- Easy to set up
- Very Fast
- Good investment
- Surprised at beta ration
- Works very well
Senior Advisor IT Architecture for Cloud Computing Solutions at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
We didn't need a special network or any hardware -- just add a new NIC. Backups are not easy, however, as it's distributed storage and you must be careful not to make a host unavailable.
What is most valuable?
How has it helped my organization?
- Price
- We don’t need special network or hardware, just add a new network card
- If you have 10GB, you can just go with vSAN
- All-flash gives improved performance over hybrid, and competes with other solutions
- If combined with Horizon, it lowers the price of solution
What needs improvement?
- Better integration with VMware DOS
- vBackup with vSAN is not so easy, because it's distributed storage so must be careful not to make host unavailable.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
I tried to install it on one cluster and the host got stuck.
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VMware vSAN
October 2024
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Awesome stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
- Awesome scalability, especially when combined with vSphere 6
- With vSphere 5.5, limited scalability
How are customer service and support?
- In beta, no technical support
- Great fourm support
How was the initial setup?
Very easy, just a few clicks. You don’t need special knowledge of storage .because it can be fully automated or you can set it manually if you want
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
There are a few products on the market. vSAN has lots of competitors, but if you want to play with a single software provider, go with vSAN. However, if you want more hardware, maybe go with Nutanix.
What other advice do I have?
They lose points because its tricky to fully understand.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: We're a partner
Network Engineer at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees
We're able to integrate it with vSphere, bringing speed and security to our patient-sensitive data system. And while it's scalable, I've yet to test its stability extensively.
Valuable Features
- The integration with other VMware solutions, such as vSphere, is valuable for us.
- It's also fast -- faster than hybrid and all-flash setups.
- Three-host configuration provides security.
Improvements to My Organization
I think that it brings speed and security as we have patient-sensitive data that we need to store.
Deployment Issues
N/A
Stability Issues
I love VMware – it’s allowed us to virtualize our server infrastructure, but I haven’t tested the stability of VSAN extensively yet.
Scalability Issues
From what I’ve seen it’s extremely scalable.
Customer Service and Technical Support
VMware is top notch, but I can’t evaluate yet for VSAN.
Other Advice
You should look at scalability and integration withing the vSphere environment.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Buyer's Guide
VMware vSAN
October 2024
Learn what your peers think about VMware vSAN. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: October 2024.
816,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.
General Manager Sales at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Offers a single console for management, is easy to set up, and is very stable
Pros and Cons
- "I have found the solution to be scalable."
- "The pricing could be better when it comes to renewing the licenses."
What is our primary use case?
We're primarily using this solution for VDI.
How has it helped my organization?
Previously, we were using three-tier architecture. Therefore, we would have three different consoles. However, after adopting a CA solution, we are only on a single console and we have cut down the EU engineers we needed as we didn't require multiple engineers for managing multiple layers. Now, we have a single engineer who can manage everything from the top layer from a single console.
What is most valuable?
The single console for management is the most valuable aspect of the solution.
The initial setup is very simple.
The solution has been quite stable.
I have found the solution to be scalable.
What needs improvement?
VMware is currently working on quite a lot of improvements and they're coming out with lots of novel features in their new releases. There's only one improvement area, and that is it needs a little bit more software and hardware to make it similar to Nutanix.
The pricing could be better when it comes to renewing the licenses.
Technical support could have a faster response time.
It's hard to come up with an exact feature that might be good to include in a future release, as each customer is different and each customer likely has different feature needs.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using the solution for almost four years at this point. It's been a while now.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is very stable. We have been using VMware for almost more than 10 years and there have been no issues regarding VMware products. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution is scalable. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support is quite good. Occasionally, it could be faster sometimes, however, largely, I have been pleased with the level of response I get.
How was the initial setup?
The product's initial setup is not overly complex or difficult. I found it to be straightforward and relatively easy. A company shouldn't have any issues with the setup process.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
When it comes to the renewal of the license, it's a very expensive solution.
We require price protection. VMware doesn't provide price protection. Many other products provide that, however, it's not something that VMware does.
What other advice do I have?
We're a VMware partner.
I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten.
If you are using VMware for a long time, there is no need to change your platform, and you can easily add vSAN as a solution. On top of that, there are multiple tools available to be able to have a hybrid cloud solution available for vSAN. If you go with the VMware Cloud, you've got the SCA as well as a hybrid cloud solution in a single product. If you are not willing to use VMware, then you can definitely choose either Nutanix or maybe a Microsoft option or any number of other solutions that may be available in the market.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: partner
Manager at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Lets you efficiently use hardware resources, but the UI needs work
Pros and Cons
- "Everyone uses virtualization to more efficiently utilize hardware resources. That's the main point of vSAN and VMware."
- "The UI falls short compared to other solutions. It needs some development to make it more user-friendly."
What is our primary use case?
The vSAN is similar to other VMware products that are quite popular in Thailand. Everyone uses virtualization to more efficiently utilize hardware resources. That's the main point of vSAN and VMware.
What needs improvement?
The UI falls short compared to other solutions. It needs some development to make it more user-friendly.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using vSAN for six years.
How was the initial setup?
vSAN isn't easy to install, because it's separate from VMware. You have to install vSAN and monitoring separately. Configuration is not straightforward. You have to define the policy first and then allocate through the virtual machine.
What about the implementation team?
We used the VMware professional team to install, and it took them around two days. After it was deployed, we used one engineer to maintain the system.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The license for vSAN is a yearly subscription.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate vSAN seven out 10.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Integrator
Solution Architect at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Extremely reliable, provides good performance and agility
Pros and Cons
- "Good performance, reliable and agile."
- "Licensing costs are a little too high for smaller sized companies."
What is our primary use case?
We sell and deploy this solution for our customers in a variety of settings from small data centers to big data analytics clusters. Most recently, we have deployed vSAN for VDI solution. We are VMware partners and I'm a solutions architect.
What is most valuable?
I like the reliability of this product because we can lose more than one host, more than one disk, and everything still works okay. It's also good on performance and agility. You can change and add things without any issues.
What needs improvement?
It would help if the cost of the solution was reduced for smaller sized companies.
For how long have I used the solution?
We've been using this solution for two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
This is a stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Scalability is good. We had a customer who bought five hosts a year ago and this year they expanded their infrastructure to 12 hosts, and everything was fine.
How are customer service and technical support?
I think the support is very good. They figured out what the issue was and responded very quickly. The problems we had were from a network perspective, nothing to do with the solution.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is very simple and doesn't take long, perhaps two to five days.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The license is perpetual and there is an additional payment for technical support which is an annual subscription fee. I think it could be cheaper, especially for smaller companies. It's okay for big deployments with a lot of servers and high level of input-output IOPS.
What other advice do I have?
I like this solution very much and I would recommend it.
I would rate this solution a nine out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
Senior Consultant at global brands
Very stable and has increased our business productivity levels
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature is the ability to continue our business needs and have higher visibility. It has definitely increased our business productivity levels."
- "I would love for this product to be cheaper and easier to configure."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use this solution for consolidation on the cloud.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature is the ability to continue our business needs and have higher visibility. It has definitely increased our business productivity levels.
What needs improvement?
I would love for this product to be cheaper and easier to configure.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It is a very stable and strong product that is easily deliverable to our users.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I know it can scale up or scale out but I have not had the need to do so.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We also evaluated Dell EMC before choosing this solution.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Server Administrator at a consultancy with 1,001-5,000 employees
As an architecting company, we require a lot of IOPS for our clients
Pros and Cons
- "We want see a better monitoring tool in vSAN. Monitoring is not that great as of now because it shows us false alarms in the Health status. We would like that to be improved."
What is our primary use case?
Because our company is an architecting company, we require a lot of IOPS going from the server side to the clients who are using the models. They require faster transactions and that's the reason we thought of having a type of HCI solution. That's why we went with the vSAN solution.
How has it helped my organization?
Previously, we were going to use traditional systems, so when vSAN was launched it gave us a lot of value. The admins have been able to relax a bit, they don't have as many outages to deal with.
What needs improvement?
We want see a better monitoring tool in vSAN. Monitoring is not that great as of now because it shows us false alarms in the Health status. We would like that to be improved.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's pretty much stable for us now, apart from some of the issues which can be tackled. But 80 percent of the time it's stable. The issues are probably on our end, network issues. That's what we have figure out.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We don't scale that much because we have a three-year refresh time. We tend to acquire for how much we predict we will scale up in the next three years.
How is customer service and technical support?
We have used technical support quite a few times but not frequently. We have had a good experience with them. We usually get good engineers on our calls.
How was the initial setup?
Initially, it was quite difficult to understand the solution because we tend to do a PoC. Later on we got used to it. Now it's quite easy for us, but at first it was not easy. We now have about 48 locations where we have deployed vSAN.
What other advice do I have?
When vSAN was introduced we were quite excited about it. We were looking for something that was not traditional and we wanted something hyperconverged. vSAN was a perfect fit for us.
I rate the solution an eight out of ten. To get to a ten it would need improvement in the Health status checkup.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Solutions Architect at a tech services company
In a production environment, it increases provisioning, security and provides faster deployment.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features are:
- Automation
- RecoverPoint for VMware
- Self-healing capability
In a production environment, these features ramp up the provisioning, security and provides faster deployment.
What needs improvement?
There is not much improvement needed. If you work with the HC Platform, vSAN is not directly touched, i.e., once the HC appliance takes care of it.
I have worked with VxRail, which is a Hyper converged Platform, as it has vSAN embedded as well as it is fully automated the vSAN configuration.
As I did not work with the implementation, but the analyses of functionalities of VxRAIL, would be unfair tell how vSAN would be improved.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used this solution for nine months (but only for sales proposal, it has not been implemented, just technical sales information).
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I did not encounter any stability issues.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I did not encounter any scalability issues.
How is customer service and technical support?
Always when I was in need of any technical support, I was promptly answered by them.
How was the initial setup?
As I have worked with the HC Platform, the setup was very simple and easy.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
For Latin America, the costs are very higher; even if you go deep on functionalities, but still it is sellable.
What other advice do I have?
Work hard on the sizing matters.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: We are a business partner.
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