Dell Unity XT vs VNX [EOL] comparison

Dell Unity XT and VNX [EOL] are both solutions in the All-Flash Storage category. Additionally, 96% of Dell Unity XT users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 87% of VNX [EOL] users who would recommend it.

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Dell Unity XT and VNX [EOL] based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

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To learn more, read our detailed All-Flash Storage Report (Updated: April 2026).

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All-Flash Storage

April 2026

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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

Everpure FlashArray

Q&A Highlights

it_user752949

Principal Architect with 1-10 employees

Dec 03, 2017

EMC VNX 2500 or EMC Unity 400. Which one is the newer and better Storage and why?

Unity is the new generation of VNX boxes, some refer it to as VNX3. The old VNX 2500 is already EOL since Dec 2014. So in this case Unity 400 is newer and better.

See all answers

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV

Technical Lead at Wipro Limited

Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades

The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.

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Dhandayudapani C

TSG Manager at Navigator Systems

Ease of implementation and robust performance enhance multi-OEM support experience

We are limited only to hardware replacement, not administration tasks. We work on AMC products through Annual Maintenance Contracts. We provide support up to the 680 model. The XT680F is a newer model, and we support from 380F to 680F. The FlashSystem 8000 series is all-flash, and there is also a 5000 series flash model. We can compare IBM DS series, including the 8000 series for recommendations. For NetApp, we can recommend the FAS 8000 series.

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Alireza Zabihi

Works at AIT

The Nimble CS-Series has proven to be reliable with 100% uptime

When we started the process of looking for a SAN vendor I had four primary criteria: reliability, performance, cost, and simplicity. We were really looking for a unicorn and were fully expected to have to make compromises in one of those areas. The Nimble CS-Series was recommended by our solutions provider, and we were blown away. Not only was it the most affordable option, but it was the easiest to deploy, had the best performance, and has proven to be reliable with 100% uptime.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Once it's set up, it just runs on its own and only requires the occasional checkup."

"This solution has improved our organization. In the past, we had reports that were taking up to two hours and after switching to SSD storage the overall processing power dropped to half an hour. The end users saw an immediate performance gain."

"From an investment standpoint, the support staff I require for it is greatly reduced, so I don't have the in-depth requirements that I had on other products."

"After switching to Everpure FlashArray, we saw significant results, as whatever hardware we used before is now compressed to 80%, maximizing space utilization in a single system."

"You get what you pay for; it is expensive, but it really works, so I would really recommend using Pure Storage."

"The best features of Pure Storage FlashArray are its ease of use and user-friendly interface, and the performance allows all types of services to be visualized from a single point of interface, making it more robust and user-friendly."

"Technical support has been amazing."

"The support has been very good from Pure Storage FlashArray."

More Everpure FlashArray pros

"We were able to integrate it very quickly with other solutions."

"The storage management is superb, with a user-friendly graphical interface and dashboards. The performance is good. The integration, dashboards, and analytics are excellent. It gives me immediate output and quick access to the reports I need promptly. It's an excellent product with high stability. The solution is scalable. The support team is highly supportive, responsive, and efficient in providing solutions. This product is highly useful and well-suited for all types of automation."

"Dell Unity XT is a unified box, and it is integrated with VVOL, our software-defined storage."

"It is stable, I have not personally seen any issues when deploying in a customer environment."

"It is very user-friendly to read and determine the exact problem, unlike HP where different tools and L3 team support are needed."

"We hear from our customers that it is stable."

"Our Unity arrays are our primary storage arrays for both of our data centers; we run all our VMs on there, they are all-flash, have been running great, and we have had no problems with them."

"I like how it separates the iSCSI drives from the standard shares. It has two different routes to it. I know most of the other solutions do this, but I just like the way that Dell EMC does it."

More Dell Unity XT pros

"Good performance for VM environments"

"Technical support is good."

"In a banking environment, on which we required a very high throughput for our database, we have used this product and our desired response was received."

"The stability of the hardware, and its ability to manage millions of IOPS, provides great comfort to system administrators, IT managers and CIOs."

"VNX 5200 works well with a medium VMware cluster, has good performance, and enables hardware disk replication."

"It’s very stable in all the years I've worked with it, I know it’s stable and the support is there."

"The replication feature provides another functionality to protect your data."

"Depending on how simple the customer needs it to be, might sway my recommendation one way or the other, but in terms of functionality, VNX is very very good."

More VNX [EOL] pros

Cons

"More cloud connectivity would enhance the solution."

"Pure Storage FlashArray could improve in the area of cryptographic information in the consoles. The user-friendliness could improve."

"One thing I'd like to see in a future release is integration between their main storage array and what they call their FlashBlade product; to be able to snapshot directly from the primary array into multiple different backup copies on FlashBlade."

"I have been primarily working with storage and have not fully explored other areas, but there is some room for improvement when it comes to performance reporting."

"Pure Storage had operational challenges between 2016 to 2018, impacting perceived reliability."

"I recognize it's a difficult challenge, but I would like to see them make the pricing more reasonable."

"There could be better storage."

"We haven't seen ROI."

More Everpure FlashArray cons

"I think Dell EMC should be more careful in appointing partners, and they need to have better control over their partners. And if their partner has some problems with them, we should not suffer."

"I would like to have secure mobile connectivity going forward. This would help me be more proactive."

"Licensing costs could be reduced."

"This lack bothers me a lot because it takes a lot of time and mistakes are made. Sometimes, a Hyper-V host gets a VMware LUN and vice-versa."

"The support portal needs fixing. Accessing a service request on the support portal seems to be a bit difficult, as opposed to just calling the 800 number."

"There is no de-duplication. Unity used to be Bionics, which had de-duplication; however, in Dell Unity XT, the de-duplication was deprecated and is no longer available."

"I called about an issue where I couldn't get VVOLs registered. It turns out it is a bug in the code and that there is no information about when it will be fixed."

"Unity only does compression. It would be nice if there was a deduplication feature as well."

More Dell Unity XT cons

"There is no easy way to defrag a RAID group. It would be nice to be able to reduce the size of a storage pool if the storage is not needed anymore."

"Poor connection to FC."

"Based on our workloads, we see repeatedly in performance reports that the built-in controller (SP) cache of our VNX model is not sufficiently large, resulting in forced cache flushing."

"VNX can improve by offering flexible upgrade options. It's not possible to add a single HDD to a current array and there are fixed rules to make upgrades."

"The CLI could be better documented, like with VMAX."

"If the VNX had embedded encryption, that would be great."

"There is no easy way to defrag a RAID group. It would be nice to be able to reduce the size of a storage pool if the storage is not needed anymore."

"There is an easy replication process between distinct data centers via VPLEX and/or RPA. But I hope in the future that EMC/Dell could replicate this with other types of storage."

More VNX [EOL] cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would prefer that they lower their pricing."

"The guaranty that Pure Storage provides when you purchase it doesn't meet the overall capacity needs to provide extra storage, if needed. Thus, it is not meeting our expectations."

"There are no licensing fees aside from the support."

"It is cost-effective because after buying a subscription, they provide a service to upgrade hardware for free. They are providing so many features. When you consider the features provided, it is cost-effective."

"The price-to-performance is good. I looked at Pure about three to four years back, but the price-to-performance wasn't right for us. Now, it's right."

"We evaluated Oracle and Hitachi, but Pure Storage had the better pricing."

"The cost of Pure Storage is subjective and determined by your environment. Pure Storage tends to be more expensive than NetApp, but it is cheaper than EMC. Performance varies with data workload, making cost considerations complex."

"Pricing is very competitive, and it's better than other competitors."

More Everpure FlashArray pricing and cost advice

"From a pricing perspective, this solution is comparable to others on the market."

"Go with the virtual appliance versus the hardware."

"Here is our major complaint with pricing. Dell EMC comes to us and gives us a price. We are like, "Well, this doesn't even compare to what we got on the last project." We say, "No, you should bring it down to this level." Then, they come back again and we are sort of in the middle again. I am like, You already sold us other stuff at a better price. We are not going to just say, 'Yes,' because we are out of time.""

"The price of the solution should be less expensive. However, at some point, you need to pay for facility and performance."

"Our big return of investment is the ability to scale and not add FTE counts nor extra administration."

"The license is not required, but we must renew the support every year, every two years."

"The solution is very expensive."

"The Dell EMC Data Protection license covers everything, like a one stop shop. All our options are covered."

More Dell Unity XT pricing and cost advice

"The initial pricing and licensing are reasonable, the yearly EMC is more expensive"

"Pricing is somewhat higher, especially in Zambia, perhaps due to the low sales volume."

"Make sure you understand how the licensing works and that you are getting the right set of licenses if you need array-to-array replication."

"Over time, VNX has become pricier than its competitors, and we have turned enthusiastically to Unity."

"Reducing dependency on JavaServer Pages (JSP) could improve the administrative overhead."

"While EMC tends to be on the expensive side, the stability and support of their products are top-notch and I feel are worth the cost."

"The initial pricing and licensing are reasonable. Yearly EMC is more expensive."

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Answers from the Community

it_user752949

Principal Architect with 1-10 employees

Dec 3, 2017

EMC VNX 2500 or EMC Unity 400. Which one is the newer and better Storage and why?

Unity series is re-engineered VNX, so the Unity is newer … it makes better use of flash, active – active , dual controller mode; better price point , configurations solid upgrade from the VNX

2 out of 21 answers

Chris Tunnah

Business Development Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Oct 31, 2017

The VNX range is older and is being phased out. I think you mean VNX 5200? That said the Unity 400 is the better investment as it is newer, cheaper to support, faster, and with higher capacity and bigger supported file system size.

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it_user281856

Advisory Systems Engineer at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees

Oct 31, 2017

Hope this helps: http://virtualgeek.typepad.com/virtual_geek/2016/05/emc-world-2016-unity-the-story-behind-the-story.html

Read full answer

See all 21 answers

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Construction Company

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

15%

Marketing Services Firm

14%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Construction Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	66
Midsize Enterprise	36
Large Enterprise	156

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	62
Midsize Enterprise	48
Large Enterprise	96

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	23

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?

Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?

The only issue is the pricing. Because we have competition, our customers always take another brand and say they can ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?

Our customers using Dell storage also use competing solutions. Our customers who have Everpure FlashArray may also ha...

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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...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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...

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Comparisons

Dell PowerStore vs Everpure FlashArray

Compared 12% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Everpure FlashArray

Compared 11% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Everpure FlashArray

Compared 8% of the time

VAST Data vs Everpure FlashArray

Compared 7% of the time

VMware vSAN vs Everpure FlashArray

Compared 5% of the time

More Everpure FlashArray Competitors

Dell PowerStore vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 27% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 12% of the time

HPE 3PAR StoreServ vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 5% of the time

Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 4% of the time

HPE Nimble Storage vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 4% of the time

More Dell Unity XT Competitors

HPE MSA vs VNX [EOL]

Compared 42% of the time

HPE 3PAR StoreServ vs VNX [EOL]

Compared 35% of the time

More VNX [EOL] Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Everpure FlashArray

May 2026

Download Everpure FlashArray product report

Buyer's Guide

Dell Unity XT

May 2026

Download Dell Unity XT product report

Buyer's Guide

VNX [EOL]

April 2026

Download VNX [EOL] product report

Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray

EMC Unity, Dell EMC Unity

VNX

Overview

Everpure Storage FlashArray delivers simplicity, speed, and performance with ease of management and data reduction capabilities. Its resilience and seamless upgrades complement its integration with VMware, while predictive analytics and proactive support enhance reliability.

Everpure Storage FlashArray leverages a flash-based architecture for improved storage efficiency, reduced footprint, and outstanding data management through deduplication and compression. Users appreciate its single pane of glass management and Evergreen model. It supports VMware environments effectively, offering predictive analytics for better operational insights. The system is noted for its user-friendly management and proactive support, ensuring minimal downtime while delivering resilient storage solutions.

What Key Features Does Everpure Storage FlashArray Offer?

Simplicity and Speed: Easy management and rapid performance enhancements.
Data Reduction: Effective deduplication and compression.
Flash Architecture: Seamless upgrades and outstanding resilience.
VMware Integration: Excellent compatibility with virtualization platforms.
Predictive Analytics: Strong insights for proactive management.

What Benefits Should Users Consider?

Reliability: Proactive support with minimal downtime.
Efficiency: Reduced storage footprint and enhanced data management.
Performance: Faster processing speeds and low latency.
User Experience: Simplified management with Evergreen model.

In industries like finance, banking, and healthcare, Everpure Storage FlashArray supports high-performance storage needs focusing on virtualization and database environments. Employed for VMware workloads, disaster recovery, and storage provisioning, it ensures application performance in private or hybrid cloud setups while enhancing management of virtualized environments.

Everpure (formerly Pure Storage)

Dell Unity XT is renowned for its ease of use and management, high performance with all-flash arrays, and seamless integration with VMware. It's appreciated for robust data replication, multi-protocol support, inline compression, and deduplication capabilities, ideal for mid-range storage needs.

Known for its advanced HTML5 interface, Dell Unity XT offers unified block and file storage with rapid deployment and efficient storage utilization. Its scalability and cost-effectiveness make it appealing to users transitioning from older systems. The system supports databases like Oracle and SQL, alongside serving as network-attached storage (NAS). While recognized for performance, integration, and reliability in virtual environments, its deduplication, compression, and support quality are areas flagged for enhancement. There's a desire for improved synchronized replication and monitoring capabilities, enhanced VMware compatibility, and active-active controller functionality. Native cloud integration and better pre-sales support are also anticipated by users.

What are the main features of Dell Unity XT?

VMware Integration: Seamless operation within VMware environments.
Data Replication: Reliable and robust data replication features.
All-Flash Arrays: High-performance storage solution with all-flash capabilities.
Multi-Protocol Support: Flexible support for various storage protocols.
HTML5 Interface: Advanced and efficient management interface.

Where can users find ROI when evaluating Dell Unity XT?

Performance Optimization: Enhanced storage performance for demanding applications.
Scalability: Easily scales to meet growing business requirements.
Cost-Effectiveness: Competitive pricing for mid-range storage solutions.
Seamless Integration: Works smoothly with existing IT infrastructure.
Reliable Data Management: Secure and efficient handling of critical data.

In sectors relying heavily on virtualization and data-intensive applications, Dell Unity XT serves as a vital component in data centers. It plays crucial roles in hosting virtual machines, supporting extensive databases, and providing robust network-attached storage. This adaptability makes it a favored choice for organizations transitioning from traditional storage systems.

Dell Technologies

With EMC VNX you'll have the right blend of flash, capacity, and application-aware software. Scale up storage for midrange workloads, optimized for virtual applications and cloud environments.

Dell Technologies

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas

Draper, Rio Grande Pacific, Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre

Samsonite, Comanche County Memorial Hospital, Kindred Healthcare

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and others in All-Flash Storage. Updated: April 2026.

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