StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs VMware Software Defined Storage comparison

StarWind and VMware are both solutions in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category. StarWind is ranked #9 with an average rating of 10.0, while VMware is ranked #14 with an average rating of 8.5. Additionally, 98% of StarWind users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of VMware users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance and VMware Software Defined Storage compete in the hyper-converged infrastructure category. StarWind seems to have the upper hand with a more cost-effective solution, while VMware offers greater feature richness often at a higher cost.

Features: StarWind HyperConverged Appliance offers live migration, a simplified management interface, and high availability. It is praised for proactive support and low cost. VMware Software Defined Storage shines with high availability against data corruption, redundancy, and scalability, along with superior technical support.

Room for Improvement: StarWind users indicate a demand for an enhanced GUI for system health monitoring and simpler hardware updates. VMware users seek performance improvements, better replication processes, and increased hardware compatibility. Each platform has specific areas requiring enhancements.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: StarWind provides diverse deployment experiences and highly praised customer service with proactive support, though minor language barriers are noted. VMware offers excellent tech support, but with fewer deployment testimonials compared to StarWind.

Pricing and ROI: StarWind is valued for its reasonable pricing, especially for small to medium businesses, with commendable ROI and low associated costs. VMware is noted for being expensive, with hefty costs for both software and hardware, but justifies this through its rich features, though it may deter budget-conscious users.

To learn more, read our detailed StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. VMware Software Defined Storage Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. VMware Software Defined Storage

April 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 848,207 peers since 2012

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 Storage FlashBlade

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

Read full review

Russ Le Puill

IT Manager at St Peter's Church of England Aided School

Proactive support with improved speed and resilience

There was a long delay with shipping, which we weren't expecting, but we were kept updated throughout. It wasn't made clear to us that we needed to provide our own SFP modules to connect to our infrastructure, so that could have been a bit clearer. It would be amazing if there was, perhaps, a more automated process for updating the hosts themselves, although the maintenance mode works well. Our StarWind command center doesn't seem to have all the options available currently, which support is investigating for us.

Read full review

RashidAnwar

Senior Project Lead at Tetra Pak

A stable solution that can be used for database applications and virtualization for multiple locations

VMware Software Defined Storage is used for database applications and virtualization for multiple locations VMware Software Defined Storage gives higher availability against data corruption. Redundancy and scalability are the other valuable features of the solution. You can scale it on the go,…

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has also helped to simplify storage for us in the way that it's easy to manage. Their automatic monitoring really helps when things break or are about to break. They see a problem coming and alert us even before our own system does."

"Speed and ease of use are the two most valuable features."

"The snapshots, replication, and the ability to have immutable blades are the most valuable features. You're putting data snapshots out in those blades, and they cannot be touched. Its performance is great."

"The main feature I have found to be product replication."

"I would rate Pure Storage FlashBlade a ten out of ten."

"The solution provides many controllers."

"The initial setup is pretty easy and simple."

"The ease of deployment and management has helped us simplify our storage. We also do not have to worry about capacity management as much. A lot of these things are native to Pure Storage."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"How quickly the StarWind solution replicates also gives us the confidence to know that in the event of catastrophic failure of any piece of hardware, we won't be far behind before things went wrong."

"The support is the most valuable feature. The support has been amazing. It's around the clock. One of our hard disks accidentally ejected without me knowing or being onsite. They called and told me about it before I had a chance to see it myself."

"The software is great. It's very easy to understand. I've not delved into any of the command-line stuff, but there's no real need to script it. Since it went in, pretty much the only thing that I have needed to do is increase device image sizes and that process is very straightforward."

"We were able to set it up via the documentation and only needed their support a handful of times."

"Their support team is extremely helpful, and they are pretty friendly and knowledgeable."

"The product runs wonderfully and has already gone through several failure tests."

"Servers came pre-configured for our environment and as soon as they were in the rack, Starwind got them up and running."

"The added speed of using standard HDD and SSD meant we could increase what services are stored on the servers without having to have additional servers."

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance pros

"The single management panel is the main feature that is wonderful for the customer."

"This is an easy-to-use product for adding flexibility to your storage solution."

"The best part of the solution is that you can actually scale up to a large number of operating systems without additional hardware."

"VMware Software Defined Storage gives higher availability against data corruption."

"The solution is simple to configure and provides good performance and less footprint."

"The most valuable features of the solution are that it is easy to deploy and the support is really good."

"The most valuable features of VMware Software Defined Storage are scalability, high availability, and performance."

Cons

"I want efficiency. FlashBlade doesn't have efficiency now."

"There could be improvements in public cloud integration."

"I would like to see more VM-Aware features in the next release of this solution."

"The speed could be improved."

"In terms of scalability, it doesn't expand out quite as robustly as some of the others, but it covers 90% of the market in what it does."

"I would also like to see better support for CIFS workloads."

"It usually comes down to just what you hit and the value you're getting when you spend the money and license the products. I would always go, "If you want to make things better, lower your price and make your licensing simpler." There's always an opportunity around that."

"I would like to see more deduplication."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"The only critique I might have is that the support is overseas in Eastern Europe and, on occasion, there has been a language issue. But in general, they're as good as can be..."

"I would request that the terms and conditions be reviewed and made more acceptable to corporate security so that we could finally turn on the proactive support feature, as it is included with our support agreement."

"I had some initial difficulties understanding the solution which could have been solved via additional documentation aimed at newcomers."

"Although the setup documentation was very complete and succinct, I found StarWind documentation to be a bit sparse."

"The only thing that can use improvement is the StarWind Management Console and Command Center."

"The StarWind Command Center web portal could use some work."

"If I had to pick something to add to the product, it would be nice if you could have more than one user account on their command center VM."

"We need to be very cautious in following every step when updating the physical host. We must move over each VM and drain roles from the servers to ensure everything goes smoothly without interruptions. If this were a more automated process, this would be less taxing each time an upgrade is needed."

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance cons

"The performance is not as good as some competing products and reporting can be improved."

"The license model of the product is an area of concern where improvements are required."

"The solution has some limitations in terms of replication to remote sites or cloud infrastructure, which need improvement."

"There is room for more integrations and plugins into more storages."

"VMware Software Defined Storage should include a shared database on a standard version."

"Simplifying the licensing model and making it cheaper would improve the solution."

"It doesn't have the ability to be deployed on any kind of hardware and network connectors."

"I'd like to see improved hardware compatibility"

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."

"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is a hardware appliance, and it's very expensive if you compare its price with other solutions. You can get the same features and benefits from its competitor, VAST Data, but for half the price of Pure Storage FlashBlade."

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."

"The product is very expensive."

"Licensing fees are paid yearly."

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"I understand that it is competitively priced compared to other brands."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"This was all completed at an affordable price point for an SMB, which was also a key element for an NPO."

"I honestly feel that there's no one else in the market doing what they're doing for the price point that they're doing it at. That's why I asked them about investing in their company. I think that the options they're providing and the software that they have is sort of revolutionary for the price point... The total cost was $24,400."

"There is a bit of a start-up cost. Having never used HCAs before, I was reluctant to buy it. I would suggest that you jump in and do it, as I wish I hadn't wasted so much time."

"We didn't have any issue with pricing or any of the sales process."

"The other solutions we were looking at were priced much higher than this and they didn't necessarily have full redundancy... Nutanix and VxRail were in the final running... but it came down to our price point."

"A desired feature or service would be the ability to have a hardware subscription plan that ensures routine hardware updates in conjunction with hyper-converged software."

"Its cost was reasonable."

"The Nutanix piece was about $45,000, getting close to $50,000 with all the licensing involved, whereas the StarWind was less than half of that, after Microsoft licensing and such."

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance pricing and cost advice

"The solution is very expensive."

"VMware Software Defined Storage is a slightly expensive solution."

"The product is quite expensive and is among the most expensive for this type of solution."

"A single socket costs you around US $6,000 for three years. At a minimum, you have a three load cluster for a medium or enterprise-scale company. It can get quite expensive because you're likely to need four to six sockets on the other side. It comes to around $30,000."

"I believe there is a yearly licensing fee of around $2000 - $5000. I don't think there are additional costs above that but it depends on the type of infrastructure you're booting."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Software Defined Storage (SDS) solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

848,207 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

33%

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

17%

Educational Organization

13%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

No data available

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

It's not the cheapest, however, the solution works incredibly well and is so simple to licence and maintain.

See all answers

What needs improvement with StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

There was a long delay with shipping, which we weren't expecting, but we were kept updated throughout. It wasn't made...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

We desperately needed to update yet downsize our data centre. We had six hosts for only approximately 14 or so Virtua...

See all answers

What do you like most about VMware Software Defined Storage?

VMware Software Defined Storage gives higher availability against data corruption.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Software Defined Storage?

The price of VMware Software Defined Storage is on the pricey side, rated four out of five in cost. There is room for...

See all answers

What needs improvement with VMware Software Defined Storage?

There is room for more integrations and plugins into more storages. More automation, such as using Playbook on Ansibl...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 21% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 33% of the time

StorMagic SvSAN vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 19% of the time

VxRail vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 12% of the time

Azure Stack HCI vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 11% of the time

Dell PowerFlex vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 10% of the time

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance Competitors

DataCore SANsymphony vs VMware Software Defined Storage

Compared 56% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs VMware Software Defined Storage

Compared 44% of the time

More VMware Software Defined Storage Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

March 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

March 2025

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

Download StarWind HyperConverged Appliance product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware Software Defined Storage

March 2025

Download VMware Software Defined Storage product report

Also Known As

No data available

VMware SDS

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

For SMB, ROBO and Enterprises, who look to bring in quick deployment and operation simplicity to virtualization workloads and reduce related expenses, our solution is StarWind HyperConverged Appliance (HCA). It unifies commodity servers, disks and flash, hypervisor of choice, StarWind Virtual SAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct or VMware Virtual SAN and associated software into a single manageable layer. The HCA supports scale-up by adding disks and flash, and scale-out by adding extra nodes.

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance consists of StarWind Virtual SAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct or VMware Virtual SAN “Ready Nodes”, targeting those, who are building their virtualization infrastructure from scratch. In case there is an existing set of servers, we offer a “software only version”, which is essentially our years proven StarWind Virtual SAN. Basically, it’s the fuel powering StarWind HCA.

StarWind

VMware software-defined storage is a simple, yet intelligent, storage data center architecture that aligns with business and application demands—eliminating static, purpose-built and inefficient hardware with dynamic, agile and automated solutions.

VMware

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Sears Home and Franchise Business

Helse Nord, Sky

Buyer's Guide

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. VMware Software Defined Storage

April 2025

Free Report: StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. VMware Software Defined Storage

Find out what your peers are saying about StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. VMware Software Defined Storage and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

848,207 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. VMware Software Defined Storage report.

See our list of best Software Defined Storage (SDS) vendors.

We monitor all Software Defined Storage (SDS) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.