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FlexPod XCS vs HPE Hyper Converged comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

FlexPod XCS
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
295
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (6th)
HPE Hyper Converged
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
HCI (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. FlexPod XCS is designed for Converged Infrastructure and holds a mindshare of 9.4%, down 9.6% compared to last year.
HPE Hyper Converged, on the other hand, focuses on HCI, holds 3.2% mindshare, up 3.1% since last year.
Converged Infrastructure
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Chris Haight - PeerSpot reviewer
Integrates everything so you are using fewer tools
The traditional UCS Blades do not take much storage internally. You would be challenged to create an HCI (Hype converged Infrastructure) solution on FlexPod / UCS or any other solution that pools internal storage. Now, with UCS X-Series, you can carve off an HCI solution, software defined pooled solution if you want. This was one area of improvement that I wanted to see and can now realize with the refresh of the Cisco UCS infrastructure. With modern modular infrastructure, RESTful API has been added, there are more integrations, ServiceNow and vCenter along with tighter plug-ins. There is cross-user interface launching, for example with Windows Admin Center. The solutions are using Ansible and Terraform for deploying infrastructure as code. All the improvements that I wanted from the last gen are here or coming. With modern workloads and GPU use on the rise, adding GPUs to modern modular infrastructure will have some pros and cons. Typically, you can add one or two GPU's to a blade with no or little trade off. With the UCS X-Series, if you are doing a GPU farm, then you may have to sacrifice compute blades in the front slots to put in a GPU tray / module. A chassis holds eight compute blades, but if you are adding a ton of GPUs, a single GPU tray or more will reduce your blade count by as many GPU trays you add. This is not just a Cisco UCS X-Series problem. It is an industry problem with modular infrastructure and one that I would like to see get solved! I am looking into one such solution, VMware BITFUSION where you can send CUDA requests over the network to a BITFUSION server with the results sent back to the requestor, early stages here and only scratched the surface thus far. With Cisco UCS X-Series, I would like to see the fabric interconnects built into the chassis instead of being external. With the fabric interconnects, the real footprint of UCS X-Series is 9U, where some of the competing solutions are 7U and have collapsed the network fabric into the chassis. This is another thing that I would like to see from Cisco, though, not really on the NetApp side of the fence, NetApp is solid storage.
Ray Baruwa - PeerSpot reviewer
Advantageous from a sustainability perspective since the networking, storage, and compute are all located within one unit
Hyperconverged is used in an environment where the footprint in the data center is restricted. It is advantageous from a sustainability perspective since the networking, storage, and compute are all located within one unit The most beneficial feature is the life cycle management. I haven't had…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product is robust, stable, and has flexibility."
"It is absolutely resilient. It has built-in redundancy and multipathing. If there is an issue with one part, it doesn't fail automatically."
"Our previous solution used to take 24 hours and now we're down to seven hours. It has really good performance."
"The most valuable feature of FlexPod is that it allows you to get the old compute storage and the network switch or the fabric of the network in one box. You can use pods to have a tiny cloud in the box, which is one of its best features."
"The product is very stable and it does what it needs to do."
"It scales well. It allows us to have very flexible architecture but to have the same level of simplicity that we'd normally expect in hyper-converged environments."
"FlexPod gives us the opportunity to deploy a product which is fully built and racked with minimal touch installation when it arrives onsite, so we can do all the configuration remotely."
"Gives us a single point of contact for support."
"The most valuable features of this solution are fast deployment, security, and it is easy to upgrade."
"The HPE Hyper Converged solution is used in a hybrid cloud configuration. We assess the disk space and partition additional capacity."
"The solution's most valuable features are scalability, easy migration, easy recovery, and flexible backup possibilities."
"There are multiple advantages. Typically, being an all-flash storage, which is available through either SimpliVity or dHCI, the performance is much better because the IOPS goes high, so it's more powerful in terms of performance. Secondly, if I'm talking of SimpliVity Hyper Convergence solution from HPE, unlike the competition, even if three hard drives fail, you are still running the solution."
"HPE Hyper Converged is stable."
"The most valuable feature is the in-built backup system. The backup speed is also excellent."
"The solution has many good features."
"It is a scalable solution."
 

Cons

"The initial learning curve is pretty steep."
"Our environment does not always require this solution, so we are not reaping the optimal ROI."
"It could be more innovative."
"The upgrades should be improved. We would like to have the ability to do unified upgrades of the whole infrastructure from beginning to end."
"I would like to have the installation of the top virtualization on its own rather than doing it through the admin. For example, if FlexPod is configured after the configuration of the host, the ESXi is installed also, but it should be part of it rather than doing it as a separate system."
"I think they are working on it, but I would like to be able to log into a portal and see the end-to-end solution and understand where it stands, from a supportability perspective."
"The ability to manage the templates across sites. We would like to easily take out the configuration of one FlexPod and copy it over, just making minor changes. There is a way to do it, but it's clumsy."
"If there were going to be any improvements, they should probably be UI improvements, overall. It can get a little kludgy sometimes when trying to figure out what to do."
"The solution would be better served if it integrated with other solutions better."
"This solution is very costly."
"We've had to do a power cycle to bring it all the way down, bring it back up for power outages, A/C shut-downs of our DC office, but it hasn't presented a problem."
"In the Hyper Converged environment, some of the brands only support the OS VMware and not Hyper-V from Microsoft or even Red Hat or KVM."
"'ve heard from other people that maybe there could be some improvements around technical support."
"The product must provide more storage capability."
"Scalability requires using additional nodes."
"The improvements could be customization and backup efficiency."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is kind of expensive even from an entry-level standpoint. I would say FlexPod would be the way to go if you are a larger business or one with large data volume."
"It is expensive. My company is small. When you look at the price point, this is a big thing for us to invest in."
"We have saved time and money for new service deployments. Without FlexPod, it probably takes about ten hours. With FlexPod, within two hours, we are up and running. So, we have seen about an 80 percent time decrease."
"The pricing and licensing are quite expensive. However, compared to other solutions, it is okay."
"I find the licensing and pricing structure to be favorable."
"The pricing is not cheaper, but stability is more important for us now. We focus on business gains, not static numbers."
"It's expensive, but when you pay for enterprise support and enterprise products, you have to pay the big bucks."
"We have seen a five to ten percent savings on new service deployments."
"It could be cheaper, everything could be cheaper."
"I would rate the price at seven out of ten. There are no additional licensing fees, but it would be cheaper to go with a dHCI solution."
"The solutions cost us a lot."
"There are costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
"HPE Hyper Converged is an affordable solution."
"If I'm comparing with Dell, HPE Hyper Converged is definitely cheaper in my experience."
"It is a cost-effective solution."
"With this solution, I buy everything together, pre-packaged, pre-installed, and in just 15 minutes, it's installed."
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Comparison Review

it_user244362 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 30, 2015
Nutanix vs. VMware EVO:RAIL vs. FlexPod
Originally posted at www.storagegaga.com/dont-get-too-drunk-on-hyper-converged/ I hate the fact that I am bursting the big bubble brewing about Hyper Convergence (HC). I urge all to look past the hot air and hype frenzy that are going on, because in the end, the HC platforms have to be aligned…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
20%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Educational Organization
10%
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about FlexPod?
The system is designed for easy scaling. Because we define everything clearly. So when we plug the system in, we apply the profile, and it scales easily.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for FlexPod?
The pricing is not cheaper, but stability is more important for us now. We focus on business gains, not static numbers. Following XCS rules ensures a stable environment, which is crucial. For me, C...
What needs improvement with FlexPod?
FlexPod should focus more on automation. Integrating an automation tool with FlexPod would enable customers to leverage automation capabilities. More automation would be helpful. Currently, we cont...
What do you like most about HPE Hyper Converged?
The solution's most valuable features are scalability, easy migration, easy recovery, and flexible backup possibilities.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Hyper Converged?
The pricing is competitive. Initially, I misunderstood and rated it as higher, but on a scale of one to ten where one is cheap, I would rate it as a four.
What needs improvement with HPE Hyper Converged?
I haven't had issues personally. I've heard from other people that maybe there could be some improvements around technical support.
 

Also Known As

No data available
HPE Hyper Converged 380, HPE Hyper Converged 250, HPE Hyper Converged 250 for Microsoft CPS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

University of Sao Paulo, WD-40, The Commonwell Mutual Insurance Group
North Lindsey College, FireWhat?, HudsonAlpha
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