Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs NetApp FAS Series comparison

Lenovo and NetApp are both solutions in the All-Flash Storage category. Additionally, 100% of Lenovo users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of NetApp users who would recommend it.

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series and NetApp FAS Series based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two All-Flash Storage solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. NetApp FAS Series Report (Updated: April 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. NetApp FAS Series

April 2026

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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 X NVMe

Featured Reviews

Jaehoon Oh

Chief Technology Officer at Lambda256

Supports efficient storage management through volume snapshots and offers reliable non-disruptive upgrades

I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could be enhanced. I can see the performance statistics in the Pure Storage console, but it does not show the performance by 4K byte unit. It displays IOPS and bandwidth, but IOPS is about real use, and I want to know how many IOPS are currently running in 4K byte units. I cannot see that IOPS because most storage systems report their performance by 4K byte unit. I want to see Pure Storage performance by 4K byte unit to compare with other storage or other internal NVMe SSD.

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Giorgio Pozzi

System Administrator at PORTGUARDIAN.COM SRL

Performance and cost-effectiveness are maximized with seamless setup and significant ROI

I use Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series to replace the old storage in our infrastructure. Additionally, I use it in customer infrastructures to migrate from the old storage to the new one On the M storage, I find the best features to be deduplication and compression. On the DE storage, the most…

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Srikanth Purushothaman

DIRECTOR at Vellore Online Systems

Has supported long-term data protection and backup while requiring better part availability and pricing options

For monitoring purposes, we normally use flash access storage exclusively. We utilize a hybrid system because we need performance, combining NL-SAS for the volume and SAS flash to use as a fast cache system that provides more IOPS. We normally implement RAID 10, which we prefer over RAID 6's n plus 2 combinations. We utilize it for data redundancy, even with write intensity on. Regarding the unified storage architecture for NetApp FAS Series, we normally opt for exclusivity unless budget constraints exist. Our IOPS are very high, reaching somewhere about 50k to 150k or 1.150k. The high performance ensures minimal latency. An advantage we've seen with NetApp FAS Series is that snapshots provide very rapid backup and fast recovery. We basically use snapshots for data protection as first-level protection, with deduplication between the two storages serving as second-level protection.

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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

"Technical support has been helpful and responsive."

"The duplication algorithm allows us to get a lot more use out of less storage. We're running a five terabyte array right now and we're running probably about 30 terabytes on it. So the duplication rate is pretty phenomenal, without a cost to performance. It still runs pretty smoothly."

"The solution is scalable."

"What we've seen on the Xs, and the Pures in general, is that we can scale way beyond what we need to without any degradation in performance."

"Speed has definitely been a big improvement for us; we were running a bunch of iSCSI to EMC VNX and that had a gigabyte bottleneck, and now, since we're running through a true fiber channel to the Pure array, we're getting 32-gigabyte bandwidth, which means the speed and accessibility for our users and our customers have definitely improved."

"If a company is looking for an All-Flash Tier and they need extreme performance for individual workloads, Pure's the way to go, over something like a SolidFire."

"Offers excellent features like efficient data reduction, a reliable SafeMode, and a great support model for continuous assistance and updates."

"I appreciate the performance."

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe pros

"We have been working with the solution for around a year and so far it has shown itself to be stable."

"Fewer features is not necessarily a negative as it leads to simpler operation and lower price."

"ThinkSystem's storage performs well, and the price per gigabyte is good, especially on SSD solutions. It's also easy to use."

"Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is highly reliable, especially for block-level storage. It is stable, with minimal downtime and no issues beyond user errors."

"This solution is good for virtualization and meets the need for CPU and RAM requirements."

"The most valuable features of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series are the dual controllers, available installation documentation, and the option of multiple host bus adapter interfaces."

"ThinkSystem is a good offer and can work out well if you can work with it to fit the use cases that you have."

"The solution is very easy to set up."

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series pros

"Has rock solid reliability and is easy to use."

"This solution is very, very, very, very stable."

"The solution is stable."

"You can use different protocols at the same time. Monitoring is also very easy in NetApp FAS Series. There is a free tool for monitoring."

"You really can't go wrong with NetApp products, They perform well, are rock solid, offer good space saving technologies, and the support is above par."

"The tool's most valuable features are ease of use, ease of access, expandability, availability, and performance. NVMe drives have improved their performance."

"The solution is stable."

"The solution is highly stable, and NetApp FAS Series is stable in production storage and for the high-density volume services."

More NetApp FAS Series pros

Cons

"You cannot tag a LUN with a description, and that should be improved. What I like on the Unity side is that when I expand LUNs or do things, there is an information field on the LUN. This is the Information field that you can tag on your LUNs to let yourself know, "Hey, I've added this much space on this date". Pure lacks that ability. So, you don't have a mechanism that's friendly for tracking your data expansions on the LUN and for adding any additional information. That's a downside for me."

"In terms of what needs improvement, the dashboard and management could be simplified."

"If the customer only needs 500 terabytes and doesn't care how much data they'll put in the server, IBM is cheaper than Pure."

"Its price is a little high right now. Otherwise, I would have given it a ten."

"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."

"There is room for improvement in catering to midrange storage needs, especially for customers seeking Enterprise-class features."

"It is on the expensive side."

"The software layer has to improve."

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe cons

"Usually, when a part fails, we have to replace it and it takes a while. It would be better if the part could be available locally here in Kenya so we don't have to wait so long to repair the solution."

"It would be useful to have structured solutions replicated to other sites."

"The type of connection that is used in Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series should be improved."

"The difficult part comes when dealing with the host. You have to enable multi-pathing and other aspects that are needed for proper configuration. I don't know if there is room for a more hyper-conversion structure to work with, but this would be easier."

"Scalability on rack-mount servers is not as good as with Blade servers."

"You can not buy a lot of options for these devices. There are a lot of things that it does not do."

"Improvements can be made to the product's performance."

"The features are limited."

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series cons

"The instructions didn’t provide for re-configurations from scratch and tech support were stuck too."

"It's not a cheap system. It is very expensive. The pricing has been ridiculous every time that we had to renew the support."

"I would like to see NetApp add incident support."

"We see a lot of bugs in roll outs, and sometimes I think the first GA are late-beta deployments."

"The tiebreaker piece that does the monitoring of the two different locations, and determines if one is not talking to the network normally (or if it's truly down) is a little difficult."

"Replication should ideally be part of the ONTAP base bundle."

"The solution can improve on the replication features."

"Needs to add wizards for newer, inexperienced users."

More NetApp FAS Series cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is an investment that we've budgeted for. While the prices may be higher than those of other vendors, we see it as a market leader with benefits. We don't regret purchasing it."

"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."

"With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."

"The licensing is on a yearly basis."

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."

"The product is expensive."

"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."

"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe pricing and cost advice

"For an all-flash setup, the cost is around $20,000 for a decent configuration."

"It is an expensive solution."

"We have a five-year contract for providing support."

"The price of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is a one-time purchase. There is a global price list available to find the price of the solution."

"All of the features are bundled together, and you can renew the bundle with all of the features included."

"The best thing about this solution is its price, which reduces our costs."

"The pricing is fair and low compared to other products in this category."

"The solution's price could be better."

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series pricing and cost advice

"The scalability is pretty good, but it's too expensive."

"It is expensive."

"The solution’s cost is reasonable."

"The price it not low, but comparing features to other vendors, the price can be balanced."

"The solution is more expensive than other vendors."

"When we need to implement a less expensive solution we use Huawei. NetApp FAS Series is a little bit expensive compared to the average of the market."

"The NetApp FAS series price is very competitive compared to other solutions on the market it is a good choice."

"If we want a ransomware solution with the product or other extended features, we need to pay an extra cost."

More NetApp FAS Series pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Computer Software Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	15
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	10
Midsize Enterprise	3

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	31
Midsize Enterprise	38
Large Enterprise	58

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.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

The price of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is very expensive, though I do not know the actual price because I am using the E...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?

The price of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is very good. We chose this type of storage for the performance and the price.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?

The type of connection that is used in Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series should be improved.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?

I use Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series to replace the old storage in our infrastructure. Additionally, I use it in custom...

See all answers

Which SAN product would you choose: IBM FlashSystem (FS9500) vs PureFlash Array/X NVMe vs PureFlash Array/XL NVMe?

Have you considered a NetApp FAS Storage for your NAS needs? I am sure it fits very well.

See all answers

What do you like most about NetApp FAS Series?

Flexibility in data replication.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp FAS Series?

I do not handle the pricing part of NetApp FAS Series since it is managed by the sales team.

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerStore vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 12% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 10% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 10% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 8% of the time

TrueNAS R-Series vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 7% of the time

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe Competitors

Dell PowerStore vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 17% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 9% of the time

IBM FlashSystem vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 9% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 7% of the time

HPE Nimble Storage vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 5% of the time

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series Competitors

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs NetApp FAS Series

Compared 27% of the time

Qumulo vs NetApp FAS Series

Compared 5% of the time

HPE MSA vs NetApp FAS Series

Compared 5% of the time

HPE StoreOnce vs NetApp FAS Series

Compared 4% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series vs NetApp FAS Series

Compared 4% of the time

More NetApp FAS Series Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

April 2026

Download Everpure FlashArray X NVMe product report

Buyer's Guide

All-Flash Storage

March 2026

Download Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series product report

Buyer's Guide

NetApp FAS Series

March 2026

Download NetApp FAS Series product report

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X, Pure FlashArray X NVMe

ThinkSystem DE Series

No data available

Overview

Everpure FlashArray X NVMe delivers high performance, reliability, and low latency, making it ideal for block storage in private cloud infrastructures and mission-critical applications.

Boasting robust data reduction, high availability, and seamless scalability, Everpure FlashArray X NVMe supports databases, VMware environments, and machine learning analytics. Known for its intuitive interface, superior support, volume snapshots, and AI-powered analytics, it efficiently manages storage needs, often deployed to replace outdated systems. Users highlight its simplistic management and easy configuration, although opportunities exist to enhance pricing, replication features, VNC integration, and storage capabilities.

What are the key features?

Data Reduction: Effective compression and deduplication improve storage efficiency.
Seamless Scalability: Easily scales to meet growing demands without downtime.
Volume Snapshots: Quickly create snapshots for data protection and recovery.
VMware Compatibility: Integrates smoothly with VMware environments for optimal performance.
AI-Powered Analytics: Provides insights for enhanced storage management and efficiency.

What benefits and ROI should be considered?

Low Latency and High Availability: Ensures rapid data access and uninterrupted service.
Easy Management: Intuitive interface simplifies configuration and monitoring.
Evergreen Model: Continuous upgrades without disruptive migrations.
Enhanced Support: Reliable service and support for critical applications.

Organizations in industries such as finance and healthcare implement Everpure FlashArray X NVMe to bolster data performance and reliability. They leverage its integration capabilities with Oracle databases and SQL workloads, supporting machine learning and virtualization. It's often chosen to upgrade legacy storage systems, ensuring high availability and speed for demanding environments.

Everpure (formerly Pure Storage)

The DE All-Flash Series delivers the performance of more than 2,000 15k rpm HDDs, yet requires only 2% of the rack space, power, and cooling. Because it consumes 98% less space and power, DE Series can significantly improve the overall efficiency of your IT operations while continuing to meet your performance requirements.

Lenovo

NetApp FAS series is an enterprise-level storage system that provides a wide variety of data management services, including data protection, block and file storage, and data management.

NetApp FAS is designed to be highly scalable, allowing your organization to grow storage capacity on demand. NetApp FAS also supports multiple protocols, including NFS, SMB, iSCSI, and Fibre Channel, as well as various storage architectures, including SAN (Storage Area Network) and NAS (Network-Attached Storage).

The FAS series has multiple data protection and data management features, including snapshots, cloning, replication, and deduplication, to help secure your data and manage it more efficiently. The system integrates with other NetApp products and solutions, to create a unified data management platform. The system can be deployed on-premise, on multi-cloud environments, or hybrid.

NetApp FAS Series Benefits and Features

NetApp FAS series provides its users with several key benefits and features, including:

Scalability: NetApp FAS series is easy to scale, allowing organizations to rapidly grow their storage capacity according to demand.

Security: Protect and manage your data with various data protection and data management tools, including snapshots, cloning, replication, and deduplication.

Seamless integration: Integrate with other NetApp products and solutions to ensure a unified data management platform across on-premise, hybrid, and multi-cloud environments.

Reduced costs: Consolidation of multiple storage boxes greatly reduces the data center footprint. From a management point of view, with NetApp FAS you manage a single storage box instead of multiple storage boxes.
Compatibility: Forward and backward compatibility ensures that you don’t have to trade in existing controllers. New controllers can always integrate with previously released controllers.

Multi-protocol support: Support for multiple protocols, including NFS, SMB, iSCSI, and Fibre Channel.

High performance and availability: The solution has high input and output per second performance and ensures that critical data remains accessible in the event of a hardware failure.
Intuitive interface: The FAS series has a user-friendly interface and management dashboard, making it easy to manage your storage systems. With unified management, you can quickly run a single protocol on your entire system
Data cloning and replication: Easily clone databases of any size. Clones occupy a very, very small footprint on the storage until they are severed from the main database. Replications carried out by the system are fast and require very little bandwidth.

Reviews from Real Users

NetApp FAS Series stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Several major ones are its speed, reliability, and a wide variety of features.

Adriano S., IT project and infrastructure service manager, writes, “The replication feature is noteworthy because it's faster than most and it uses little bandwidth. Then there's the friendly interface that the equipment offers. With this interface, it is very easy to manage.”

Temitope O., a NetApp product manager at Hiperdist Ltd, says, “I like the unified management feature because sometimes you end up running a single protocol on the entire system. You rather have a system for a particular protocol and another system for other protocols, especially in a big environment like mine.”

NetApp

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company

Information Not Available

Children's Hospital Central California, Plex Systems, PDF PNI Digital Media, Denver Broncos, PDF KSM Legal, Clayton Companies, Virginia Community College

Buyer's Guide

Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. NetApp FAS Series

April 2026

Free Report: Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. NetApp FAS Series

Find out what your peers are saying about Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. NetApp FAS Series and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.

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