DataCore SANsymphony vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize comparison

DataCore and IBM are both solutions in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category. DataCore is ranked #5 with an average rating of 9.4, while IBM is ranked #12 with an average rating of 9.0. Additionally, 97% of DataCore users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of IBM users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

DataCore SANsymphony and IBM Spectrum Virtualize compete in the storage management software category. DataCore SANsymphony seems to have the upper hand due to its flexibility and rapid deployment, while IBM Spectrum Virtualize is known for its robust disaster recovery and competitive pricing.

Features: DataCore SANsymphony is valued for its ability to integrate with different storage solutions and VMware environments. Key features include high availability with mirroring, seamless auto-tiering, and compatibility with commodity hardware to deliver fast, stable performance. IBM Spectrum Virtualize offers a strong abstraction layer and ease of storage migration. Its important features include thin provisioning, compression, and seamless cloud tiering, making it effective for disaster recovery and multi-vendor storage management.

Room for Improvement: DataCore SANsymphony could benefit from less complex pricing and improved support quality. Users suggest better iSCSI connectivity, enhanced performance reporting, and improved integration with backup solutions like Veeam. IBM Spectrum Virtualize users would like a simplified management interface and improved support for cross-cluster migration. Enhancing data deduplication and scalability features are also recommended.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Both products offer on-premises solutions, with DataCore also supporting hybrid cloud deployments. DataCore SANsymphony is praised for its rapid deployment, often within a day, and for its responsive customer service. IBM Spectrum Virtualize is similarly regarded for its straightforward deployment process and excellent technical support, though the consistent updates and customer-centric support from DataCore are highlighted.

Pricing and ROI: DataCore SANsymphony's pricing is perceived as high due to a shift to subscription models, despite its long-term cost-effectiveness from hardware flexibility and efficient storage use. IBM Spectrum Virtualize provides competitive pricing with bundled licensing options, offering a balance between enterprise features and affordability. Users see positive ROI with high availability and cost savings over time.

To learn more, read our detailed DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize Report (Updated: February 2025).

Buyer's Guide

DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

February 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 844,944 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

Read full review

TempreviewerD

Architecte Principal at Orange

Robust with good replication and access protection

The solution is constantly evolving. Recently, deduplication and compression have been further improved to meet customer needs, and updates are easily implemented without stopping production. The update assistant checks the state of health before using good practices, during checks that the data is still presented for service continuity, and afterward, if the actions carried out are indeed active. Technical support is truly available even without a production incident. This is really essential right now.

Read full review

EdwinVan Halm

Virtualization Architect at Halm-IT

Enterprise product that delivers high performance features

The primary use case is high availability and disaster recovery. They use it as an active-active cluster located in two physical locations for quick recovery using immutable snapshots The quick restore, the low latency, and the ease of use are some of the most valuable features. The product is…

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's very easy-to-use."

"The ease of deployment and management has helped us simplify our storage. We also do not have to worry about capacity management as much. A lot of these things are native to Pure Storage."

"The solution is able to handle workloads and is easy to use. It allows us to actually manage the boxes in less time."

"The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power outages when we need to quickly move data between different data centers. It ensures efficient replication and helps maintain our data centers' uptime."

"I would rate this solution an eight plus. It has has good flexibility and stability, it's easy to manage and the response time is good."

"It helps simplify our storage, because the user interface is very simple and the installation is easy."

"Using this solution has made our backups more reliable."

"It is very easy to use, and it is very fast."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"It's a software storage solution that can scale as we like. There is also has a parallel feature that enhances the performance of the storage solution. We can separate storage and computing, and we can scale these two parts of the platform to meet business needs efficiently."

"It is a well-proven, automated management tool in all dynamic provisioning, auto-tiering, great performance, parallel I/O, cache speed mechanism, etc."

"The dashboard is very intuitive, and there are many counters to diagnose what happens during a short period (like when a backup is in progress)."

"I'd have to say that the biggest improvement gained by using SANsymphony has to be the performance of the product."

"Our central storage has very high availability. DataCore SANsymphony ensures high business continuity."

"The most valuable feature of DataCore SANsymphony SDS is its high availability. This solution also exhibits good performance and has high stability."

"It is a stable solution."

"The dashboard is very intuitive, and there are a lot of counters to diagnose what happens during a short period (like when a backup is in progress)."

More DataCore SANsymphony pros

"It is a single pane of glass management interface, so once the storage is allocated to SVC, they only have one place to go to manage it for everything."

"The ability to add the virtual machine on the Spectrum environment to sort out the data movers(DMs) and their schedules is a valuable feature. You are able to have, for example, four data movers to balance them so you do not have too much work on one data mover."

"The ability to have a feature-rich software set which extends the capabilities of the back-end storage arrays."

"We can failover easily, because a lot of our data is replicated from family to the second replication."

"The SVC gives excellent performance with tiered storage behind it."

"The ease of management, the simplicity of the CLI, the speed of that interface, and the well-architected design of the product in general are valuable features."

"The most valuable feature is its reliability."

"It has the ability to seamlessly move hardware in and out as we refresh technology."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize pros

Cons

"I would like to see more monitoring capability included in the next release of this solution."

"Commvault has mainly driven the Analytics, providing data and reports. However, the product has room for improvement, especially regarding storage analytics. Upgrading firmware has caused issues, requiring feature disabling to revert to traditional backups. The firmware upgrades sometimes affect Commvault backups."

"The solution is expensive."

"It would be beneficial if the layer could support the S3 protocol and be container ready in the next release."

"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."

"It usually comes down to just what you hit and the value you're getting when you spend the money and license the products. I would always go, "If you want to make things better, lower your price and make your licensing simpler." There's always an opportunity around that."

"To improve FlashBlade, some analysts suggest enhancing its handling of relational database management systems and SQL queries."

"They need better integration with public clouds along with a better hybrid solution."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"I would like to see SMPA (Shared Multi-Port Array) technology developed with the aim of allowing a configuration identical to other storage arrays."

"If you're dealing with big databases or transactional databases, it might not be the best-suited solution. The design of DataCore's solution isn't oriented towards this type of data."

"There is no way of quickly matching the exact size of a vDisk to a disk pool."

"We are waiting for container support (on the roadmap), as well as a user-friendly full web-administration capability, and an improved API."

"For customers or technicians that don't speak and understand English, it could be great to have other languages support, all the more so given the number of countries in which SanSymphony is used."

"When I sometimes reboot for maintenance, the connectivity from the iSCSI initiator host could be improved."

"Its interface could be better."

"Datacore is developing a new WebUI with new dashboards. It is a good idea as the classic GUI is lacking dashboards."

More DataCore SANsymphony cons

"The disk reliability is not that good."

"For improvement considerations, I would probably say multiple sites."

"Tighter integration with cloud storage might be useful as a target for a variety of use cases."

"Adding features for data deduplication is one area of improvement."

"t is limited in terms of a single system to eight nodes or four, what they call IO groups."

"The Storwize port is not so stable."

"There are big arrays now, and if a customer wants add more disks to it, you have to have another array. Adding disks to existing arrays is one of the most demanded things from our customers."

"The case logging process is efficient, but resolving software problems takes too much time."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We used a reseller for the purchase."

"It is within reason for what you get. From what we have found comparing it to other vendors, it is in the same range as others. Given the choice, we would definitely redeploy it based on the cost."

"Support is a separate line item. Support is a different cost, but whatever your support is now, that's what you're going to pay forever. If your support's $100 today, six years from now it's $100. It doesn't fluctuate unless you upgrade it, or change it, etc."

"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."

"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"The price of this solution could be made more affordable."

"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"DataCore SANsymphony's pricing is very high and should be much cheaper."

"The cost is at the same level as other storage solutions and it is easy to understand the licensing."

"Pricing has improved but it is still expensive."

"The pricing and licensing are better with DataCore."

"Make sure you are made aware of the annual subscription cost when purchasing."

"This product has a good ratio between quality and price. In many cases, it's less expensive to work with DataCore than other storage systems."

"This solution allows the use of off-the-shelf hardware and charges by the TB of storage."

"It is relatively expensive, and the additional costs for hardware and storage can make it a significant investment for customers."

More DataCore SANsymphony pricing and cost advice

"We would like the CPU cycle to save more on the licensing costs for us."

"This solution came as an additional cost for the TSM package we chose."

"The entry point of pricing for this product is the most amazing price ever in the industry."

"It has a lot of advanced functions for a reasonable price."

"I am very happy with the pricing. There is no comparison when it comes to pricing. I have looked at all solutions from EMC, Veritas, Hitachi, Dell, etc. None of them compares to IBM when it comes to pricing. I get great pricing from them."

"Do a proof of concept, if you are not comfortable jumping in, but do it."

"We have struggled with Pure Storage, but people are understanding that much of Pure has been consumer grade SSDs. Therefore, when the customer is really understands what they are getting, they realize that IBM presents the same sort of value as existing vendors."

"I think it is a good value for the price."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Software Defined Storage (SDS) solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

844,944 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

37%

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

21%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

20%

Financial Services Firm

15%

Government

12%

Real Estate/Law Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for DataCore SANsymphony SDS?

The cost changed from a perpetual license to a subscription model, and it seems reasonable. I am technical personnel ...

See all answers

What do you like most about DataCore SANsymphony?

The dashboard is very intuitive, and there are a lot of counters to diagnose what happens during a short period (like...

See all answers

What needs improvement with DataCore SANsymphony?

In my opinion, there should be improvements in how to get and filter logs. However, this is not a frequent need becau...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

As a customer of IBM, I can often secure discounts of seventy to ninety percent, depending on the purchase volume, wh...

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

I would like to see them provide a unified platform that offers block, file, and object-based protocol access. Presen...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

I use IBM Spectrum Virtualize as a storage device that provides storage to servers needing storage. I utilize it in m...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 21% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 12% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 13% of the time

VMware vSAN vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 12% of the time

HPE SimpliVity vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 10% of the time

StorMagic SvSAN vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 10% of the time

Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 9% of the time

More DataCore SANsymphony Competitors

VxRail vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 27% of the time

Dell VPLEX vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 23% of the time

IBM Spectrum Scale vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 19% of the time

VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 16% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 15% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

March 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

DataCore SANsymphony

March 2025

Download DataCore SANsymphony product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Virtualize

March 2025

Download IBM Spectrum Virtualize product report

Also Known As

No data available

DataCore Virtual SAN

No data available

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

Experience peace of mind with DataCore SANsymphony, the ultimate software-defined storage solution alleviating storage management challenges. Say goodbye to the complexities of managing different storage tiers and disruptions with SANsymphony's block-level storage virtualization technology, empowering you to automate capacity provisioning and data placement across diverse storage environments including SAN, DAS, HCI, and JBOD. Break down silos, control data placement, meet business continuity objectives, boost performance, and seamlessly expand or refresh hardware with SANsymphony. Benefit from features like asynchronous replication for disaster recovery, minimizing data loss, accelerating application responsiveness, and integrating new technology non-disruptively. Trusted by industry leaders like NASA, Thorntons, Inc., and TUI Cruises, DataCore SANsymphony guarantees unparalleled flexibility, scalability, and reliability, ensuring uninterrupted data access and application availability while reducing storage costs and inefficiencies.

DataCore

IBM Spectrum Virtualize is a dependable solution that improves data value, security, and simplicity for new and existing storage infrastructure. Proven over 12 years in thousands of deployments, its innovative virtualization capabilities help organizations achieve better data economics by supporting new workloads that are critical to their success. IBM Spectrum Virtualize software helps make new and existing storage more effective and standardizes functions traditionally deployed separately in disk systems for greater flexibility and potentially lower costs.

IBM

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Volkswagen , Maimonides Medical Center, NASA, Thorntons, Inc., TUI, ISCO Industries, Pee Dee Electric Cooperative, United Financial Credit Union, Derby Supply Chain Solutions, Mission Community Hospital, Bellarmine College Preparatory, Colby-Sawyer College, Mount Sinai Health System, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Quorn Foods, Bitburger, University of Birmingham, Stadtverwaltung Heidelberg, NetEnt to name a few.

Pelephone, Sprint IT Enterprise Services

Buyer's Guide

DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

February 2025

Free Report: DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Find out what your peers are saying about DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

844,944 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize report.

See our list of best Software Defined Storage (SDS) vendors.

We monitor all Software Defined Storage (SDS) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.