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Dell PowerFlex vs FlexPod XCS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 PowerFlex
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
HCI (5th)
FlexPod XCS
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
295
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. Dell PowerFlex is designed for HCI and holds a mindshare of 6.0%, down 12.1% compared to last year.
FlexPod XCS, on the other hand, focuses on Converged Infrastructure, holds 12.8% mindshare, up 9.3% since last year.
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Dell PowerFlex6.0%
VxRail10.6%
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)9.2%
Other74.2%
HCI
Converged Infrastructure Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
FlexPod XCS12.8%
HPE ConvergedSystem10.9%
Oracle Private Cloud Appliance8.3%
Other68.0%
Converged Infrastructure
 

Featured Reviews

MS
System & Network Specialist at Alfaisal University
Has supported seamless integration and offers fast implementation
This needs to be checked for the most valuable features in Dell PowerFlex for data management. It is more stable, more powerful, and has more integration features. The scalability is very good and is one of the key features of Dell PowerFlex. Its flexibility and scalability are the main reasons we can use Dell PowerFlex.
John Kevin - PeerSpot reviewer
Infrastructure Manager at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Enforces standardized setup procedures following Certified Validated Design (CVD) guidelines and offers greater flexibility and control over the system compared to traditional systems
The GUI setup follows the right setup, meaning we have to follow the CVDi.e. Certified Validated Design. Everything is clear, because you can build CI yourself, but without rules, it can be messy. With FlexPod, there are rules to follow, making it more standardized. This helps with troubleshooting and compatibility assessments, simplifying troubleshooting significantly. We also use FlexPod pre-validated architectures to validate the design. It is very, very important to us because we had a bad case in 2015 where separate items integrated poorly due to no version or firmware compatibility certification. Troubleshooting became a nightmare. So, standards are crucial for us, and everything entering production should be verified or at least documented for certification.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is scalable."
"The integration with AWS is a valuable feature."
"We're doing a lot of VMware for IT so this solution is really valuable from a VMH point of view. We're trying to assist our customers mainly with management, because that's what they want. The most important aspects are ease of management, as well as ease of configuration, allowing them to attach additional nodes and resources for the applications."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is integration."
"The most valuable feature is the overall integration and just seeing the three different layers which make up the machine software. Altogether, it's something that I would say is much better than any other solution that I have experienced before."
"The program is stable."
"Perfectly suits customers dealing with the combination of future storage needs and, at the same time, keeping up their computing power."
"The solution saves a lot of space in the data center and that is a key advantage for us."
"All of our main applications run on this solution, and it has done a stellar job."
"The most valuable thing for me is the shorter time to market."
"It can scale, compute, and storage independently by what we need."
"The solution has decreased downtime incidents by close to 100% and with the resiliency built into the system, one component fails and the others still work."
"Finally, we have easily seen a 100 percent improvement in application performance over our previous platform."
"FlexPod’s prevalidated architectures are very important to our organization... Especially in healthcare, it is absolutely critical that we have a validated performance platform. It has to work every time."
"It's flexible; it's adaptable; it's pretty fast; and it's non-disruptive."
"I like the fact that it is all integrated; that is the biggest thing, as you get everything all in one shot in one big, solid unit."
 

Cons

"The biggest issue with the solution is that it doesn't support Hyper V. It's a big problem."
"The solution’s automation and pricing could be improved."
"Including instrumentation would be a helpful improvement."
"In terms of improvements, I think it would help to have easier access to the cost of installing VxRack infrastructure."
"It could be easier to learn."
"The installation is complex."
"We've had some issues around the licensing."
"We've had some issues around the licensing. There were some issues in terms of using the VMware license."
"Not a perfect ten because it could use better integration on the network side between UCS and the switching layer. The fact that LACP is not supported on UCS blades isn't so great."
"The GPU based VDA solutions could use improvement."
"FlexPod's technical support is bad, as with everything regarding Cisco support."
"The technical support is slightly above average. I would like them to have quicker escalation"
"We would like them to have better features to integrate with the cloud."
"We would like to see the automation improved because there has been a learning curve having to create the workflows."
"The solution has not reduced our data center costs."
"There were several different management consoles that we had to deal with: UCS, VMware, and separate ESXi installations."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price could be improved."
"If one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the price as eight and a half. The tool is expensive."
"The pricing for this solution is good."
"The product is expensive."
"The solution is expensive and I give the cost a two out of ten."
"The solution's price is medium."
"The solution's pricing could be much cheaper and affordable."
"We have a good contact in Dell and he prepared all the information and provided everything to us."
"We have absolutely seen ROI. We have saved between two to four million dollars on travel alone over the past 24 months."
"As a whole, it is inexpensive, and it uses the least amount of parts."
"Anytime that you are buying any storage make sure you understand storage. Do not just buy storage based on what somebody sells you in terms of IO or throughput."
"Coming from a rack and stack server model to FlexPod, it has saved us a lot of time (approximately hundreds to thousands of hours)."
"It created lower total cost of ownership. Previously, we had disparate storage and servers, and there were bits of kits everywhere. Now, we have two data centers with almost identical setups in both."
"Make sure you are buying for performance, not just capacity."
"Make sure that you engage as much with whom you are buying from as a partnership, not just as a purchase."
"It is cost-effective."
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Comparison Review

it_user244362 - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Consultant with 51-200 employees
Aug 30, 2015
Nutanix vs. VMware EVO:RAIL vs. FlexPod
Originally posted at www.storagegaga.com/dont-get-too-drunk-on-hyper-converged/ I hate the fact that I am bursting the big bubble brewing about Hyper Convergence (HC). I urge all to look past the hot air and hype frenzy that are going on, because in the end, the HC platforms have to be aligned…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
8%
Healthcare Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Marketing Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise16
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise66
Large Enterprise182
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerFlex?
Dell PowerFlex is a premium software-defined infrastructure solution and while the initial investment may seem higher than traditional SAN or mid-tier HCI solutions, the long-term TCO is competitive.
What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerFlex?
Area of Improvement: While PowerFlex Manager is powerful, the UI could be more intuitive, especially for first-time users or non-technical admins. Streamlined navigation, contextual help and guided...
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Also Known As

VxFlex, VxRack FLEX, PowerFlex
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Canopy, 8x8Inc., Atos, Canadian Pacific, City of Denton, CenturyLink, BNP Paribas, Asyaport, EDF, CSC, Fox Sports, Insight, Hunter, KPIT, Paetec, Rosetta Stone, Sonda, Xerox
University of Sao Paulo, WD-40, The Commonwell Mutual Insurance Group
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