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Pivot3 vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 2024
 

Categories and Ranking

Pivot3
Ranking in HCI
27th
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
StarWind Virtual SAN
Ranking in HCI
4th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
189
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Pivot3 is 0.2%, down from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind Virtual SAN is 2.3%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

JW
One feature we found useful was the product's complete ability to integrate with vCenter
The primary use case was for a persistent VDI solution using vSphere as the hypervisor software and using Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop as the provisioning software in an enterprise Windows server domain infrastructure It greatly streamlined the time it took to scale out the enterprise and it…
Ahmed Hosni - PeerSpot reviewer
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.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One feature we found useful was the product's complete ability to integrate with vCenter."
"The most valuable feature is the visual encoding."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of implementation."
"The ProActive support gives me peace of mind because I am a one man shop, but with the technical support behind me, I feel like more than just one person. We spent two to three hours, depending on what we have to do, always on the phone, and they do not push to end the call."
"I like the asynchronous replication and failover features. They are what I'm primarily using it for. The asynchronous replication is helpful because our servers are backed up continuously throughout the day. If anything goes wrong we just fail over immediately. That is a very nice feature to have."
"The most useful aspect is the hyper-converged SD SAN and the ease to expand it by just adding cheap SSD or NVME disks."
"The solution offers easy one-click PowerShell scripts that are ready to run."
"It includes every feature that a traditional SAN offers and so much more."
"The StarWind Virtual SAN management console is intuitive and easy to use."
"Virtualizing data infrastructure with StarWind Virtual SAN improves efficiency and reduces operational costs."
"Their support goes above and beyond with the integration of their software."
 

Cons

"Snapshot notification would be a good addition."
"One of the biggest problems with HCI vendors was the lack of flexibility for adding resources"
"In the next release, I would like to see compatibility and support for critical applications, like SAP."
"I did not see any indication that StarWinds vSAN is a usable solution with non-GUI instances of Hyper-V."
"It would be helpful if StarWind provided more precise and detailed documentation explaining how to configure the solution in various scenarios, including the advantages and disadvantages of each."
"For someone entering the IT sector with little knowledge of storage, iSCSI, and virtual disks, they might not find the GUI immediately obvious."
"I would like them to invest time in reducing the complexity of the startup and shutdown procedure."
"It would be great if it provided thin provisioned virtual disks."
"We have, in rare cases, received conflicting guidance between different support folks within StarWind."
"Being able to run StarWind vSAN on top of any free UNIX operating system to build a resilient iSCSI/FTP/SMB storage system would be useful."
"This product would benefit from having automated alerting functionality."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our fees are approximately $100,000 yearly."
"We evaluated other options and this one was the most cost-effective."
"The StarWind VSAN business model is very cost-effective."
"I think the cost of this solution is quite fair."
"This solution has a great price for the functionality."
"StarWind is best price/performance for SMB."
"The licensing is straightforward, with free and trial versions available."
"The free version is great to use for labs or test environments."
"The setup cost is very low. The pricing is great."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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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) combines flash and disks of the cluster and forms a virtual shared storage “pool” acce...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?
Choose StarWind Virtual SAN, it is the most flexible, reliable and cheap solution.
What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
While using StarWind Virtual SAN so far, I have not found anything missing. It is true that we are using it in a very strict project in which we were looking for a solution that would satisfy a str...
 

Also Known As

No data available
StarWind SAN & NAS
 

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

SNHMC, HPD Software, The Hurlingham Club, NHS, Rochester Police Department, The Doe Run Company, 101 Casino, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport
Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
Find out what your peers are saying about Pivot3 vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.
824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.