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Dell Unity XT vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe comparison

 

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

Dell Unity XT
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
196
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Pure FlashArray X NVMe
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
15th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Dell Unity XT is 7.8%, down from 10.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 0.8%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

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.
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.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has compression, which allows you to store more data than you would normally under the arrays."
"It is simple to use and easy to manage. We don't touch it after we set it up."
"The most valuable feature is the performance. It's still an all-flash array at a good price point."
"It is scalable, and we usually recommend Dell Unity XT to small and medium companies."
"This solution is easy to work with and easy to maintain."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to provision storage from the CLI, versus having to go in and use the GUI every time. I can just script it out and it will create what I need. That makes it super-easy to manage. Also, for us, it's a set-and-forget. Once we provisioned it out, we haven't had to mess with it."
"I have found Dell EMC Unity XT to be stable."
"For me, the most valuable feature is the ease of management."
"The duplication algorithm allows us to get a lot more use out of less storage. We're running a five terabyte array right now and we're running probably about 30 terabytes on it. So the duplication rate is pretty phenomenal, without a cost to performance. It still runs pretty smoothly."
"The tool's valuable features are speed, security, data compression, and reliability. Its data compression feature is the best that we have ever seen. It helps us to save money and resources."
"It's incredibly easy to use and greatly simplified our ability to both deploy and manage our storage subsystems."
"The initial setup was extremely simple and straightforward."
"It has good, reliable, fast storage."
"Offers excellent features like efficient data reduction, a reliable SafeMode, and a great support model for continuous assistance and updates."
"We are satisfied with the performance as it is significantly faster compared to traditional storage options."
"Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution."
 

Cons

"The solution can use improvement with the patch cluster like the Synchron and Active replication."
"The product’s pricing should be improved."
"Scalability for the 650F is good, but I was expecting a little bit more."
"The iSCSI and the VMware integation using vSphere could be less confusing."
"It needs deduplication. We'd like to have the dedupe capabilities in the Unity."
"I would like to see them add Storage Groups, like we have had in Clariions and VNXs."
"I'd like to see more of the NVMe back-end for the flash. And the big deal with the PowerMax is that they've used all U2 drives so that they can avoid having to take it down. I see using M.2 and modular sections as being a real nice alternative that could be implemented in Unity at a fairly low cost."
"It would be nice to have been able to easily move off our old VNX system to this system. The process is very manual."
"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics should not incur extra charges."
"You cannot tag a LUN with a description, and that should be improved. What I like on the Unity side is that when I expand LUNs or do things, there is an information field on the LUN. This is the Information field that you can tag on your LUNs to let yourself know, "Hey, I've added this much space on this date". Pure lacks that ability. So, you don't have a mechanism that's friendly for tracking your data expansions on the LUN and for adding any additional information. That's a downside for me."
"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial."
"In the future, I would like to see integration with enterprise backup systems."
"The tool's pricing is higher than competitors."
"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."
"In terms of what needs improvement, the dashboard and management could be simplified."
"There are some challenges with data encryption and reduction."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"When you look at what Dell EMC is compared to, like NetApp, they're all priced pretty similarly. I think the pricing of the hybrid model is good."
"The price is very reasonable."
"I liked the price point when we purchased it."
"All the licenses are included from day one of your purchase of the product, so you don't have to buy licenses separately. There are no additional costs to be paid for the maintenance of the solution."
"We purchased a five-year warranty."
"Licensing is fine. We worked with a sales rep to purchase our Unity."
"The return on the investment was simply speeding up our entire vSphere stack, which allowed our developers and engineers to get their workloads done faster and simpler. We were experiencing VM snapshot times of 45 minutes to two or three hours, and it shrunk it down to under five minutes."
"As far as licensing goes, I love how VMware works with Dell EMC Unity. It's great. They work hand in hand. They have made it so simple."
"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
"The support cost per array is about $20,000 a year for 24/7 support."
"The product is expensive."
"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."
"Given its price, Pure is not the first option."
"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
"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 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."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
68%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Government
2%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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 recommend Dell EMC Unity XT All-flash which can guarantee you a ratio of 3:1 signed ...
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 NetApp. Differences are in the user interface mostly, they both do what they a...
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 show a few aspects helping the decision, comparing Unity Xt480f and AFF220 (both ...
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?
Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics should not incur extra charges. This is one of the main things organizations need.
 

Also Known As

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

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Draper, Rio Grande Pacific, Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre
Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Unity XT vs. Pure FlashArray X NVMe and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,190 professionals have used our research since 2012.