FlexPod XCS Reviews

It is where we keep our production network: all our main controllers, accounting applications, and our file servers. They are running on FlexPod.

The virtual environment is a lot more efficient than physical boxes. It allows us to move stuff around a lot, adding resources and removing resources with minimal disruption.

It is a simple turnkey solution.

When we purchased it, we had to configure everything. However, everything was already there. We just cabled it up and started to build the virtual machines (VMs).

It is been pretty stable. We have had it running for over five years now, and have had minimal problems.

It is pretty scalable. It has allowed us to add more stuff very easily.

The technical support is amazing. The NetApp support is really good. We had some problems with the storage, so we contacted them. They jumped right in and were able to take care of the issue quickly.

The solution was already implemented when I arrived at the company.

I was not involved in the initial setup, but sometimes I am involved with upgrades which are challenging. This is because there is a lot of documentation that has to be reviewed before you go through an upgrade. It is not as straightforward as some other solutions. However, the product is very stable and it does what it needs to do.

Make sure you have your NetApp support up-to-date.

Most important criteria when selecting a vendor: reliability, support, and value for money.

Company-wide production and development of private cloud infrastructure.

• Scale up/down
• CD/CI pipeline
• Development environments scale up/down

• Converged infrastructure
• Engineered Reference Architecture
• Continued evolution of the architecture
• Manpower savings
• Ease of automation

Newer platform reference architectures take a long time to harden and be publicly available.

We are running mostly virtualizations. We use it for VMware, Hyper-V, and XenServer. On top of that, we use it for some Microsoft, Linux, Oracle SQL, and web development.

It's just a nice simple solution. There is a single number to call for support. If you call and say that you have a FlexPod, they will usually include the VMware or UCS pieces for you. You don't have to call Cisco or VMware directly. You can just call your FlexPod help center, and if they know it's a FlexPod, they'll help you with NetApp questions. They will also help you with VMware and Cisco UCS questions.

I would like to see a single upgrade download, so you could download an upgrade that would upgrade the NetApps that would have all the parts. Right now, you have to go and download the VMware upgrade pieces from the Cisco website. You have to download the Cisco stuff from their site, and then download the NetApp stuff from their website. It would be helpful if they had a single download area for the versions that work together. I can't think of anything else to improve. They support all the protocols: SCOE and NFS.

There are no issues at all with stability. Everything is redundant. The Cisco UCS platform is rock solid. The switches are rock solid. You have Nexus switches that are redundant in power and in usability. The NetApps are all rock solid because they have dual controllers. You are running cluster modes so you have lift migration and you have storage failover. There's really no downtime because everything is virtualized and everything is redundant.

Scalability is great. All three parts are real scalable. If you want to add more things to your VMware, you just add the ESXi host. To add to more to the UCS, you just add more blades. To add more to the NetApp, you just put more controllers or shelves under the cluster. The scalability is the same with all three products.

Technical support is awesome. We own a FlexPod, and so do my customers. They've seen a lot of stuff. They've worked with all three vendors. You don't have to call the other vendors, and they usually will bring in resources as needed.

We look at reports out there, and see who is up and to the right. I think that Pure Storage was leading the charge on SSD for a while, but the all-flash FAS has really been awesome.

The ability to do better deduplication is what the differentiation is right now. Who is doing the best deduplication and who is doing the best compression? Right now, the all-flash FAS with 9.2 is pretty awesome on deduplication and compression.

Go look for somebody who is doing it and has been doing it for a while. The FlexPods have been shown to be reliable. They work with two of the best vendors. Cicso: For the compute and for the networking, you can't get better. VMware: For the virtualization. They just work great together. There are other converge solutions out there like EMC, but I think that these are the three agnostic ones. EMC obviously owns a piece of VMware, so it's hard to know what parts they want to play. Maybe Pure Storage is the other agnostic, but I believe that NetApp, right now, is doing the best converged FlexPod design in the FlexPod space.

There was a lot of documentation around it, in terms of what works with what. Customers know that if they upgrade their NetApp to version 9, they know what versions of UCS they need to upgrade to and what versions of VMware will work with that.

The most valuable feature of the solution is that it combines storage and server – very streamlined, very flexible, and built upon reliability.

It reduces the operational costs with just one platform to manage. It’s a seamless integration between three different products: servers, storage and switches.

I think that allowing faster certification times on newer codes on both Cisco and NetApp sides could be good as this is a pain point. They need to make certification more streamlined.

It's very stable and there's very few issues with it because it’s a certified product in which all the components work together.

It's very scalable so you can add more server, networking or storage infrastructure, or just add more FlexPods. You can add another FlexPod and have the same features, reliability and scalability with no issues.

Phenomenal – you can work through Cisco or Netapp and they will get the right people involved. The customer doesn’t need to call three people – it’s one entry point per customer.

It's deployed by NetApp or Cisco, so a lot of FlexPods are done through a partner so there is a single point of contact for the customers.

The most valuable features of the solution are the ease of support and industry leading technology – in storage, servers and networking, as well as virtualization.

• Ease of troubleshooting is good
• Ease of further deployment or expansion

In the config advisor tool, it could be more specific in pointing out or letting you know what to fix when it confronts issues.

It’s extremely stable.

It’s extremely scalable, which is excellent. Either adding storage to the existing cluster, or more nodes, and then the same thing on the Cisco side – more blades or chassis – all of it is extremely easy.

It's very responsive, good customer support.

It's been efficient for the customers to call the NetApp support line and then they can help assist in opening cases with the other vendors.

The setup is fairly straightforward. We have used all three vendors for a long time.

The most valuable feature of the solution is the pre-design. I don’t have to think – it’s a proven and pre-certified architecture that just works.

From my perspective there is not much to improve on and NetApp has gone through great strides to make it a great product with great top-notch support.

I’ve been dealing with them for three to four years and its just sound equipment.

It's rock solid.

It’s extremely scalable. We’ve gone through growth cycles, especially with clustered on tap, and it’s a very easy process.

I think support is fantastic, without a doubt. Anytime I have an issue via email or phone its squared away.

It’s pretty straightforward, there are tons of deployment guides out there which for the most part are spot on.

I would say the service profiles of UCS for the compute aspect, cluster Data ONTAP, and NDO.

I would say that we have about 700 VMs and I think 30 HyperV’s, so we can stand up a cluster much easier, and it ensures consistency between our clusters.

I think that the orchestration and automation could be better. I think there are tools out there for it, we just don’t have them deployed. It’s an area that I think our organization could do better at.

The stability of the solution has been very good; it's very stable.

I would say that its very scalable, as it meets and exceeds our needs.

I’m more on the storage side and NetApp is excellent. Cisco, whom I dealt with in my last job, I found them to be quite good.

I would say the setup was fairly straightforward but I’ve been working with FlexPod for about five years so my perspective may be a bit skewed.

I would say that you should at least consider it. Although it does require some cross-team collaboration, how you work together and combine things depends on your political and cultural relationships within your team. It can be a cross-domain kind of experience.

I think the validated design and architectures, and being able to call one of the parties for support and they can fix your problem is great.

We are installing our first NetApp component, and we are doing FlexPod certification as well. I think VDI will improve and the new storage system we are currently installing will help that as well.

I think that at this point I don’t know yet – it all sounds good.

We have been using the components (VMware, Cisco and IBM) since 2001.

I think it’s very stable.

Scalability is even better – you can expand it very easily with the clusters.

I would say that I don’t have much experience yet, but I look forward to being able to call one place instead of moving from vendor to vendor when there is an issue.

It's pretty straightforward.

We're using a vendor team.

I’d say its worth looking into – the community using it is a great resource.

Peer reviews are very important, as you're not getting a sales pitch, but real information.