Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Dell PowerMax NVMe vs VAST Data comparison

Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

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 FlashArray X NVMe
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
16th
Ranking in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
7th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Dell PowerMax NVMe
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
9th
Ranking in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VAST Data
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
20th
Ranking in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
8th
Average Rating
10.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
File and Object Storage (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 2.5%, down from 3.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell PowerMax NVMe is 9.6%, down from 16.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VAST Data is 5.4%, down from 6.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
 

Featured Reviews

Eugene Hemphill - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps to save money and resources with the data compression feature
One point I'd like to improve is that the tool should start selling small boxes again. It discontinued some products and is focusing on bigger, more capable boxes, neglecting the SMB market. Even though it's not a big market, it shouldn't have removed them. One way to improve the product is to add an operational assistant that doesn't depend on VMware. It could also establish more alliances with other operational systems.
Haseeb Khalid Sheikh - PeerSpot reviewer
End-to-end NVMe capabilities helps improve availability, performance, and capacity
The solution's most valuable feature is the data reduction ratio. You can store a 5:1 ratio of your data in Dell PowerMax NVMe. For example, if you have 200 terabytes of usable capacity, you can save up to five times of data on that capacity. That means you can save one petabyte of data on just 200 terabytes of usable capacity. The solution's end-to-end NVMe capabilities have improved our operations. Everything is fast, and you don't have to map your storage to old hybrid storage technologies. Our organization has experienced positive change, and the solution has improved our uptime, availability, performance, and capacity.
Alan Powers - PeerSpot reviewer
Stability-wise, a device that has been up and running for years
The failover capability and resiliency are some of the solution's valuable features. The big thing is resilience because it has richer coding in it, so multiple devices can't fail. Also, one can still access a number of CBoxes that can allow one to access their file system. Once a device fails, it fails the transparency of the end-user, and it just starts using another resource. The encryption capability, the snapshots, along with a whole bunch of features make the tool valuable. VAST Data keeps adding more and more features all the time.

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 very straightforward to set up."
"Offers excellent features like efficient data reduction, a reliable SafeMode, and a great support model for continuous assistance and updates."
"The Pure1 component is most valuable at this point in time when comparing it with EMC. Pure1 is where you can have your diagnostics in the cloud, so you can look at things from your mobile phone."
"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."
"Everything, especially the VMs inside, is pretty fast."
"Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is reliability."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is its ease of use."
"A huge benefit of the PowerMax has been the decreasing of our physical footprint. We recently did a consolidation where we went from 58 tiles down to 5. If we had used just the PowerMax, we could have gone from 58 tiles down to 2 tiles, which is huge space savings. If you have 56 newly available floor tiles on a raised floor data center, which you previously had to cool and provide power to, then now, not only are my costs going down, I now have more revenue opportunities because I have more space to put new customers."
"The upgradability and extendibility for the size of the storage unit are noteworthy."
"The optimization of the cache memory of each engine and the use of persistent memory."
"We removed the need to observe whether we ran into issues with the performance of disks or number of IOPS. Previously, our Oracle Database would throw us performance errors. Now, with PowerMax, everything runs smoothly."
"There is no management overhead involved in optimizing performance. It does it so well on its own. We don't have to manage much at all. It really is like a set it and forget it solution. My storage engineers love the system. It is a lot less work than our previous systems, which weren't bad by any means. There is not nearly as much management as before. So, we are saving dozens of hours per month for our storage team, and that is a real cost in our business."
"The best feature is the protection - PowerMax NVMe is volume-based and replicates data, so it's very comfortable for us to use."
"The product is very fast and reliable."
"Key features include performance, replication time, and dedup and compression."
"The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations."
"This has been one of the most reliable storage systems that I have ever used."
 

Cons

"Efficiency improvements would always be welcome, but I'm not sure if they could get more efficient."
"We would like to see more visibility into garbage collection and CPU performance in the GUI."
"In the future, I would like to see integration with enterprise backup systems."
"One point I'd like to improve is that the tool should start selling small boxes again. It discontinued some products and is focusing on bigger, more capable boxes, neglecting the SMB market. Even though it's not a big market, it shouldn't have removed them."
"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."
"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial."
"There are some challenges with data encryption and reduction."
"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."
"Remove the need for physical or hardwired virtual servers to run consistency groups, instead make the expensive array controllers handle that."
"We have had some trouble with the VMAX-to-PowerMax migration, but the VMAX box will be powered down after the migration. The PowerMax boxes are working fine and we don't have any issues with them."
"The installation of equipment needed support's help."
"It's a relatively new product, but for the next release I would like to see higher bandwidth on the front-end adapters. This would allow even greater scalability for critical workloads and consolidation for non-critical workloads. The hosts may not require that level of I/O performance today. However, it allows us to scale physical non-cloud environments without large investment."
"There is room for improvement in terms of integration with various service providers for public clouds."
"If you go to Pure or you go to NetApp, they deliver in one month. If you go to Dell or HP, they will take up to six months for delivery. This is not a business model for today."
"The solution should integrate better with OpenShift and Kubernetes architecture."
"The solution should include more AI features to make it smarter."
"The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement."
"The write performance could be improved because it is less than half of the read performance."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is expensive."
"The tool is an investment that we've budgeted for. While the prices may be higher than those of other vendors, we see it as a market leader with benefits. We don't regret purchasing it."
"The tool's pricing is cheap; I rate it a six to seven out of ten. Most of our sales are not subscription-based. We sell the hardware, and customers keep using it. They only renew the service part annually. The support can be a bit pricey, but the solution is more cost-effective than anything else out there."
"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
"Its price could be better. It is not too expensive, but it is the high-end cost. It is kind of a Rolls-Royce. You pay a lot, but you get a lot out of it. So, the price pressure on the way down would be great, but at the end of the day, if you need to do the work, you just pay for it."
"With VMware, we pay $300,000 annually."
"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."
"The price is starting from $500,000."
"Negotiate hard and consider the commercial advantages/benefits to Dell EMC for onboarding your product."
"The pricing is comparable to other vendors."
"Support pricing is very high. Our support contract is about to expire and Dell EMC provided us with an extremely high renewal quote. It was four times more than the support contract for our previous EMC VNX solution."
"I think it is an expensive tool, but it is the best product. I think it is expensive and the cost one must pay for the best solution."
"The price is on the market. It's not inexpensive, but it's available on the market."
"The PowerMax appliance pricing was reasonable. Dell EMC quoted us a substantial discount."
"The pricing might be a bit high for small organizations, so it's more suitable for larger enterprises."
"Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one."
"We acquired VAST Data as a one-time, capital purchase."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays solutions are best for your needs.
831,791 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.
What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Maybe the price can be reduced since the solution is very expensive.
What's the difference between DELL EMC Powerstore and Powermax NVMe?
Dell PowerStore is an all-solid-state midrange storage system. It has many internal elements taken from other Dell of...
What do you like most about Dell EMC PowerMax NVMe?
First, it's an enterprise storage solution. This is very important for us. Another important feature is replication.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerMax NVMe?
The price of Dell PowerMax depends on the project size. It is the best choice for large projects in terms of price an...
What do you like most about VAST Data?
The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VAST Data?
Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one.
What needs improvement with VAST Data?
The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement.
 

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
Dell EMC PowerMax, PowerMax
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Rackspace, Open Line
Norwest Venture Partners, General Dynamics Information Technology, Ginkgo Bioworks
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell PowerMax NVMe vs. VAST Data and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,791 professionals have used our research since 2012.