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Dell Unity XT vs HPE Nimble Storage comparison

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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
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
34
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (7th)
Dell Unity XT
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
194
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HPE Nimble Storage
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
7th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.2
Number of Reviews
120
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 0.8%, down from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Unity XT is 10.3%, up from 10.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE Nimble Storage is 3.8%, down from 7.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage
 

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.
Syed Habib - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient data replication and fast IOPS have improved operational performance
Dell and a partner jointly implemented this solution in Auvink. We installed the Flash, which makes our IO operations fast and efficient. Replication is available, allowing us to replicate data simultaneously from one site to another. All-flash technology and vTXT enhance speed, and the IOPS are faster. The cache's IOPS are much better. Snapshots provide a unique feature for testing and make management more comfortable and easy. The platform is multi-supported and certification is more convenient and easy to manage.
Ajit Pratap Kundan - PeerSpot reviewer
A tool that offers protection against ransomware and other enterprise-level attacks
HPE Nimble Storage's cost is very high, making it one of its downsides. HPE Nimble Storage's cost is very high compared with any HCI solutions, like HPE's SimpliVity, Nutanix, VMware, or Dell VxRail. A person requires a special skill set to operate HPE Nimble Storage because there are hardly any solutions similar to Nimble Storage in the market. The product's support can be made faster and more responsive if HPE trains its partners in such a way that they acquire more expertise on Nimble Storage through the training sessions. HPE Nimble Storage is dependent on only VMware vSphere Hypervisor. In the future, HPE has to make Nimble Storage feasible with other hypervisors like Microsoft Hyper-V, Nutanix Acropolis, and RHEV, meaning it should be hypervisor agnostic.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The standout features for us in Pure FlashArray X NVMe are its robust DDoS protection, seamless transparent failover, and failback capabilities ensuring high availability."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is its ease of use."
"Offers excellent features like efficient data reduction, a reliable SafeMode, and a great support model for continuous assistance and updates."
"On a scale of one to ten, I rate Pure FlashArray as ten."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is reliability."
"The solution is very straightforward to set up."
"The most valuable features of this solution are its ease of use and performance."
"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."
"The flash aspects of the Unity make it incredibly fast. The fact that you get that much storage directly on what is basically a 3U box to us, that density has been really useful."
"It's easy to manage. We access it and manage it through Unisphere and have had no issues. We're able to provision storage, create consistency groups, create RDMs for our virtual machines. Creating it through Unisphere, it automatically adds the data store on the VMware side and rescans the LUNS. We just have to add and configure the storage in one place and it takes care of everything, which is very handy."
"All-flash is a game changer. If you need performance, simple operations, and you plan to use it with VMware, it is a good choice."
"The initial setup was very straightforward. Migration was smooth and configuration of the storage was quick and simple. The time needed to put it into production was less than expected, and data migration itself went without a glitch."
"We can sleep at night because the support is great."
"It is lightning fast, low on power and heat, and has a small footprint with great performance."
"The most valuable thing for our use case is the flexibility to have multiple-protocol support."
"It has reduced the latency in application and database reads and writes... All-flash, it's fast. We have the 650 model which is all-flash, upgraded from VNX. It just flies."
"Even through upgrades, there is no downtime, not even a hiccup for users."
"Its speed, ease of use, and it has been completely reliable."
"It has allowed us to upgrade our DMS to the latest version and reuse the older array as the DR storage for VMware SRM."
"Performance, reliability, InfoSight, the ability to upgrade the O/S on the SAN without taking it down, and cost."
"Some of the beneficial features I have found are the Block-level backups, the interface is easy to use, backups work well and the portal is functional."
"Scalability is another reason we chose to go with Nimble: upgrading to another storage array. If we need higher capacity or throughput, we can just replace controllers, we don't have to replace or forklift-upgrade the whole chassis."
"In the 20 days that we have been using this solution, it has been stable."
"It's easy to use, it's just like 3PAR. I made clusters of 32 hosts with 50 volumes and that took barely an hour. I scripted a lot of it, filled in the names of volumes, the names of servers."
 

Cons

"I would like to see replication and DR features in the next release of this solution."
"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."
"The tool's portfolio is minimal. It is expensive."
"There is room for improvement in catering to midrange storage needs, especially for customers seeking Enterprise-class features."
"I would like to see some AI features that would allow arrays to intelligently identify threats or unusual behavior in the data pattern and give an alert."
"The software layer has to improve."
"We need better data deduplication."
"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."
"Compression and block deduplication on non-all-flash solutions."
"Scalability of this solution could be improved."
"We cannot connect directly with Dell due to sanctions."
"Having more artificial intelligence tools built into the solution would be a great benefit. This would allow us to see more about the workloads and higher visibility, such as performance degradation."
"This solution would be improved with the addition of flexible raid volumes."
"We are running VMware, and with the VNXe it was possible to restore. We're using Veeam for VMware backups and with the predecessor, it was possible to mount a backup or restore a backup from a storage snapshot. With the Unity 300, this is not possible."
"Software updates have to be downloaded to the root of the device. This pushes the available space to 95% utilization."
"There are a lot of things that can be done with it. It's got Cloud IQ, but I think it's not as mature as it could be, they could make it more effective. They could make it more comparable to some of the other products out there that have cloud analytics. The amount of insight that the Unity product is able to give, at this point, is okay, but not class-leading. Some of the other data-reduction technologies, like deduplication, are not to the level of other competitors and what their products provide."
"I would like to see an added feature to auto-fix, or a dynamic alerting system on storage."
"There is no active-active controller, which means that we can only have one controller online at a time."
"I really would like to see synchronous replication. This is something that when we have multiple arrays in our environment and being able to do something like a zero RPO."
"HPE does not have suffficient storage."
"The way the market is going, supporting NVMe storage would be useful as a step up."
"I would like to see integration with OneView, at least for reporting or some sort of monitoring."
"I would like to see SSL Certification."
"The most difficult part about Nimble was the fact that it didn't have a standard length."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."
"The support cost per array is about $20,000 a year for 24/7 support."
"Given its price, Pure is not the first option."
"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
"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."
"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
"They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."
"With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."
"With the large Unity that we bought, it has saved us about one and a half rack space. That's our return on investment on our flash array. We also need less Fibre Channel connectivity."
"At the end of the day, the licensing cost is key, because every customer has a pain point, that the cost of each piece is high. So if they would bundle everything in a package, that is how the competitors are selling their footprint."
"Currently, we buy directly from Dell EMC. We've tried going through resellers before, but we've found that if we go directly through Dell EMC, we get a good a price from being with the government."
"When I see other products—like HP, Huawei, and Lenovo—from competitors, I have seen a lot of disadvantages with EMC, price-wise. Huawei and Lenovo are very price competitive. Looking at the price point for a country like Sri Lanka, where we have a very low economy, I think you need to look at a pricing mechanism that is a bit more flexible."
"The license is not required, but we must renew the support every year, every two years."
"This product is cheaper than the EMC VNX solution. It is good for small businesses."
"While Dell EMC is costly, I don't have any complaints about their licensing model."
"There is no capacity license for XT and no additional costs for expansions. I would rate its pricing as four out of five."
"Performance per dollar, when we looked at it, was the highest that we could get for what we needed."
"I think HPE Nimble Storage is less expensive than Primera and is the best solution for Venezuela."
"There are no licensing costs for this solution."
"HPE Nimble Storage is more expensive than some of the other solutions, such as Pure Storage. They charge more for every feature than other vendors."
"Our hybrid solution could do with some more competitive pricing and more scaled-down deployments. Already, the smallest one is too much for us. We would flourish by having a smaller unit."
"The solution is a little pricey compared to others on the market."
"There is a one-time price for hardware, and with the software support, everything is included, such as software upgrades. The licensing of the solution is included in the cost of the hardware and the support is an extra cost. We have purchased support on an annual basis, but you can purchase support up front for up to seven years. We usually buy five years and near the time of the expiry, we sometimes extend it."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is expensive and ten is cheap, I rate the solution's pricing ten out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
71%
Computer Software Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
3%
Government
2%
Educational Organization
65%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
3%
Financial Services Firm
3%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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 is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
I saw that you have doubts about what you chose. I have a lot of experience with the constructor, honestly I can reco...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
They’re both great solutions and I’ve used both. EMC is being VERY aggressive on pricing which may be the undoing of...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
First of all the decision should be taken looking at similar products in terms of capacity and performance. I will sh...
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, z...
Which would you choose - HPE Nimble Storage or HPE Primera?
HPE Nimble is a versatile synced WAN San solution. It is easy to use and doesn’t require much training for admins. Th...
What do you like most about HPE Nimble Storage?
The solution's predictive analytics is good. It helps to save costs.
 

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
EMC Unity, Dell EMC Unity
Nimble Storage
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Draper, Rio Grande Pacific, Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre
Ace Relocation, Atkins Nutritionals, Berkeley Research Group, Canadian International School, City of Hot Springs, Clackamas County, Corona-Norco Unified School District, Ideal Integrations, Linear Technology, P&O Maritime, Retail Apparel Group (RAG), Virtual Radiologic
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Unity XT vs. HPE Nimble Storage and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.