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Huawei OceanStor Dorado vs NetApp AFF comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
15th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (6th)
Huawei OceanStor Dorado
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
9th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp AFF
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
2nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
311
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 0.8%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Huawei OceanStor Dorado is 4.4%, up from 4.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp AFF is 9.4%, down from 9.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Eugene Hemphill - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps to save money and resources with the data compression feature
One point I'd like to improve is that the tool should start selling small boxes again. It discontinued some products and is focusing on bigger, more capable boxes, neglecting the SMB market. Even though it's not a big market, it shouldn't have removed them. One way to improve the product is to add an operational assistant that doesn't depend on VMware. It could also establish more alliances with other operational systems.
TOLGA ALNIAK - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers ransomware protection for files stored on servers
Data processing is the most important feature. We are using Huawei OceanStor Dorado, which employs SSD storage on the hardware side. No reported performance issues or improvements are required for our systems because all of the systems run on memory on the host side. The Oracle data and Oracle virtual machines also operate from memory. Additionally, we use Oracle for patching systems, with all data residing in memory. There is some latency during backup times, typically at night, but this is acceptable for us. These latencies occur outside of office hours, so they do not impact our operations during normal times when there is no noticeable latency.
Anna Sofo - PeerSpot reviewer
Since switching, our clients have reported improved performance and reduced latency
I like NetApp AFF's deduplication. The solution's AutoSupport feature is efficient and effective because customers are notified of potential issues before they experience problems with NetApp. The support is sold based on metro clusters, so they guarantee the client's business continuity. NetApp has an Active IQ app that allows you to get information on your smartphone.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is very straightforward to set up."
"What I really like about this program, is that it is easy to use and easy to configurate."
"We're able to get higher-density workloads on the same infrastructure, and we have a smaller physical footprint. The performance is excellent – during our test the bottlenecks are never on the X array, it just keeps picking up the pace to match what you need. The real-time visibility is a differentiator in my opinion."
"It offers competitive performance, and the Evergreen storage model of Pure fits well with my organization."
"One of the best features is the support, which is excellent."
"The initial setup was extremely simple and straightforward."
"FlashArray has some fresh efficiency features. I've never seen a storage solution with a compression rating this high before. It's at least 4-to-1 on Oracle databases. It's the best flash storage for Oracle."
"On a scale of one to ten, I rate Pure FlashArray as ten."
"There are plenty of features available in this solution."
"Huawei includes features for file servers and file services. It offers ransomware protection for files stored on servers. However, it does not support blocking websites."
"We can use Huawei OceanStor Dorado capacity storage for many different purposes."
"The initial setup is straightforward. Deployment takes about a day."
"The performance is good."
"Two things really stand out for me. First, there's group cloning, which is very nice. It simplifies managing multiple clones across the group. Second, Huawei's multi-controller architecture with load balancing is a good part."
"The most valuable aspects encompass a comprehensive set of common features, such as NetFlow technology, hyper-micro, and hyper-application functionalities."
"Huawei has more features than other vendors. It integrates well with security management solutions, though not directly with databases."
"The initial setup was very straightforward. It was intuitive to set up storage volumes and get the networking functioning. Their engineer was very helpful. We got the current array on our production site the very same day it was shipped in. We had it up on the network and started to put some storage on it."
"AFF helps us improve performance for our enterprise applications, data analytics and VMs. We have moved our primary data stores for production over to AFF, and a lot of the problems that might happened have gone away."
"It simplifies data management for NAS environments with its ease of management, ease of share creation, and Active IQ feature. These features are good overall. It helps us manage data quickly and sufficiently. Also, compression features, like dedupe, give us a good ratio."
"The Snapshots and just the overall flexibility of the product have been great."
"NetApp is like a one-point central management. For example, one can put everything on the right version and control the whole environment from one software solution."
"The most valuable features of this solution are snapshotting and cloning."
"The file-based protocol supports NFS and CIFS."
"We have had issues before on our infrastructure where 20 to 30 percent of the people would come to us pointing the finger at the storage technology or storage back-end. That is now virtually zero."
 

Cons

"The tool's pricing is higher than competitors."
"There are some challenges with data encryption and reduction."
"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."
"We've seen that when we create a POD in synchronous mode, it increases the latency."
"The software layer has to improve."
"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."
"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial."
"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics should not incur extra charges."
"Huawei OceanStor Dorado's biggest weakness is its lack of cloud integration."
"Huawei should provide new security features, such as blocking ransomware sites and improving detection. Currently, we receive updates from HQ in China; there are instances where hackers may infiltrate network sites and encrypt our data."
"An area of this product that has room for improvement is the NAS capability."
"They should add a feature to the platform to help us manage storage communication with one of the vendors."
"This solution does not support VMware VVols 2.0."
"One of the key areas that need enhancement pertains to the software procurement process."
"The user interface of Huawei OceanStor Dorado could be more user-friendly. Other solutions, such as EMC, have a better user interface."
"This solution can improve by providing easier migrations and better Metro features."
"The admin tools and the integration with other products and clouds can be improved. It should also be easier to identify and troubleshoot problems in this solution. It takes a long time, and it should be improved."
"One minor improvement could be making scale-up solutions with AFF more cost-effective compared to scale-out options."
"Their customer support can be better. When we have an outage, we need to wait until it is escalated to L3 which takes a lot of time."
"There are no pNFS with VMware VVOLs."
"Something I've talked to NetApp about in the past is going more to a node-based architecture, like the hyper-converged solutions that we are doing nowadays. Because the days of having to buy massive quantities of storage all at one time, have changed to being able to grow in smaller increments from a budgetary standpoint. This change would be great for our business. This is what my leadership would like to see in a lot of things that they purchase now. I would like to see that architecture continue to evolve in that clustered environment."
"You have a limit in terms of how much you can expand storage. It sounds like a lot. However, over the years, as you grow, it may be smaller than you think."
"It would be very useful if we could do the NFS to CIFS file transfer, but it is not supported at this time."
"The price of NVMe storage is very expensive."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"With VMware, we pay $300,000 annually."
"The tool's pricing is cheap; I rate it a six to seven out of ten. Most of our sales are not subscription-based. We sell the hardware, and customers keep using it. They only renew the service part annually. The support can be a bit pricey, but the solution is more cost-effective than anything else out there."
"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"The product is expensive."
"Pretty much everything that you need is licensed when you buy the product. Licensing to me is different than the maintenance cost, but they can bleed into one another. We buy the product, and we expect three years of support bundled into what we negotiate on our storage arrays. I would start to see maintenance costs going into the fourth year, but we're not there yet."
"They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."
"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
"It is an expensive solution."
"There are some costs in addition to the standard licensing fees, depending on the requirements."
"The pricing is very competitive."
"Huawei OceanStor Dorado has a competitive price compared to other solutions."
"The price of the solution is reasonable. There is not a vendor that offers an All-Flash Storage Array at the price of Huawei OceanStor Dorado. The other solutions are approximately 50% higher."
"In price comparisons with alternative products, it stands out as a more cost-effective option."
"The price of Huawei OceanStor Dorado is very inexpensive, it cost approximately $5 per gigabyte."
"I rate the pricing a six on a scale from one to ten, where one is expensive, not cost-effective, and ten is cheap."
"NetApps offers a lot of different options. Just take your time and work with the consulting teams. Lay out what your needs are to ensure you are purchasing what will help you be successful."
"Our TCO has increased by 15 to 18 percent."
"With other options, you need to buy a couple of different products to achieve the same outcome."
"NetApp AFF is an expensive solution."
"From an application standpoint, we have seen a lot of return investment on the speeds and responsiveness of the actual storage."
"The entry point for potential customers, who are looking at coming onboard for flash systems, it may be a bit expensive. It would be good if the price comes down."
"We benefited from implementing all-flash by reducing our data center footprint. We took it from 30 racks to just over five. This is one of the biggest savings for us."
"It is relatively cheap compared to other vendors."
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Comparison Review

it_user186357 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 28, 2015
NetApp vs. XtremIO
Is there another storage platform as feature rich as NetApp FAS? I think it is fair to say that NetApp FAS running Clustered Data ONTAP is a very feature rich platform – the move to the clustered version of ONTAP has brought many next-generation features including Scale-out and Non-disruptive…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
70%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
3%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.
What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics ...
What do you like most about Huawei OceanStor Dorado?
The product has the best compression and encryption features. The most valuable features I have found in the tool are...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Huawei OceanStor Dorado?
The products they offer are quite cheap. However, I do not have much information about licensing since we don't buy t...
What needs improvement with Huawei OceanStor Dorado?
Some customers have reported not understanding how the immutable part can be unlocked. From my perspective, it's not ...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
Well, Is one thing NetApp Storage has vs other brand is the mix of protocol CIFS with NFS booth working together in t...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
This question is very dependent on your requirements. Both are among the best in the field. Of course, the intended c...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
The answer depends on your needs and budget. If you want high performance (who doesn't) or let's say the latency matt...
 

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
OceanStor Dorado V3 All-Flash Storage System
NetApp All Flash FAS, NetApp AFF, NetApp Flash FAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Telecom Italia, Hi3G Sweden, KPN
DreamWorks Animation, FICO, Yahoo! Japan
Find out what your peers are saying about Huawei OceanStor Dorado vs. NetApp AFF and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,296 professionals have used our research since 2012.