Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series vs VxRail comparison

Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series vs. VxRail

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Categories and Ranking

StarWind Virtual SAN

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the HCI category, the mindshare of StarWind Virtual SAN is 2.3%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series is 0.6%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VxRail is 21.2%, up from 21.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

HCI

Featured Reviews

Ahmed Hosni

Senior System Engineer at Giza Systems

Feb 24, 2024

Provides a cost-effective way to run an HCI storage platform for almost any hypervisor

You can maintain and update it with little to no fuss, even the free version is incredibly capable whilst it brings the cost of a Highly Available HCI solution down to a very cost-effective point. Having used Starwind Virtual SAN for many years both for clients and for internal systems, it has always done exactly what it set out to do. It provides a cost-effective way to run an HCI storage platform for almost any hypervisor, but it is most effective with Hyper-V. It's simple and easy to use, The software monitoring should be web-based to be reachable from any VLAN workstation.

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Austin Ajaegbu

Enterprise Information systems/Wintel Systems Administrator at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

Dec 24, 2021

Allows for centralized management with great interconnectivity

My main use is server management and virtualization This solution allowed us to move from using standalone systems to having all our data center management in one place. The most valuable feature is the interconnectivity, which allows me to use the system across my data centers and makes it easy…

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Sushil MIshra

AG at SIS.

Apr 17, 2024

Trouble-free architecture, we don't have to juggle multiple components like in a traditional three-tier architecture

We mainly use it for virtualization across all our applications. We also have a DC/DR setup based on the VxRail infrastructure It's a trouble-free architecture. We don't have to juggle multiple components like in a traditional three-tier architecture. With VxRail, it's a pre-built solution…

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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

"One of the most valuable features is the way it sets up the virtual SAN, because we don't have to buy a separate appliance for storage. It uses the existing storage on the servers, which is definitely a cost savings for us."

"Being hardware agnostic is a must and definitely scored points for us."

"Having support is also very valuable to us as we are a small team."

"I've had to open a few support cases over the years due to administrator errors, and the support received was top-notch."

"vSAN we found was simple to set up, easy to configure and manage and allows us to achieve storage redundancy."

"The most valuable feature is the reliable storage replication, which enables me to create a robust infrastructure to run our business."

"The ability to run the software virtually on every virtualization platform and the ability to eliminate all storage vendor locking are the most valuable features."

"It is extremely stable."

More StarWind Virtual SAN pros

"This solution allowed us to move from using standalone systems to having all our data center management in one place."

"In our implementations, HDS Storage Virtualization has helped in migrating data with the least amount of downtime, compared to other storage technologies."

"The replication technology can move data faster than EMC MirrorView and requires less bandwidth. The Storage Virtualization technology is the most mature in the market, outside of IBM’s Storwize (which has a lot of compatibility issues, and EMC’s very expensive VPLEX solution); and it works."

"It has a valuable deduplication feature."

"The pricing is very, very good."

"We were able to speed up our gaming software, which was a big plus."

"It's a good product based on the features. You can upgrade the solution with only one click."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is the automation and integration points with other automation tools."

"Offers zero-day deployment"

"There are so many features, but if I have to choose, I would go for scale-out upgrades and performance. Scale-out upgrades are very valuable. Typically, when customers engage in virtualization, they're committing themselves to run many virtual machines on a fewer number of hosts. They'll have five or six hosts, and they will run all their virtualization on vSphere. They could be having anywhere from 50 to 100 or even more virtual machines. Once all these go into production, getting downtime or getting planned maintenance windows is extremely difficult. It is something that typically businesses will frown upon. With VxRail, you can just go ahead and add a node without disrupting the existing environment, which works very well. That's why scale-out upgrades are a key feature. Its performance is also valuable. It delivers a very high number of IOPS for a hybrid configuration or an all-flash configuration. The processors that are available in the Xeon family are very powerful. They are multi-core with typically 2 gigahertz, 2.4 gigahertz, or higher frequency, so the performance is very much appreciated."

"The cover points feature in VxRail is remarkable. It's unique. It has an intervention failover system as well as an automatic failover system, reaching clusters existing in VxRail. This makes all files act as a single file with a large and huge resource, and, of course, with customized administration, configuration, and resources. It provides automatic failover for redundancy and data recovery."

More VxRail pros

Cons

"It would be great if it provided thin provisioned virtual disks."

"The console is something that I feel could be improved. There is nothing technically wrong with it, but it can be jazzed up and/or made to be a little more intuitive."

"There needs to be more visibility on how long the cloud replication will take as there is no current ETA."

"An update caused a syncing issue and it took over a month to resolve it"

"Ability to to test the virtual storage are network area and storage speed from StarWind Management Console."

"StarWind doesn't really have any performance reporting, especially compared with other vSAN products we've used."

"Although minor, some of the documentation could be rewritten to be clearer."

"StarWind Virtual SAN architecture is slightly complex and requires the team to carefully identify and study how the solution integrates with VMware vSphere."

More StarWind Virtual SAN cons

"An area for improvement would be technical support. In the next release, I would like to see more features added to make this a more complete solution."

"An update to its technology would be good. The G Series has been around for more than five years and HDS seriously needs to ramp up, since the competition has better performance at a lower cost with better features and functionalities. For example, it needs redirect on write Snapshot, preconfigured storage tiering with better IOPS, built-in deduplication technology on hybrid disk, etc."

"HDS reaches a ceiling depending on model. The G200 cannot transition to G400, the G400 can transition to G600 but cannot transition to G800, which is the top-end model."

"There is limited support for SAP HANA with this solution."

"Troubleshooting can be a little more difficult than legacy systems."

"This solution needs to have the capability where even older versions of hardware can be seamlessly utilized and additional expansion becomes so much easier."

"The product has high pricing. This particular area needs improvement."

"I would like to see VxRail add duplication features to its hybrid solution."

"We do not use the storage part of VxRail, we use Pure Storage to map out the VxRail because the disk performance from Pure Storage was far better than the performance of the disk on the inside of VxRail."

"The agility of the support team to provide you with better solutions should be improved. VxRail also has to be improved in terms of simplicity. Adding a simple node seemed like quite a project."

"The way that the VxRail is licensed could be improved."

More VxRail cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The setup cost is very low. The pricing is great."

"I would suggest that you download the free version, deploy in your lab, and play with it."

"I think the bang for the buck is much better with StarWind Virtual SAN."

"The licensing is a bit weird. If you license the standard version of StarWind, it allows you four terabytes. Then, they have a pro version, but with the pro version, the only difference is it doubles the terabytes to eight."

"The scalability limitation for us is its licensing. At some point in the fairly near future, we will probably have to upgrade our license so we can store eight terabytes instead of four. We are currently at four terabytes, but we're starting to knock on the door of that capacity."

"The Price/Performance ratio for this solution is outstanding!"

"Licensing is based on nodes rather than TBs, which means that the users are free to increase storage capacity without putting thought into licensing."

"The pricing is fine for the work that it does."

More StarWind Virtual SAN pricing and cost advice

Information not available

"VxRail is not cheap, but it's not expensive either."

"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."

"There is an advantage for those who have a good deal with Dell. Its price is good. From a company's perspective, it is always too expensive, but it is about value for money."

"The solution is competitively priced but it is expensive. However, this is expected as we are a corporate enterprise and we need this environment."

"We most likely pay yearly for support. The cost was justified by now because it stays up and I don't have to constantly open tickets. I probably rebooted the system once or twice. We haven't replaced any discs in the storage, we haven't had to do any disc replacements, so it just runs. You pay a little more but you cut down on the maintenance."

"We were expecting Dell EMC to bring us something that would work very quickly and easily, but also be at a reasonable price point, and they did."

"It is just as cheap to move over to an HCI solution as it is to maintain a legacy system."

"The licensing costs can vary depending on the number of processors and specific requirements, which may result in considerable expenses."

More VxRail pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

18%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Computer Software Company

21%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

10%

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about StarWind Virtual SAN?

It is easy to use and can monitor system synchronization and check Storage status. StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN) combin...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?

If you are comfortable with the solution and you feel that you don't need support, you can begin with the free licenc...

What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?

Areas for improvement in StarWind Virtual SAN include simplifying the setup process, especially for users with limite...

How does HPE Nimble Storage compare to VxRail?

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HPE Nimble Storage dHCI Vs. VxRail One of the best things about the HPE Nimble Storage dHCI is the three, two, one, z...

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 e...

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 bein...

VMware vSAN vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Comparisons

Compared 28% of the time

StorMagic SvSAN vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 19% of the time

Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 17% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 13% of the time

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 3% of the time

More StarWind Virtual SAN Competitors

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series

Compared 44% of the time

Dell PowerFlex vs Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series

Compared 14% of the time

HPE Alletra dHCI vs Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series

Compared 13% of the time

HPE SimpliVity vs Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series

Compared 12% of the time

More Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series Competitors

Dell PowerFlex vs VxRail

Compared 33% of the time

VMware vSAN vs VxRail

Compared 21% of the time

HPE SimpliVity vs VxRail

Compared 15% of the time

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs VxRail

Compared 7% of the time

HPE Hyper Converged vs VxRail

Compared 6% of the time

More VxRail Competitors

Product Reports

StarWind Virtual SAN

Download StarWind Virtual SAN product report

Download Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series product report

HCI

November 2024

Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series report

VxRail

Download VxRail product report

Also Known As

StarWind SAN & NAS

HDS Unified Compute Platform, Hitachi UCP, Hitachi UCP Select

VCE VxRail

Learn More

StarWind

Hitachi Vantara

Dell Technologies

Overview

StarWind Virtual SAN provides high availability and fault tolerance for virtualized environments without the need for dedicated SAN hardware. It allows for real-time replication between servers, shared storage for Hyper-V clusters, and enables vMotion and High Availability features for VMware vSphere. The solution reduces costs and leverages existing hardware while providing a scalable and reliable infrastructure. Valuable features include ease of use, scalability, top-tier support, hardware agnosticism, and the ability to use off-the-shelf standard servers to increase storage space. StarWind VSAN has helped organizations improve performance, data availability, and data security while reducing downtime and providing cost-saving storage options.

Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP) is the company's product for converged infrastructure (CI), combining resources server, storage, networking, virtualization, and software management.

VxRail is a hyper-converged appliance based on VMware virtual SAN Software and is jointly engineered and built with VMware, for VMware, to enhance Vmware. VxRail software-defined architecture simplifies compute, storage, virtualization, and management. It will safeguard performance, reliability, and flexibility across your organization with a broad range of workloads and applications from business-critical to next-gen. With VxRail, you are covered.

VxRail is a single turn-key appliance that is a validated, fully integrated, pre-configured, pre-tested solution and offers non-disruptive scaling. Every node includes compute storage and IO. All-flash configurations can contain between 12-28 cores per node. The storage capacity options run from 7.6 TB to 19TB with either 256 GB or 512GB of memory. Hybrid appliances may have 6-20 cores per node, 3.6 TB to 10 TB of storage capacity, and 24GB to 256 GB of memory.

VxRail offers high availability fail-over, an active/active stretch cluster, and VSan Kernal integration. VxRail is a power-edged server with APIs built on automation. There are over 15 million different combinations of hardware available with VxRail. VxRail provides a simple, cost-effective solution that solves a large range of use cases. Additionally, you also get a mixed workloads automated system that is backed with fully automated system updates, and complete end-to-end lifecycle management all in a single two-rack appliance.

VxRail is a value-added suitable solution for distributed small to mid-sized enterprises, remote offices, private clouds, and virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). You choose the deployment option that best suits your organizational needs, from appliance to integrated rack offerings, with or without networking, and it will be delivered to you, ready to deploy out-of-box.

If you know VMware, you know VxRail.

VxRail Features and Benefits

Seamlessly accelerate deployment to a hybrid cloud
Fast data center modernization
Create developer-ready Kubernetes platforms

Powerful performance and reliability
Improve and simplify operational efficiency
Excellent integration
Save time
Reduce costs

Reviews from Real Users

VxRail is an all-in-one solution: "You don't have to worry too much about the hardware and you don't have to work on integrating a storage device. We instead have this as an all-in-one solution and everything is available as a box."

VxRail is remarkable: “The cover points feature in VxRail is remarkable. It's unique. It has an intervention failover system as well as an automatic failover system, reaching clusters existing in VxRail…”

VxRail is a powerful performer: “...VxRail delivers a very high number of IOPS for a hybrid configuration or an all-flash configuration. The processors that are available in the Xeon family are very powerful. They are multi-core with typically 2 gigahertz, 2.4 gigahertz, or higher frequency, so the performance is very much appreciated.”

Sample Customers

Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School

Asia Capital Reinsurance, RMZ, Cigniti Technologies, SPAR, Infosys

World Wide Technology Inc, Renault Sport Formula One Team, 8x8 Inc, Brownes, Canadian Pacific, Canopy, Denton, EDF, Unilin, Xerox

Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC Series vs. VxRail