Dell PowerMax NVMe Reviews

We use the solution of building systems and data warehouse management systems. 

Dell PowerMax NVMe has good scalability and performance. 

The solution does not use new versions of OS and patches. Its installation is also difficult. The solution is not as fast as other storage in the market. 

We have never had issues with data loss and vulnerabilities. 

You need three people to handle the deployment. 

Dell PowerMax NVMe's price is expensive. 

I rate the product a nine out of ten. 

Our primary use case is blocked storage.

The smaller footprint of the device has been really nice. We have gone from eight bays to one bay. Having one floor tile in our data center has been pretty awesome. A lot less power and HVAC cooling is being consumed.

We have all of our large Oracle databases along with a lot of order processing for our warehouses, which ship out clothing, currently on PowerMax.

The data reduction has been very impressive.

There are definitely some improvements that can be made to the CloudIQ.

CLI and Solutions Enabler need improvement. While it's been around forever and it's proven that it works, it can be cumbersome to operate and train some storage admins on it. Also, if you haven't been using it for a while, it can be complicated.

The stability is extremely simple. 

From a Unisphere standpoint, it has gotten a lot easier to manage. I can train some of our admins quickly on how to utilize and provision storage. The complicated aspects of Solution Enabler are still there for guys, like myself, who like to utilize the old school way.

It's as scalable as any other legacy array.

We were previously using VMAX, and it was the end of their lifecycle.

Our performance requirements were that it was an all-flash array multicontroller, and it has been great. We always go for multicontroller architecture. 

The initial setup was very easy. We set it on the floor and powered it in and up. The BIN file was already written, so we didn't have to wait on our local customer engineers to write the BIN for us. 

We have upgraded and already added disks, which was pretty easy to do. The BIN files were quickly modified to accept those disks, which is pretty awesome.

I deployed it myself.

We used post-base migration, which was pretty straightforward, which is not too complicated. I wanted to use the new SRDF-integrated migration method which is integrated with PowerMax, but we didn't get a chance to use it.

It beats the Unities and XtremIOs. Compared with those products, it's been good.

We're integrated pretty tightly with Dell EMC, so there was really no exploring outside of Dell EMC.

The new version of the Unisphere Solution Enabler is really good.

It is a very straightforward workhorse of our block storage portfolio. It is one of the best block storage arrays out there. It is a very solid machine that has been around. 

The primary use case is for Tier 0 applications.

We have no performance related issues due to hardware.

This solution has helped to consolidate islands-of-storage in our data center due to a reduced footprint. This is because of single pane of glass management.

Applications require zero downtime. The high availability and the configuration of the current Symmetrix provide all of that.

We get amazing IOPS and workload with VMware, SAP, and Oracle.

The stability is the most valuable feature.

It has a simple GUI, but still has a CLI-like interface for managing and monitoring.

I find Unisphere and REST API valuable.

We would like easier DR setup. We require DR operations, and we wish it was a lot easier to do that configuration.

It could use additional features and easier integration.

The stability is amazing. Zero downtime reported over the last years.

I would like the scalability to improve, as it requires additional footprints.

It's been always stable, so we haven't really required much support.

We had an opportunity to transform our environment. From experience with previous hardware, we selected this solution.

Our performance requirements were high IOPS, as well as stability. It is meeting those requirements and exceeding our previous infrastructure.

The initial setup was complex. The initial implementation team was not familiar with the Symmetrix architecture.

This was all new implementations for us.

We used a reseller for the deployment, who we are no longer working with.

Our costs are on a yearly basis.

IBM was the competitor. Ultimately, it came down to price.

The product is good. Test it yourself. Assess it against other solutions, and you'll be impressed.

Data plays a role in digital transformation, automation, and database decision-making.

I am looking into CloudIQ.

We're not at the NVMe architecture mode yet.

Our mission-critical environment is on the PowerMax.

It does what it's supposed to.

• The All-Flash array
• Performance
• Reliability

Our operations team would say that the GUI needs improvement.

You taking an island-of-storage and just creating another.

The scalability is acceptable and what we expected.

The technical support has been A plus.

We chose this solution because we wanted to go with the All-Flash array.

The initial setup was complex, and we had experienced people working on it.

For the migration process from the older VMAX arrays to PowerMax, we VMotioned everything. It was easy.

We considered Dell EMC and NetApp.

There is nothing that is not there.

The primary use case is for SQL database, as it's our primary data tier. We are deploying the main SQL databases for our cloud application on the solution.

It has dramatically cut down the footprint in our data center and reduced the amount of raw disk capacity that we needed to purchase.

The managing and monitoring of PowerMax arrays from a performance, capacity and health checks perspective is really easy. It integrates well with our existing automation  environment and is inline with all Dell EMC's other values and products. As we are moving an application over to it, it has been very fast, efficient, and easy for our teams.

• Compression 
• Deduplication

The REST API needs improvement. We are a very big automation company, and this would be big for us.

It has been very stable, so far. We have been a VMAX customer for a little awhile, and it is continuing on with the same reputation.

The product is still very new for us, but given what we have heard about it and everything we've seen, it should scale very well and not disrupt us.

The technical support is excellent. We have always had great support.

We're actually not going from VMAX arrays to PowerMax. We're going from Hitachi arrays to PowerMax.

Our performance requirements for this solution were response time and very low latency. We were able to cut our response times in half by implementing this solution.

We were using the Hitachi arrays and wanted something easier to manage. After last year's Tech World and hearing all about the brand new PowerMax array, we knew that it was something we had to really look into. We really liked the compression and deduplication.

The initial setup was very straightforward. We were up and running in no time and immediately serving production applications with it.

We partnered with Data Strategy, who is now Trace3, for our PowerMax implementations. We had a very good experience.

We also considered Hitachi since they were our current vendor.

It's a very strong platform for compression, deduplication, and performance, which makes it tough to compete with.

We use PowerMax as a dedicated Tier 0 for our product.

We are a partner installer.

It significantly simplifies storage.

• The ease of install
• The ease of maintenance
• Expandability

There is some room to grow, especially with some of the installation quirks.

As an installer, I've seen a lot of different things. It's mostly stable. It's had its fair share of quirks, but support has always been there to help us get around those quirks.

The scalability is incredible. It's great.

I use technical support frequently. Support has been relatively great across the board. There have been some language barrier issues in the early morning hours. They transfer calls to China, and there are some translation issues, but they know their stuff. You just have to let them go and type because you don't understand what they are saying.

The build process is relatively straightforward.

Talk to other people who have the people. It has been a great experience for most of my customers.

It's pretty much where it needs to be. For the most part, it is solid.

• Performance
• Replication time
• It's become easier to use
• Dedup and compression

I'd like to see the dedup and compression improve. Two to one is not very good. We should be getting something like three, four, or five to one.

The setup was pretty straightforward. It wasn't that hard.

We bought it from a reseller and we used some services from Dell EMC. Our experience with them was pretty good. They showed us the basics and got us started.

We acquired PowerMax for virtualization with PowerVC, which is the IBM product for virtualization. We're still in the PoC phase. While we initially acquired it for the PowerVC solution, we hope to deploy everything on it once we finish the PoC.

The data in our environment grows very quickly. Other solutions were a little bit slow, but with the PowerMax, there isn't going to be any negative impact.

Unisphere 9 has good functionality compared to version 8 or version 6. PowerMax, with version 9.02, which we installed recently, has some very good features, such as CloudIQ.

The performance is really good.

I also like that there is integration for automation. We are using the API for Unisphere with PowerMax and it's pretty amazing.

The deduplication and the reduction of data are some of the keys we are looking for because our data is growing so fast. We need a solution to minimize the data.

The NVMe integration could be improved.

Whether it's the older version of VMAX, or VMAX All Flash, or PowerMax, all these series are pretty amazing in terms of stability. This is electronics, so nothing is 100 percent perfect.

It's pretty expandable.

We haven't used any tech support for this product.

We used the PowerVC solution with VNX but that didn't work very well. We're doing a PoC with PowerMax and it's working very well compared to VNX. 

The setup wasn't complex because we have already deployed a number of VMAXs in our environment and they are pretty much the same.

We are buying it directly from Dell EMC.

We did not go with this solution for the consolidation because in the banking environment we have to isolate the various applications. It's a requirement of the business.

I would rate PowerMax at nine out of ten. I have used many different storage systems, all the major VM technologies, but I find that with Dell EMC there are no issues.