No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

HPE Apollo Systems vs HPE Synergy comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

HPE Apollo Systems
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Rack Servers (8th), Density Optimized Servers (2nd)
HPE Synergy
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
91
Ranking in other categories
Blade Servers (4th), Composable Infrastructure (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are IT Hardware and Infrastructure solutions, they serve different purposes. HPE Apollo Systems is designed for Density Optimized Servers and holds a mindshare of 21.3%, down 23.9% compared to last year.
HPE Synergy, on the other hand, focuses on Blade Servers, holds 10.6% mindshare, down 22.5% since last year.
Density Optimized Servers Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
HPE Apollo Systems21.3%
Dell PowerEdge C- Series21.6%
Huawei FusionServer X Series15.9%
Other41.199999999999996%
Density Optimized Servers
Blade Servers Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
HPE Synergy10.6%
Dell PowerEdge MX- Series10.2%
HPE BladeSystem8.9%
Other70.30000000000001%
Blade Servers
 

Featured Reviews

Gökhan  DURMAZ - PeerSpot reviewer
Account Manager at TD SYNNEX
High-quality integration and strong support have optimized our rack server operations
HPE Apollo Systems is a good product because it has better support and best quality with integrity. When I speak about integrity, I speak about GPU integration or other integrations such as GPU integration, backup software integration, and hypervisor integration. Regarding the integration of high-speed interconnectors in HPE Apollo Systems, they impact computational tasks because the high-speed interconnect affects performance. I don't remember the specifics. Regarding the cooling technologies, they help to reduce operational costs. The positive impact I see from HPE Apollo Systems is that support is good and quality is good. In general, HPE Apollo Systems appears to be for rack servers with some optimization capabilities.
MR
Presales engineer and consultant at Hybrid Tech
Redundant components and single console management improve efficiency while high costs warrant attention
Regarding HPE Synergy, the most valuable feature is that the whole solution and the whole system operate in passive mode, and there are very few chances of downtime as all the components in HPE Synergy are redundant, including VC Flex modules and interconnect modules, as well as power supply and fan modules. Other networking and storage connectivity modules are also redundant, and we can mount the entire Synergy frame in a single rack. If we fully populate a Synergy frame with 12 servers, 12 physical machines could be mounted in one Synergy frame, mostly with redundant power supplies and networking ports along with SAN connectivity on a single console.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"When we moved to the Apollo and all flash drives, we gained a lot of performance."
"we can use the same platform for several use cases: Hadoop, Ceph, and we are considering the server for another use case right now. It's a single solution, we only have to integrate it once and we can use it for several technologies."
"I find HPE Apollo Systems to be scalable and efficient for AI initiatives, and the environmental efficiency has a significant impact on operational costs."
"Apollo Systems provide stuff that standard services do not, more HTDs, more compute power, at very reasonable pricing."
"HPE Apollo's support is the most valuable feature."
"The most valuable feature is the amount of programming storage available."
"We're going to buy another Apollo 6500. We may configure it with half the number of GPUs because that may be all we need. In a sense, we can see the Apollo 6500 being so powerful that we only need half the GPU capability that we have now."
"HPE Apollo's most valuable feature is the ability to expand our storage capacity."
"They're easy to swap and move around the datacenter, for sure. They don't occupy too much space for what they offer."
"Ability to easily re-utilize parts of the hardware for different purposes."
"We can put a bigger workload on there because the systems can produce a lot more resources now."
"The initial setup is fine."
"The Online firmware update for the virtual connects has minimized our downtime windows."
"Shorter delivery times. Where we now have a delivery time of about six weeks, we hope to go back to days."
"We have more control over the firmware and how we are managing our physical servers."
"HPE Synergy software-defined infrastructure simplifies our operations by quickening deployment, quickening roll-out and services to our clinicians and physicians."
 

Cons

"What's coming out in Gen 10 is very strong in terms of additional security."
"We have tried to used standardization using Ubuntu Linux and it's been hard. They had some difficulties getting the RAID configuration up and running because there are no drivers for it."
"The technical support from HPE has always been good in my experience."
"There is a shared battery for all cache controllers in the node. When you have to replace that element, you have to take down all three nodes and not just one."
"We are quite happy with it, but its price and storage density can be better."
"The predictive analysis feature could be improved."
"The solution's deployment, security, and scalability need improvement."
"If the workload is not purely sequential, then performance in the IO is less than optimal because it's optimized for streaming processing."
"HPE Synergy could improve its remote support."
"The Synergy platform is HPE-specific and more for on-premises. You're kind of locked in with VMware and the HPE with the VMs. The Nutanix offering is a bit more flexible."
"We had an issue during the initial setup with the 40 Gigabyte cards. They weren’t working, so we had to work really closely with HPE support to get them to work."
"The setup was a bit complex."
"Gen 11 is being released. That's going to have a lot of advantages over Gen 10 and previous generations in terms of the cooling modules in the servers to keep them cooler and run with more efficiency and better performance. There are more management features with iLO 6 and the latest OneView management."
"One of the features I want to see, which I will see with OneView 5.0, is to have all the OneView consoles in a single pane of glass. That will make it easy to see everything in one place and not have to log in to multiple consoles."
"The speed in OneView and how it updates the entire configuration needs improvement. If they can do that, and it could be a little more clear on what impact different actions will have for certain things, that would be good."
"The initial setup was complex. From what I was told, there were issues initially with getting the SFPs on the floor for our data center and something with the image, but I think that was on our service provider' side. They couldn't get the image to deploy with the right drivers and stuff."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is more expensive than Dell which is their main competitor. However, there are times we have managed to receive a comparable price."
"Obviously I would like to see the cost go down. That speaks for itself."
"It is an expensive solution but it is worth the money. The standard licensing cost is for the GPU and the features that someone is using. There are additional charges but they depend on the solution."
"There is an annual license required to use HPE Apollo."
"Compared to other products, HPE Apollo is not an expensive solution."
"It costs us around $60,000 a year."
"Nutanix was really hard to implement, and it was very pricey compared to what we get from Synergy."
"The platform that we run Synergy on is all virtualized. Our primary cost is likely VMware."
"We pay about £500 for the solution."
"The cost is high and that is a drawback for some customers."
"We do CAPEX."
"We don't have to pay for Synergy because it's part of our plan."
"We bought everything outright to start with. We don't do much consumption-based stuff."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Density Optimized Servers solutions are best for your needs.
886,664 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
8%
University
7%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise56
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with HPE Apollo?
Some features could be added to HPE Apollo Systems in the future, and I feel that some capability is needed. HPE Apollo Systems is a bit expensive, and there are some issues with scalability. Two f...
What is your primary use case for HPE Apollo?
I have been distributing this product for three years. I don't have specific use cases, and everything about the major use case for HPE Apollo Systems is good. I don't know the purpose clients are ...
What advice do you have for others considering HPE Apollo?
I am not using these products today, and I do not work with some specific firewalls. My company is TD Synnex, a distributor company, and I work for this company. My email is , and my first name is ...
How would you choose between HPE's Bladesystem and Synergy?
For me, choosing between HPE’s Bladesystem and Synergy came down to which solution was more powerful, reliable, and stable. It turns out Bladesystem was the winner. Bladesystem is excellent because...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Synergy?
As far as the prices are concerned, rack mount solutions are less expensive than HPE Synergy prices; however, HPE Synergy prices are higher but justify themselves as the solution accommodates all t...
What needs improvement with HPE Synergy?
In my opinion, for future improvements in HPE Synergy, there should be better management of power consumption complexity as well as an increase in the number of servers that can fit in a single Syn...
 

Also Known As

HP Apollo Systems, HP ProLiant SL, HP Apollo
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Weta Digital
HudsonAlpha, Virgin Media, EMIS, United
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Cisco and others in Density Optimized Servers. Updated: April 2026.
886,664 professionals have used our research since 2012.