Microsoft Azure File Storage Reviews

We use the solution in our organization for its archival functionality. We are essentially archiving data with Microsoft Azure File Storage. Even though we have the applications and the storage, we are replicating our data into different data storages.

Feature-wise, it is an easily accessible solution since Microsoft is integrating everything into its products nowadays.

The solution is expensive. Considering the enterprise licensing required for the solution, the cost of the solution is an area where the product needs improvement.

I have been working on Microsoft Azure File Storage for around five to ten years. Presently, I am working on the latest version of the solution. I am an end user of the solution. I also work as an integrator for the solution.

We don't face any stability issues with the solution in our organization. I rate the solution's stability an eight out of ten.

It is a very scalable solution. I rate the solution's scalability a nine out of ten. Around ten to fifteen of our customers are using the solution.

In my experience with the solution's technical support team, I would say it was okay since I faced no difficulties. I rate the solution's technical support team an eight out of ten.

Positive

We use Commvault and Veeam in our organization. The reason to use Microsoft Azure File Storage is that it is a cloud solution. Though the other ones are also cloud solutions, Microsoft offers better pricing compared to them.

The solution's initial setup process was straightforward.

Around two weeks were needed for the solution's deployment process. Also, the deployment process is something which one can do by themselves.

Only one technical person is required to deploy and maintain the solution.

We need a consultant with knowledge of integration and EDI-related processes to implement the solution.

I am unsure if I have seen an ROI using the solution since I don't look into the commercial part.

One needs to pay according to the storage they plan to use in the solution. The payments are to be made yearly. It is usually monthly, but we opted for yearly subscriptions in our company. In general, all cloud solutions are expensive. Ultimately the solution of the cost depends upon how one plans to use it, which includes features like data usage backup and other such data-related stuff. So the cost can differ from customer to customer.

I recommend the solution to those planning to use it, especially if they require a cheap cloud solution. We haven't seen any issues with the solution in our organization since it works fine. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

We have a hybrid Microsoft Azure File Storage deployment. One of the models is running onto the cloud where all the images and KYC data is uploaded onto the cloud platform, and that is stored onto the file storage.

We have developed our own payment solutions on a mobile platform, where we have two modules for our solutions. In the first model, we host it as an entire SaaS solution where clients will bring their merchants and will use our solutions. The second model is where we sell this solution to the clients, offshore, and the client will host it on their premises or onto the cloud. My clients are Indian banks and overseas banks

Another model of the solution we sell is for offshore clients, the client will host it on their infrastructure or onto the cloud. My clients are Indian banks and overseas banks. Many banks are connected and are using our solutions over the cloud. For example, if a customer with the corporation wants to onboard their own merchant to use these solutions, they have to onboard the merchants and confirm the KYC.

We have developed a digital platform where sales and the other staff can go to the merchants, and upload their KYC data, such as identity verification and address verification. All this data will go out through the mobile phones by clicking the pictures. All of the images will be uploaded via the API calls at the backend application, which is Microsoft Azure File Storage, and all those images get stored, encrypted onto the file storage.

We have not explored the desktop performance analysis of the file storage, but the user interface, API, and the response that we receive over the file storage are very good. We have a lot of customers that connect to the client-side, click the images, and upload them. The beauty of the solution is that we can mount the file storage into a critical server as well as an external drive. The speed that we receive with the images is pretty good.

In our use cases, we see the weakness in mobile internet connectivity.

When the user clicks the pictures of the identification and verification, addresses, those images have different sizes. If you click via the HD camera, it takes four to six Mbps. The issue is not with the Microsoft Azure File Storage, but the issue is at the front end when it is uploaded from the mobile network. This is the main pain area for us, and we are looking for a way to compress the images to the best possible minimum size, to allow them to be uploaded without any issues, without any dependencies on the external network.

I have been using Microsoft Azure File Storage for approximately two years.

We have not seen any problems with the stability of the solution.

Microsoft Azure File Storage is scalable. Using the cloud, the entire model is scalable.

By using the load balancer, we have our in-built APIs for all the applications, which are Microsoft Azure File Storage, which is very scalable. We are using Microsoft Azure File Storage to receive and to have access at very fast speeds globally. The backend, modules, and the application on virtual machines, which is again scalable. We find it's very easy to host it on the cloud, because when it's already an on-premise server, they have many constraints, such as time, hardware, availability, and labor force. The solution is very easy to scale, you can scale out or scale in on demand. It can even be automated on the cloud.

We have many customers that are using our solution which uses Microsoft Azure File Storage. For example, there are five overseas banks that are using their own solutions, the Commercial Bank of Qatar, the National Bank of Dubai, RAKBANK Dubai, and Network International Dubai. Our solution is one of the very first solutions in India where you can accept your payments on NFC-enabled mobiles using our applications. We have approximately 10 to 15 Indian banks that are using the solution. 

Our payment solution, it's a complete hybrid model. There are many models running on-premise, and many models running on the cloud, such as AWS and Azure. My payment application is not hosted in one vertical. There are many verticals to it and different product portfolios. The core payment application is on-premise, and certain verticals are hosted onto the AWS platform, but the digital merchant onboarding platform is on the Microsoft Azure File Storage.

The main difference between AWS and Microsoft Azure File Storage which we have found from our compliance perspective since we are in the highly regulated payment industry is that AWS only has the presence in the Mumbai region in India, but Azure has two presence in Chennai and in Mumbai. From the compliance point of view, we found that since our on-premise is again in Mumbai region, we cannot have disaster recovery in the Mumbai region. This is one of the cons for AWS, for which we hosted the merchant onboarding platform on Azure.

The initial installation of Microsoft Azure File Storage was straightforward. The process was not difficult for the implementation of the solution with the module, it took approximately 30 minutes.

I rate the initial installation of Microsoft Azure File Storage a four out of five.

There was a team that was doing the implementation of the Microsoft Azure File Storage. The team consisted of system administrators.

We have not seen a return on investment with Microsoft Azure File Storage because we are running a small infrastructure with this project. We have not increased to the level where we have seen a return on investment. However, we have seen a return on investment for the AWS platform.

In Microsoft Azure File Storage we only pay for what we use. We don't have to pay for what we are expecting to use or what we are locating, we only pay for what we are using. This is the advantage of the cloud.

One of the major benefits for AWS is that they have a very large customer representative base where clients can be picked from, they offer large discounts and credit. We were not able to receive the same kind of offers from Microsoft Azure File Storage. We tried to approach Azure while hiring for our disaster recovery discussion, but we didn't receive anything from Azure.

If we use a Microsoft Windows computer we will have to pay additional fees for the license for Microsoft Windows.

I rate the price of Microsoft Azure File Storage a five out of five.

We are focused on the Indian market and we have a lot of SMEs and enterprise customers. The most difficult aspect of capturing more customers is for Microsoft Azure File Storage to offer higher discounts and credits. They do not provide enough discounts.

I rate Microsoft Azure File Storage an eight out of ten. 

I generally help customers use Microsoft Azure File Storage primarily for a lot of purposes, including the storage of files and enhancing storage security. There are private endpoints and private DNS resolver, which is basically a private endpoint resolver that resolves the IP address of the private endpoints internally. It is then further mapped within the application. It also has short file storage which accesses the storage according to the minimum privilege and rights assigned to that storage. It has networking facilities and firewall options to safeguard public data. It also has a SaaS token that can be generated around the storage and shared storage which enables customers to share their files through Azure File Storage. 

Flexible stroage in the cloud is very use and can be cheap and programmaticlay deployed

There are various features attached to the solution, including firewall options to safeguard it. The profile management option is another valuable feature that allows us to manage the profiles and secure them. It allows the user to understand what configuration has been made to the  Azure virtual desktop. Blob Table Container Tables Queues Elastic San & Azure NetApp Files are also lots of other features that can be explored.

There is always going to be room for improvement. Certain use cases will evolve where file storage is used with visual ID and group mapping. As long as the dynamic mapping is working seamlessly, there aren’t any changes needed in Microsoft Azure File Storage. As of now, I've got no such recommendations.

Importing and exporting data needs to have a bit more documentation. Recently, Microsoft has actually stepped up and provided some training about securing data but they need to have a solution in case the data needs to be migrated. They need to include a service to securely transfer the data through Microsoft and encrypt it.

I have been working with Microsoft Azure File Storage for a couple of years.

It is very rare to get an outage in Azure. If there are any issues, the data is replicated into the DR region, allowing you to access it depending on the skew that is actually applied. 

Microsoft Azure File Storage can scale well because of its dynamic nature. It's quite scalable because of a file agent that is set on-premise and helps to scale out pretty much really. Azure can create large storage accounts and manage that, replicating the data securely.

Medium to large enterprises can mostly use file storage because they have a lot of data and Microsoft's features are evolving every day, making it a fit match.

I have direct experience with customer service at Microsoft. Usually, it involved raising a ticket. However, we as consultants are expected to fix the client’s problems first, and if there is a bug, then we raise the ticket. My experience with customer support is pretty good. They've always responded very quickly, and I never had to follow up with them. 

Positive

Net App

The setup is easy and easily doable. As long as the steps recommended by Microsoft are applied, it is not very complex. 

Usually, it is our customers who implement the solution. In most cases, they don’t require assistance if they follow the guidelines laid by Microsoft. However, in case there is any kind of assistance required, we help them to set it up. Usually, it is deployed on the cloud, but there are multiple ways to mimic the deployment and in some cases, they require it.

The pricing is usually dependent on your storage requirements. Overall, I believe Microsoft Azure File Storage's price is reasonable. 

On Premises San Storage

As long as one knows how to implement and secure it, Microsoft Azure File Storage can be used efficiently. There aren’t any particular recommendations, because a lot of it is already in place.

Microsoft has been implementing these scenarios but they can work a bit more around the SaaS token scenario. If they can simplify that, it can be great as not enough people use the SaaS tokens. I think this needs to be explained on an engineering level. If they include it, customers can use and choose this facility.

Overall, I would rate Microsoft Azure File Storage an eight out of ten.

We use the solution to store critical files of clients. I also use it to link with Kubernetes. 

The tool offers a secure way to access storage. You can also easily share the files securely across Azure. 

I have had issues migrating my data to another subscription. 

I have been using the solution for a couple of years. 

My company has less than 50 users for the solution. 

I would rate the product a seven out of ten. 

We use it to easily access data from the user side into our network. Like, we have some remote sites, and we have the user on the remote site who can easily access all the data as per the permissions and our requirements.

First of all, the solution is very secure. Secondly, the solution is very fast. It is reliable and available all the time. In the backup, it allows us to create the rate servers to save our data and use our data in multiples.

Firewall rules should be introduced to secure the access date from any virus attacks. Anti-virus should be introduced in the work filtering and document filtering.

I have been using Microsoft Azure File Storage for three years.

It is a stable solution because we don't need to care about hardware or electricity. We need a strong internet connection to access our data everywhere, logging in with our password.

It is a scalable solution. The number of users depends on our requirements. Sometimes it can be ten, sometimes hundred or fifty. I rate it eight out of ten.

The technical team is good and responsive.

The initial setup was easy from the user's side. They could quickly get access to the data. The deployment takes some time. First, we need to buy the storage and implement the policies per our network design. Whether it will take one week, two weeks, or one month depends on the network design. If we are on-premises, we must buy hardware according to our requirements. For the deployment, we had a technical team consisting of an assistant manager for network, system, or micro administrators. Also, there is a network engineer or system engineer. The solution is deployed on the cloud and on-premises.

We pay for both yearly and monthly licenses. The yearly one is cheaper than the monthly one.

I recommend the solution to those planning to use it. I rate the overall solution an eight out of ten.

We use this solution for storing our log data from SIM. We store our files and map our server to have an archive on all the logs generated for SIM.

The storage in this solution is excellent.

We don't have anything that we would improve. We are happy with how it has worked and have not encountered any challenges.

We have been using this solution for five years.

It is a stable product, and we have had no issues or incidents.

It is a scalable solution, and we have about 500 users with 250 in each office using Microsoft Azure File Storage daily.

If the file is large, there may be a delay in download time.

We have not used any other cloud solution.

Our costs are only related to space, and the price is comparable to other competitive solutions. Customers always want to pay less too.

I rate the product a ten out of ten. I would recommend file storage because there are no issues. It is simple, easy, and stable. It is suitable for medium-sized and enterprise companies.

Microsoft Azure File Storage has multiple functionalities, and you can use it as a source, but you may face some problems when contributing something in Azure. This is hard to do. The configuration in Azure doesn't help. This is okay, and it's not a big problem since I am not too aware of Azure resources. That's why I might have faced problems at first.

The solution is not user-friendly.

I have been using Microsoft Azure File Storage for a year.

It's a stable product.

The solution can be expanded because one can manage and install huge amounts of data in Azure. Those using the solution in my organization are using it for DevOps. We have around 20 users using the solution in my company.

I never faced any issues that prompted me to contact technical support.

The solution is deployed on the cloud.

To those looking into using the solution, I recommend getting Azure documentation. This will help you to configure the solution with other tools.

Owing to the fact that some features might get added in the future after sending my notes to Azure, I rate the overall solution an eight out of ten.

The product is a reliable cloud solution. Its performance and ease of use are good. 

The tool needs to be more intuitive. 

Also, the product name keeps changing. It can be confusing when product names change frequently, especially with Microsoft. Sometimes, if you refer to a product by a certain name last year, it might have a different name six months later.

I have been using the product for 2 to 3 years. 

I rate the product's stability an eight out of ten. 

I didn't face any issues with the solution's scalability. My company has 1000 users who use it extensively. 

The tool's support is not bad if you have a premium contract. 

Microsoft Azure File Storage's deployment is not complex. 

I rate the overall solution an eight out of ten. If you're considering using it, I'd say it's a reliable product. However, in terms of costs, it's important to plan to avoid unexpected expenses. Each solution has its strengths and weaknesses. Depending on your specific needs, you may find one solution better suited than another. That's why most larger companies don't stick to just one solution.