

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

129

Ranking in other categories

HCI (1st)

Q&A Highlights

Netanya Carmi

Content Manager at PeerSpot (formerly IT Central Station)

Oct 26, 2021

How does VxRail compare with Cisco HyperFlex HX Series?

VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if you are working with a limited budget, this platform offers freedom of choice and a number of different options. In contrast, Cisco HyperFlex HX does run on the more expensive side and cannot offer the same level of cost-effective solution. VxRail is able to provide both an ability to upgrade the system with an ever-growing library of resources as well as to provide powerful processors. This is something that I greatly appreciate. Being able to simply add upgrades to the system without necessarily having to worry about the system being bogged down is invaluable. The ability that it provides to apply updates to the system with ease is something worthy of note. If you add this to the fact that VxRail runs on multiple cores at 2 gigahertz or higher, then that means that in terms of ability, the VxRail is difficult to match. In terms of usability, it is hard to argue that VxRail delivers. It is pretty simple and easy to both set up and manage. Once the system is set up, all of the management tools are centrally located to assist in providing ease of use. The Cisco Hyperflex HX Series is both stable as well as reasonably easy to set up. Cisco has a step-by-step program guide that leads you through the process. Once it is set up, it is not prone to glitching or freezing. However, the pricing model that Cisco applies to this product requires users to pay a yearly subscription. This can end up being rather expensive in the long run. Conclusion Both systems offer stable solutions. Ultimately, VxRail is more cost-effective.

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Featured Reviews

Nuno Mendes

IT Manager - Resp.Department at Parvalorem

High performance solution that makes it easy to efficiently manage VM resources

In our case as a credit recovery company working with the state, our infrastructure is fixed and stable as we don't have the same need for growth as other types of companies. That said, one of the biggest problems with HyperFlex HX is that if you want to adjust your solution in terms of processing power, memory, or disk capacity, you have to buy completely new hosts. From a financial perspective, it can be very expensive to do so, and from a legal perspective, there are all kinds of compliance issues we would have to sort out before buying any new solution or application. Since we as a company will only be operating for perhaps the next ten years, when our HyperFlex solution comes to its end-of-life in 2024 our next step will likely not be with HyperFlex or any other solution from Cisco. Instead, from a financial point of view, we will likely turn toward a cloud solution because, that way, we won't have to spend so much money on physical infrastructure. We are, after all, only a small company and HyperFlex can be very expensive for other companies of our size, whether in Portugal or elsewhere like the United States. One other area for improvement is in regard to HyperFlex's integration with VMware. HyperFlex integrates with a specific version of VMware in such a way that HyperFlex doesn't always resolve security issues with VMware at the same pace as what you see in native implementations of VMware. This has happened in one or two situations in the past. On the other hand, the integration is otherwise adequate, especially in terms of availability and virtualization features (such as being able to split up each of our four hosts within VMware).

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Sushil MIshra

AG at SIS.

Trouble-free architecture, we don't have to juggle multiple components like in a traditional three-tier architecture

I like the caching mechanism. Frequently used data is stored, so it definitely improves performance. VxRail's integration with VMware environments is very good. Our VxRail is built on VMware, and the integration is seamless. We haven't faced any challenges. We can migrate VMs between servers in real-time and replicate them to our DR site without any problems.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

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

"It's very easy to integrate with the ACI network."

"The most valuable features of this solution are scalability, performance, and reliability. It scales well inside of a large data center."

"Cisco HyperFlex HX has improved the way our organization functions on the storage side by having one big storage space for hosting VMs. We do not have to provision other ones. That's a positive aspect of it."

"The most valuable feature of Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is its performance."

"It is helpful as a backup solution."

"The storage system is its most valuable feature. It has eliminated our entire need for having to worry about storage. We were storing a lot of syslog data and using a lot of templates in our data center. With the storage system, we are now saving an enormous amount of space."

"It increases efficiency, decreases the cost, and manages the network in one single way. That's the most important thing."

More Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] pros

"The technical support is very helpful and answers questions whenever we have issues with the product."

"The stability of VxRail is good, we have not had any issues."

"There is no in-depth config involved nor third-party needed, saving us time and money."

"This is a good solution if you want to deploy an ACI Environment but don't have all the necessary resources."

"We are very happy with the purchase, and it works well. It is fast. We went with the full-flash version, meaning that we have SSDs. So, we can build a Windows virtual machine in two minutes. We were surprised when we first tried to do that."

"I like that there is a dependency on the storage controller."

"The feature that I have found most valuable with VxRail is its upgrade. Because if you talk about the normal ESX process you have to upgrade the firmware, the bios, and you have to manage the compatibility. You have to do a lot of things. But in the case of VxRail, it's a single upgrade, end to end. You simply upload the bundle, click next, it will do some pre-checks, if those pre-checks pass, it will update everything one by one. It will put one ESX in the maintenance and move other VM's to another mode. There is no downtime to the VM's."

"The assurance that my systems would not suffer a performance drop no matter where they are is valuable. I do not need any extra hardware."

More VxRail pros

Cons

"The initial setup is very complex because there were some issues. It is not clear to how set up this solution."

"Cisco has to continue improve the management tools to provide a better command line interface with more functions. That would be better for administration."

"Its price could be better."

"The architecture separates data, computing, memory, and storage into different parts."

"Cisco's technical support originally was outstanding, but it has declined over the last 12 months. I've heard they're trying to do better, but I haven't been overly impressed with their support recently for HyperFlex."

"I haven't been too impressed with the Cisco HyperFlex HX, honestly. It's a hard concept."

"There is a VMware plugin for HyperFlex, which sometimes it hangs up in our environment, and doesn't function well."

"Cisco should combine its features with its prices."

More Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] cons

"It can be a bit complex for engineers who are new to it. There's a learning curve involved. They have to learn to operate it."

"The upgrade packages require a lot of bandwidth. This could be reduced for an improved experience."

"I would like it to tier to the cloud effectively, making sure that cold data can be pushed out to some sort of Bitbucket."

"The licensing costs are too expensive. They should work on their pricing model."

"The fact that is based on vSAN is the main issue of this solution."

"Lifecycle management (LCM) should be enhanced"

"When it comes to maintenance, it takes 16 hours to upgrade a 12 node VxRail plus. This could be improved in the system."

"I would prefer it if each cell had a tool geared toward billing clients."

More VxRail cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a license required to use this solution."

"The licensing is perpetual and the only thing that you may need to pay for on a monthly basis is if you're going to use their cloud-based management features."

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

"I would like the pricing to be cheaper."

"Our licensing is Hybrid. We have all of our applications for billing and outage management through this."

"We would not have invested if we didn't feel the return was there for our customers."

"Pricing is better if you buy more Cisco products."

"There is a recurring cost for the VMware license and the HyperFlex licenses."

More Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] pricing and cost advice

"I live in Brazil, and my customers are from Brazil. It is quite an expensive solution. It is more expensive than the traditional environment."

"The pricing is very accurate, and we haven't had any problems with the licensing costs."

"It's a highly expensive solution"

"It is just as cheap to move over to an HCI solution as it is to maintain a legacy system."

"It is reasonable. Compared to the legacy hardware that we had so far, we are not paying way more, but we have very good performance. Its price is good."

"The licensing aspect is the most painful for some of our customers. Customers go for a VMware license that's standard and then they find they have to go with the enterprise solution and adjust the license. If you have a limited budget, that's difficult."

"The price is good."

"The pricing for this solution is on the high end but we do get good value for money based on performance."

More VxRail pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

26%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

How do I choose between Cisco Hyperflex HX Series and Nutanix Acropolis AOS?

Cisco HyperFlex HS series vs Nutanix Acropolis AOS Cisco HyperFlex gives extended hyper-convergence functions from core to edge and multi-cloud environments. It helps IT and OT teams deploy hyper...

See all answers

How does VxRail compare with Cisco HyperFlex HX Series?

See all answers

What do you like most about Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series?

It's easy to get the tool started.

See all answers

How does HPE Nimble Storage compare to VxRail?

HPE Nimble Storage dHCI Vs. VxRail One of the best things about the HPE Nimble Storage dHCI is the three, two, one, zero rule. That means I need three copies of my data on two different types of me...

See all answers

What Is The Biggest Difference Between vSAN And VxRail?

While both run on the vSAN technology from VMware, vSAN needs to be deployed on vSAN ready nodes while VxRail is an engineered system. The choice to choose which technology depends on two major fac...

See all answers

What are the major differences between VxRail and Dell EMC PowerFlex?

VxRail vs. Dell EMC PowerFlex VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if the user is working with a l...

See all answers

Comparisons

VMware vSAN vs Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL]

Compared 34% of the time

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL]

Compared 15% of the time

Dell PowerFlex vs Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL]

Compared 13% of the time

HPE SimpliVity vs Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL]

Compared 6% of the time

Dell vSAN Ready Nodes vs Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL]

Compared 5% of the time

More Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] Competitors

Dell PowerFlex vs VxRail

Compared 33% of the time

VMware vSAN vs VxRail

Compared 21% of the time

HPE SimpliVity vs VxRail

Compared 14% of the time

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs VxRail

Compared 7% of the time

HPE Hyper Converged vs VxRail

Compared 6% of the time

More VxRail Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL]

December 2024

Download Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] product report

Buyer's Guide

VxRail

November 2024

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Also Known As

No data available

VCE VxRail

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Cisco

Dell Technologies

Overview

The Cisco HyperFlex HX Data Platform is a purpose-built, high-performance, scale-out file system with a wide array of enterprise-class data management services. The data platform’s innovations redefine distributed storage technology, giving you complete hyper-convergence with enterprise storage features:

Enterprise-class data management
Continuous data optimization
Securely encrypted storage
Dynamic data placement
Clusterwide parallel data distribution
Linear and incremental scaling
API-based data platform architecture
A simplified approach

VxRail is a hyper-converged appliance based on VMware virtual SAN Software and is jointly engineered and built with VMware, for VMware, to enhance Vmware. VxRail software-defined architecture simplifies compute, storage, virtualization, and management. It will safeguard performance, reliability, and flexibility across your organization with a broad range of workloads and applications from business-critical to next-gen. With VxRail, you are covered.

VxRail is a single turn-key appliance that is a validated, fully integrated, pre-configured, pre-tested solution and offers non-disruptive scaling. Every node includes compute storage and IO. All-flash configurations can contain between 12-28 cores per node. The storage capacity options run from 7.6 TB to 19TB with either 256 GB or 512GB of memory. Hybrid appliances may have 6-20 cores per node, 3.6 TB to 10 TB of storage capacity, and 24GB to 256 GB of memory.

VxRail offers high availability fail-over, an active/active stretch cluster, and VSan Kernal integration. VxRail is a power-edged server with APIs built on automation. There are over 15 million different combinations of hardware available with VxRail. VxRail provides a simple, cost-effective solution that solves a large range of use cases. Additionally, you also get a mixed workloads automated system that is backed with fully automated system updates, and complete end-to-end lifecycle management all in a single two-rack appliance.

VxRail is a value-added suitable solution for distributed small to mid-sized enterprises, remote offices, private clouds, and virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). You choose the deployment option that best suits your organizational needs, from appliance to integrated rack offerings, with or without networking, and it will be delivered to you, ready to deploy out-of-box.

If you know VMware, you know VxRail.

VxRail Features and Benefits

Seamlessly accelerate deployment to a hybrid cloud
Fast data center modernization
Create developer-ready Kubernetes platforms

Powerful performance and reliability
Improve and simplify operational efficiency
Excellent integration
Save time
Reduce costs

Reviews from Real Users

VxRail is an all-in-one solution: "You don't have to worry too much about the hardware and you don't have to work on integrating a storage device. We instead have this as an all-in-one solution and everything is available as a box."

VxRail is remarkable: “The cover points feature in VxRail is remarkable. It's unique. It has an intervention failover system as well as an automatic failover system, reaching clusters existing in VxRail…”

VxRail is a powerful performer: “...VxRail delivers a very high number of IOPS for a hybrid configuration or an all-flash configuration. The processors that are available in the Xeon family are very powerful. They are multi-core with typically 2 gigahertz, 2.4 gigahertz, or higher frequency, so the performance is very much appreciated.”

Sample Customers

BluePearl Veterinary Partners, Ready Pac Foods, Bryant University, Bellevue Group, KPIT Technologies, City Harvest

World Wide Technology Inc, Renault Sport Formula One Team, 8x8 Inc, Brownes, Canadian Pacific, Canopy, Denton, EDF, Unilin, Xerox

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, VMware, Nutanix and others in HCI. Updated: December 2024.

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