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Dell XC Appliance vs VxRail comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 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 XC Appliance
Ranking in HCI
19th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.5
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VxRail
Ranking in HCI
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
131
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Dell XC Appliance is 0.3%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VxRail is 19.0%, down from 21.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Enables seamless integration with multiple software and outstanding AI tools
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it. I find it overly reliant on VMware. In cases of company mergers involving different platforms, software that can handle a multi-hypervisor environment would facilitate quicker integration.
Rami Jadallah - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamline management and integration with seamless upgrades
The primary reasons customers choose VxRail include ease of management, ease of upgrades, and integration with VMware. The hyper-converged infrastructure simplifies software and hardware upgrades. Customers prefer the single pane of glass management and integration with VMware, which makes it easier for them to proceed with decisions involving VMware products.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features are the deduplication and the compression features."
"The most valuable feature is that you can assign a volume to an off-shore workload on the fly."
"It's an extremely stable solution, and I highly recommend it."
"What I like the most is that it is easy to implement, easy deployment and that it's easy to manage."
"When we compare it to normal hardware servers, I'd say it is quite easy to configure and deploy."
"From a single screen, I can view VM details, performance, and hardware issues, such as power supply or fan malfunctions, along with RAM module problems."
"The most valuable feature is the low management overhead, and the lower skill set required to manage it."
"The solution's hardware is great."
"My customers use it for VDI. It has been very usable and very fast to use with VDI. On the VxRail side also, it has been very fast."
"Scalability is easy with VxRail, and I would rate it almost a ten out of ten."
"The simplicity and manageability of VxRail are most valuable. We have a very good experience with this product. Its stability and scalability are also very good."
"VxRail is very cost-effective and affordable in the long term. It is more recommended when it comes to financial life, but it may depend upon the license. VxRail comes with VMware licensing, which may not be that cost-effective as compared to others. With VMware, it's an auto check competition. VMware is an expensive solution, especially for Nutanix. Nutanix have their own hypervisor called Acronis, which is very cost-effective against the VMware. Nutanix is cheaper for the hardware but not for the software. If you ask the Nutanix partners to deploy Nutanix over Cisco servers or Dell EMC servers, the cost will be higher. Nutanix wants to compete financially. Therefore, they propose their software over the Supermicro server, which is a very cheap Chinese server. In fact, I don't like their terms of service. HyperFlex has the highest price, and it is very expensive. I don't know why. It may be because this is a UCS system, which comes from Cisco and is already expensive. When it comes to HyperFlex, they need the labor to deploy Hyper-V, Citrix, or any other hypervisor."
"The assurance that my systems would not suffer a performance drop no matter where they are is valuable. I do not need any extra hardware."
"There is a single vendor with the hardware, software, and maintenance. Thus, there is a single vendor with whom we can contact."
"We like the design and that it meets data storage needs."
"The solution is stable and reliable. This is one of the main reasons why we purchased this solution."
 

Cons

"Dell needs to do a lot of work to simplify the maintenance and life-cycle upgrades for the product."
"In the next release, I would like to see support for Docker and containers."
"The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor."
"We are not always advised of new features or updates, so we must research to stay up to date."
"The solution's storage size could be improved."
"Currently, there is no support for the servers that are not in the cluster."
"There should be more provisioning capabilities within the solution."
"The cost of using the public cloud deployment is astronomical."
"The price should come down a little bit. It has become better than it was at the beginning. There was a really big price difference between a hyper-converged infrastructure and the classic servers and storage. The gap is lessening, however, it's still there."
"This solution needs to have the capability where even older versions of hardware can be seamlessly utilized and additional expansion becomes so much easier."
"At present, VxRail is a hyperconverged state of the art product being installed in a legacy way. We need hyperconverged install teams."
"If they continue developing their product regarding VMware, it will be one of the best products in the HCI space. In terms of additional features, there is nothing missing because, for data protection, they also have the CDP option for VM. They can protect the VM at any point in time."
"I would like to see more solutions for satellite capabilities where we can put it into smaller locations and still have the redundancy that we have with a larger cluster."
"They're getting better with their one-click upgrade. The success factor is now between 85% to 87% with the latest release. They should just continuously improve on that one-click factor and make it more seamless."
"During code upgrades, VxRail can be sensitive. It requires a very clean environment to proceed without issues."
"Some of the features of the hyperconverged infrastructure could be integrated with external storage. Right now, for example, if I have surveillance going, I need to purchase very cheap storage. So, an integration between the hyperconverged infrastructure and external storage would be good."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We received a good price from Dell."
"The pricing for Dell EMC solutions is quite expensive and not really made for small or medium-sized businesses."
"The pricing is dependent on the technology and is in direct relation to the manufacturer and the components."
"The pricing is good."
"The price point is very fair for a product in this category but can vary depending on the components selected within the family of products."
"The product is expensive compared to other solutions."
"The tool is expensive."
"The licensing aspect is the most painful for some of our customers. Customers go for a VMware license that's standard and then they find they have to go with the enterprise solution and adjust the license. If you have a limited budget, that's difficult."
"It has a yearly subscription. It can be for one year, three years, or five years."
"A typical node that I would sell to a customer has a list price be between $80,000 and $100,000 per node. Organizations typically start with four nodes. That's the hardware, software, VMware licensing, everything. Customers typically pay about half of that - approximately $45,000 to $50,000 a node. On average, it costs about $200,000 to get your foot in the door."
"The licensing costs can vary depending on the number of processors and specific requirements, which may result in considerable expenses."
"VxRail is still more expensive than its competitor solutions."
"It is expensive as compared to other products in the same category."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What advice do you have for others considering Dell XC Appliance?
My advice for people who are selling this product is to first make sure that you educate the customers. The customer doesn't often know much about HCI and what the need to be using it for. If they ...
What needs improvement with Dell XC Appliance?
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's applian...
What is your primary use case for Dell XC Appliance?
Dell offers several benefits with its appliances. Primarily, I can combine them horizontally and vertically, reaching up to sixty-four nodes. Additionally, Dell employs its own artificial intellige...
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, zero rule. That means I need three copies of my data on two different types of me...
What Is The Biggest Difference Between vSAN And VxRail?
While both run on the vSAN technology from VMware, vSAN needs to be deployed on vSAN ready nodes while VxRail is an engineered system. The choice to choose which technology depends on two major fac...
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...
 

Also Known As

No data available
VCE VxRail
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cardlytics, AEW Energie, Aubert, Zhongtong Information Service, Commune de Villepinte, Teikyo University Hospital
World Wide Technology Inc, Renault Sport Formula One Team, 8x8 Inc, Brownes, Canadian Pacific, Canopy, Denton, EDF, Unilin, Xerox
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell XC Appliance vs. VxRail and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.