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Dell EqualLogic PS series vs HPE MSA comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 2, 2025

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

Dell EqualLogic PS series
Ranking in Modular SAN (Storage Area Network)
7th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HPE MSA
Ranking in Modular SAN (Storage Area Network)
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2025, in the Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) category, the mindshare of Dell EqualLogic PS series is 3.0%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE MSA is 17.3%, down from 18.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
HPE MSA17.3%
Dell EqualLogic PS series3.0%
Other79.7%
Modular SAN (Storage Area Network)
 

Featured Reviews

HansThilen - PeerSpot reviewer
A highly scalable and astoundingly stable solution offering its users an extremely good technical support
Regarding an area to improve, I would say that from Dell EqualLogic family, I can't buy Dell EqualLogic PS series. I can't buy any more solutions provided by EqualLogic, so the solution will have to make certain improvements in the future. Since we can't buy anything from EqualLogic in our company, we plan to move to another solution. Since I can't buy it anymore, I don't receive any updates on the solution. Also, this is the last year in which one can buy support for the solution.
Pragnesh Sachania - PeerSpot reviewer
Scalable, easy to manage, and used for virtualization environments
We didn't face any issues with the technical functionality. However, we faced a lot of challenges with our custom configuration. The HPE support person who did the installation was very technical. He answered all the queries, and we resolved the entire setup. We set up the storage as per our requirements. We previously used a physical server instead of virtualization. With the help of an HPE engineer and partners, we prepared a strategy for migrating the entire physical servers to our virtualization infrastructure. It took two days to deploy the solution. Six people were involved in the solution's deployment, including two from HPE and four from our IT team.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution has been working well overall."
"You can always trust it. It is stable."
"The solution can scale."
"Technical support, when we had access to it, was very good."
"The technical support for the solution was really good."
"It is extremely reliable."
"It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The most valuable feature of Dell EqualLogic PS series auto tiering by using this feature, the customer can get higher performance on a valuable budget."
"It has notably provided scalability benefits."
"The most valuable feature of HPE StorageWorks MSA is its flexibility."
"The most valuable features are data deduplication and snapshot replication."
"The solution is very easy to use, it is not really complex for any user, such as non-technical individuals."
"MSA performs exceptionally well, particularly in regions with frequent power outages."
"The cost to performance for HPE StorageWorks MSA is good."
"The simple configuration feature is great. It is very simple, allowing you to set up MSA very easily."
"HPE MSA is a very flexible array because we can add more enclosures and extend the capacity dynamically."
 

Cons

"The only challenging part in the tool was related to some site recovery area. In order to exploit the site recovery area, my company had to purchase additional VMware products."
"Synchronous replication uses space inefficiently."
"It is at the end of support and no longer supported. We have to move our VMware to another storage platform, and we have decided to use Dell PowerStore. We like Dell's products, and it is a new platform with a lot of features."
"Dell EqualLogic PS series could improve the performance because in our hybrid configuration the read speed is faster than the write speed."
"The performance isn't as good as, for example, Nimble."
"6510 and 6610 have two iSCSI connections in each controller. Why do 6110xxx members have only one, and why do the same members have the possibility of having an active iSCSI interface in the passive controller? It could make a lot of noise with a failover."
"Why is it not possible for both controllers to be simultaneously active (load balancing)?"
"There is no option for mixing RAID types in one device."
"The support contract is expensive, although they are very responsive."
"The solution could improve by adding configuration tools."
"P2000 has become legacy and we can't find spare parts for it anymore. The life cycle is very low."
"I rate HPE support four out of 10. I'm not happy with them. We purchased mission-critical support, and we're supposed to get a response in four hours. Instead, I'm waiting days for them to replace the drive. They asked me to send back the failed one, and I don't know the address. After I sent it back, they told me they haven't received it. It's a nightmare."
"HPE StorageWorks MSA could maybe include a pay-top of texture feature or something like job replication."
"The solution requires hardware."
"This product is getting a little bit older, so new features like deduplication are not included."
"There is room for improvement in terms of scalability. There are times when we need to upgrade the device and the firmware. Sometimes, that can be a struggle."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"All features are out of the box. The license will be in the virtual, OS, or application layer."
"I don't think I would say that the product is less expensive...The product's price is not an issue for our company, considering the relationship we have with Dell and the customer support we receive."
"Price-wise, the solution is cheap. I rate it a three on a scale of one to ten, where one is very cheap, and ten is very expensive."
"Initial packages include all upgrades and services."
"It seemed expensive at first, but the durability lowered the cost of ownership dramatically over time."
"I didn't buy it. It was another person seven years ago. So, I don't really know, but all storage platforms cost a lot of money. It is probably in the mid-range, but you get what you pay for."
"​It is a fair price."
"There are annual maintenance costs beyond the original licensing period."
"The solution’s pricing is reasonable."
"When we bought this solution it was very reasonably priced and they were willing to deal."
"HPE StorageWorks MSA's licensing is perpetual and not integrated."
"This solution involves a one-time CapEx payment, followed by warranty extensions."
"The solution can be a bit expensive."
"I would rate the pricing as nine out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"The price of the solution is a little high and they should provide more competitive pricing. If you want to increases the storage size there are additional fees."
"This solution is quite expensive; they should lower the cost."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Manufacturing Company
15%
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Dell EqualLogic PS series?
The technical support for the solution was really good.
What needs improvement with Dell EqualLogic PS series?
An improvement that could be made is to have a storage solution with all SSD hard disks, as we currently have a Dell EqualLogic PS series with traditional hard disks. It's not simple to replace a h...
What is your primary use case for Dell EqualLogic PS series?
Dell EqualLogic PS series is the storage of our server, which serves our use case. The deployment of Dell EqualLogic PS series takes about five days.
What do you like most about HPE StorageWorks MSA?
The most valuable feature of HPE StorageWorks MSA is its flexibility.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE StorageWorks MSA?
I did not compare the cost of HPE MSA with others because we buy with a framework contract, and HP is the only brand available on that contract, so we have no comparison.
What needs improvement with HPE StorageWorks MSA?
The user web interface is a bit slow, but it is really easy to use, although you still have to wait a bit when you send an operation. We have had some drive failures, but with the redundancy, we ha...
 

Also Known As

EqualLogic PS series
HP StorageWorks MSA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

FAW Foundry, AW Engineering, Unimat, eLongNet Information Technology, BDO Brasil, Odyssey Space Research
Femsa CSC, TTX, Rabobank
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell EqualLogic PS series vs. HPE MSA and other solutions. Updated: November 2025.
873,003 professionals have used our research since 2012.