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IBM Spectrum Virtualize vs VxRail comparison

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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

Everpure FlashArray
Sponsored
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
211
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (4th)
IBM Spectrum Virtualize
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (13th)
VxRail
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
134
Ranking in other categories
HCI (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

Software Defined Storage (SDS) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM Spectrum Virtualize2.2%
Red Hat Ceph Storage12.3%
DataCore SANsymphony5.9%
Other79.6%
Software Defined Storage (SDS)
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VxRail12.4%
VMware vSAN10.0%
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)9.4%
Other68.2%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Lead at Wipro Limited
Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades
The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.
AS
IT Specialist at Saudi Business Machines - SBM
Unified storage solution supports cross-vendor replication and diverse industries
One of the most valuable features of IBM Spectrum Virtualize is its virtualization capability. It allows for the creation of stretched clusters, which are crucial for running Linux-based workloads that need mirroring for boot disks. The solution also provides asynchronous and synchronous replication, supporting operations across different data centers. Its deployment options across public, private, and hybrid clouds add to its versatility.
Saleh Khalid - PeerSpot reviewer
computer scientist at Imam University
Experience improved integration and cost-efficiency while facing support challenges
The best features of VxRail are its compatibility with VMware, its hyper-converged solution capabilities, and its single line of support. These are the most beneficial aspects of VxRail. I switched from the previous HP solution to Dell solution because it was a good decision. With HP servers, we dealt with a vendor for the compute servers, another vendor for the storage servers, and another vendor for the networking, which required us to manage multiple vendors. Now, we have a single team who can handle VxRail and a single line of support. We don't need anything other than that, and these are the differences we noticed after we switched.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Has also helped simplify storage for us. The other person we put in there, took about a week to implement. And we had both arrays set up within around four hours with a thirty minute drive time between the two locations."
"This solution has improved the way our organization functions through its reliability and consistent platform for storage and has helped us to simplify storage because the management tools make everything a lot easier."
"It has been very stable. I have not seen or heard of downtime storage issues after moving over to it."
"In Pure Storage FlashArray, the dedupe and compression are excellent, and performance is good too."
"It solved many problems and provided unexpected features that improved our business execution, making us more agile internally."
"The solution is very reliable."
"The most valuable features of Pure Storage FlashArray are simplicity, ease of use, and dashboard management."
"Their REST API is wonderful, well-documented, and easy to use."
"It is a single pane of glass management interface, so once the storage is allocated to SVC, they only have one place to go to manage it for everything."
"We can failover easily, because a lot of our data is replicated from family to the second replication."
"The scalability is very good. It can handle anywhere from very small to large enterprise class."
"It improves a lot of functions for our clients, the high availability is the best thing, I have been working with it for 15 years, and it's one of the most stable products that IBM has."
"The versatility is the main benefit, since it virtualizes everything, they use it for so many different things."
"Don't go with EMC. Go with IBM. Go with this product. Absolutely. It's a very good product compared to the competitors."
"We acquire companies (and things), so we end up with odd hardware. We bring it behind the SVC and it allows us to migrate stuff off of it seamlessly. SVC can also cover up a host of defects of the underlying storage."
"The SVC gives excellent performance with tiered storage behind it."
"VxRail comes from Dell and they have a one-stop service; you can work with Dell to get everything solved, and any issues in hardware or in software, whether it be VMware related or Dell related, are all handled by one team from Dell."
"This is a good solution for medium-sized installations especially when it will be coupled with VMware."
"It's a turnkey solution, which is good for customers, because they are buying into stability."
"The stability of the solution is rock solid."
"One of VxRail's most valuable features is its small footprint in the data center. Additionally, the solution's simplicity is a significant advantage. You don’t have to configure or learn about storage software and administer many things separately. You can do all the administration jobs in one pane, bringing agility and simplicity."
"The features of VxRail that we find most useful for our customers include the easy update mechanism and the support for both VMware and hardware."
"Its ease of administration is extremely valuable. It allows me to make better use of my time for other tasks instead of maintaining systems through multiple administration consoles."
"It helps simplify the management of VMware."
 

Cons

"The overall scalability for this product could be improved as well as having a single console to management multiple arrays."
"It needs to improve its price."
"It would be beneficial to have a health check command that can be run from the CLI to ensure that all hardware components are functioning properly rather than having to enable remote access and connect to support for a health check."
"I can't see where they can make anything better, unless, of course, they lower their prices even more."
"They should work on their upgrades, they're not smooth."
"The product could improve by providing the capability to support NAS storage – CIFS and NFS."
"Pure Storage FlashArray could improve some aspects. There are certain features that are good and there are some features that I see some issues with at the technical level."
"Larger capacity and more storage ports would be the two things I'd like to see."
"Technical support at IBM is actually not as great as it used to be. It seems like IBM has decreased the number of people who can support this environment."
"It's been pretty stable, but we've had some issues. I wouldn't say it's poor, but the resiliency has been less than what we expect from an enterprise class product."
"In general, the migration is complicated, though it is case-by-case."
"Tighter integration with cloud storage might be useful as a target for a variety of use cases."
"GUI should be developed in HTML5 as opposed to Java."
"NBME support and support for a higher Fibre Channel lengths could be improved, but those are already on the roadmap."
"I had a couple isolated problems with reliability, mostly related to replication, but I have been able to work through them."
"Scalability needs some work in some areas. The number of volumes needs to be increased drastically."
"One of the complications in teaming is the number of patches that are required, which is too high."
"It would be an improvement if VxRail could be integrated with some other hypervisors and not just with VMware."
"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 initial setup was not that easy, it was a medium difficulty level."
"You cannot install another operating system such as Microsoft or Hyperflex or Nutanix."
"We would like to see integrating with Nutanix. Currently, we are working on integrating the two to see if there is any value in doing so."
"One area of the product that could be improved is the support."
"It would be nice if its installation can be simplified, but it is currently not too bad. They can provide deduplication and compression in hybrid configurations. To the best of my knowledge, these features are not there, and it would be nice if these are added. Some of its competitors already have these features, so it will help VxRail to have a better feature set and compete more effectively."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have seen a reduction in total cost of ownership."
"It is light years beyond anything else with the same price point."
"There is always room for negotiation."
"The cost has room for improvement."
"There is an annual or perpetual license required for this solution."
"You get what you pay for. It is expensive, but it really works."
"The pricing of Pure Storage FlashArray is reasonable."
"While more expensive than NetApp, Pure Storage FlashArray offers superior performance that often justifies the higher cost and adds value overall."
"This solution came as an additional cost for the TSM package we chose."
"The entry point of pricing for this product is the most amazing price ever in the industry."
"I think it is a good value for the price."
"We would like the CPU cycle to save more on the licensing costs for us."
"Do a proof of concept, if you are not comfortable jumping in, but do it."
"It has a lot of advanced functions for a reasonable price."
"I am very happy with the pricing. There is no comparison when it comes to pricing. I have looked at all solutions from EMC, Veritas, Hitachi, Dell, etc. None of them compares to IBM when it comes to pricing. I get great pricing from them."
"We have struggled with Pure Storage, but people are understanding that much of Pure has been consumer grade SSDs. Therefore, when the customer is really understands what they are getting, they realize that IBM presents the same sort of value as existing vendors."
"More cost-effective than Nutanix."
"The solution is competitively priced but it is expensive. However, this is expected as we are a corporate enterprise and we need this environment."
"VxRail is an expensive solution."
"The pricing for this solution is on the high end but we do get good value for money based on performance."
"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 licensing of vSAN and VMware for different editions of VxRail is not easy."
"The product is expensive compared to other solutions."
"The price could be lower."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Construction Company
7%
Performing Arts
15%
Marketing Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business63
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise143
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise31
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business42
Midsize Enterprise43
Large Enterprise56
 

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?
Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
I don't really know much about the pricing for Pure Storage FlashArray in terms of the absolute cost. Regarding Everg...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
Despite liking Pure Storage FlashArray, there is room for improvement in automation. Pure Storage FlashArray needs to...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?
IBM Spectrum Virtualize is not an expensive product. It offers flexibility with different flavors, whether appliance-...
What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Virtualize?
IBM could improve IBM Spectrum Virtualize by bundling Storage Scale and Storage Virtualize into a single appliance. T...
What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?
I primarily use IBM Spectrum Virtualize ( /products/ibm-spectrum-virtualize-reviews ) when I have different hardware ...
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, 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...
 

Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
No data available
VCE VxRail
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Pelephone, Sprint IT Enterprise Services
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 StarWind, Nutanix, Red Hat and others in Software Defined Storage (SDS). Updated: March 2026.
885,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.