HPE Hyper Converged Reviews

I have several years of experience in storage area network and IT infrastructure, working with Pure Secure, Pure Secure Storage, EMC Square, HP, and Lenovo storage and other brands, several other brands and IBM, IBM storage, and I'm an expert on Fibre Channel configuration and new technology, virtual storage. vSAN is useful in hyper-converged infrastructure.

Generally, I love infrastructure management, installing servers, configuring, managing servers, patching, software distribution and other tasks. I work on several other topics including project delivery, architecture planning and implementation.

I use HPE SimpliVity to set up a small server farm in my recent job, on some DL rack server, Enterprise series. We set some local storage for specific local database Oracle or database SQL Server. I appreciate HP model and hardware because the support is very efficient. Our standard was to deploy desktop and workstation Hewlett Packard instead of other brands. At Intesa Sanpaolo, we choose alternative Lenovo or HP as model and brand.

Regarding medium size storage, in the past, I used a very old storage system that is now probably out of market, the VA 99000. My job has evolved from being purely technical to more project management focused. Our standard was to maintain top level infrastructure brands such as Lenovo and HP.

In HP, I have been on board on a project study until 2018 and we studied the server rack model that supports HPE Hyper Converged board and Windows configuration. HPE Hyper Converged is excellent because it can avoid the usage of storage area network.

For example, if you have three servers in parallel in a battery, a cluster, you can share the local storage for each server in a hyper-converged virtual storage without the storage area network. The architecture here has a simple physical structure. The logical configuration is complex, but the physical infrastructure is simpler than the old legacy cluster with the storage area network. The possibility of issues is minor. There is a very high level of redundancy and very high level of performance distribution and parallel usage of resources. It functions as a grid configuration.

HPE Hyper Converged can be improved by replacing the old infrastructure based on legacy clusters and old servers. It can replace and dispose of legacy storage that is very expensive to maintain and has great dimensions to manage. You can dispose of big storage to have a battery of local servers with local storage in a hyper-converged architecture. This is not the future, it is the new technology. It is probably the best solution for cloud service and also for companies that require several virtualized environments.

The foundation for using the hyper-converged solution is virtualization. First, every company must switch from physical setup to virtual configuration. Second, HPE Hyper Converged is a technology upgraded to avoid local big storage, storage area network, and complex fiber cabling from server to storage. You can eliminate everything and just manage the battery of servers in hyper-converged configuration as they share and are able to share the local storage as main big storage area network.

The initial setup of HPE Hyper Converged requires study and a comprehensive understanding of virtualization. The second step is to follow instructions step by step, as it can be complex to understand the approach and technology. We needed to have a clear vision of virtualization before switching to hyper-converged skills.

I have not utilized the system's hybrid and multi-cloud support personally, but I manage some projects to transition from local on-prem infrastructure to the cloud.

Currently, I am working with HP products, as well as Dell products, but majorly focusing on HPE Hyper Converged.

We are implementing HPE Hyper Converged for the banking sectors, for core banking solutions, and it is a good fit for the VDI solution.

The features of HPE Hyper Converged that are most effective include its simplicity, scalability, and high availability. The HPE HCI solution has 6-9 availability, which makes it a better HCI solution than other HCI vendors.

The benefits customers achieved after implementing HPE Hyper Converged include reduced staffing needs for managing the compute infrastructure. The whole compute infrastructure consists of different parts, such as networking infrastructure, storage, and compute, but in HPE HCI solution, users can manage them all in one single interface.

Currently, the HPE HCI is based on the VMware solution, and most clients are skipping VMware because VMware has changed its licensing method. If HPE starts to use its own hypervisor for its HCI solutions, it will be the best solution.

We push a different vendor for the backup and replication, so we only use the HCI, then we use Veeam for the backup and replication section.

Generally, not only the HCI solution but other HPE solutions are all stable. Users can operate them for many years, and they will not lose their performance or polarities.

HPE has many teams who can assist with different solutions in terms of technical support.

For technical support, I rate them 9.5-9.6 out of 10.

Positive

The installation of HPE Hyper Converged has no complexity. It is open and easy, and the user interface is simple to understand and implement. After implementation, it is easy for customers to manage their infrastructure independently.

The deployment model for HPE Hyper Converged is on-premises. In Ethiopia, the majority of clients use on-premises implementation.

More than five people take part in the deployment of HPE Hyper Converged.

I also participate in this process.

There is significant cost saving with HPE Hyper Converged. It has many resources, and clients use their resources effectively after implementation.

The licensing cost and setup cost for HPE Hyper Converged rates at 80%.

I am familiar with HPE Hyper Converged and am discussing the latest update, the newest version.

The implementation duration depends on the number of nodes used for the specific project. For an average of five nodes, including networking and virtualization, the HCI solution installation and implementation takes one week.

HPE Hyper Converged is a cloud-ready solution. However, in Ethiopia, regulations do not allow the use of cloud solutions. It is still not permitted to take data to the cloud, but the system is ready for cloud integration.

I rate HPE Hyper Converged 9.5 out of 10.

Our main use cases include Hyper-V, the operating system, and 2019 Windows Server. The solution works well with RAID storage. We have implemented a three-host configuration in this solution with high availability switches and HP SAN storage.

We utilize Hyper-V from Windows.

Easy to manage resources hd ram cpu and VM AND BACKUP AND RESPOND 

The improvement in migration has been significant.

The hyper-converged system is easy to set up.

It is very complicated to migrate to another domain. When we have one domain and want to move to another domain, we need to destroy the cluster on the HPE Hyper Converged system, and we need to change the IP sub-network and IP service. This process requires destroying the cluster and rebuilding it from scratch, which is very complicated and difficult.

We installed this solution in 2019.

Excellent 

Scalability need more cost but we have a plan and sizing extra size for 5 years so we change all technology to another ,and we don't need to scale current solutions 

Technical support from our partner in Jordan is very good. Regarding licensing and spare parts such as hard disks under warranty, they have been responsive. When a hard disk was damaged, they replaced it within one month. The response time was excellent.

Positive

I didn't have previous one

The setup process for the hyper-converged system is straightforward.

First time from vender ,second time from our team for migration to another ip and domain 

100%

The product is intermediate in price, neither expensive nor cheap. We are talking about an on-premises solution without licensing for years. Currently, licensing is required for VMs and CPU cores. It requires a yearly subscription. The government prefers not to follow this trend as they always need to maintain perpetual licenses.

Different barnd and looking to price and requirement 

I recommend hyper-converged solutions in general, without specifically recommending the HP brand. It is a good solution overall.

They are looking to implement AI solutions to provide more reports and feedback.

We have multiple brands including Dell and HP. We also use Data Protector from HP for tape solutions.

On a scale of 1-10, I rate this solution an 8.

We usually work on how to converge to web-end projects for end customers, where they either do an infrastructure refresh or consolidate their disaster recovery secondary side. 

There's also a need for data protection and backup, where they need to be hyper-converged to support business continuity across sites.

It's a very complete product with residencies to protect data and secure it end-to-end. It includes storage, computing, and networking, offering a fully ten-key solution. 

We have a very good return on investment due to data savings through compression and deduplication methods. 

It simplifies IT management and enhances security, including the end-to-end security of the IT data engine. The product is complete, simple, and provides visibility. 

Not to forget, the AI intelligence of HPE InfoSight offers predictive analytics, proactively protecting the end customer. This proactive approach is crucial for an IT product to anticipate incidents before they occur. 

So, AI is also a part of it, enhancing the customer experience for their business. These are the main advantages and differentiators of HPE against the competition.  

One of the things that can be improved is that today, is supporting VMware, maybe as a hypervisor. But it would be good to have an open kind of platform for other hypervisors, maybe. Like Nutanix is doing, it's very open.

Another area of improvement is the expansion node. Because today, we can add a few disks, which is limited. Or scale out. But in the capacity upgrades, there is a kind of limitation somewhere.

In future releases, I would like to see more advanced features in terms of replication on the DR side. Because today, the product is doing what should be done. But it's not at the same level with the other third-party vendors like Veeam, applications like Commvault, and other production.

We have been working with it for five years. 

We work with the latest version of this solution. 

I would rate the stability a seven out of ten.

We have around 15 to 20 customers using this solution. I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten.

The customer service and support are very helpful. 

Neutral

We also use HPE SimpliVity, HPE Hyper Converged, HPE EliteRadity, and DHEI products.

The initial setup is very straightforward. The product is very easy to deploy, both on-premise and in the cloud. This is because it works with VMware, which is a popular virtualization platform. 

Additionally, the product is supported by HPE, which provides remote deployment assistance. 

So, the product is very well supported in terms of setup and installation.

The service delivery partner is responsible for the maintenance of the solution. They are directly connected to HPE for maintenance and support. 

The pricing is very competitive. I would rate the pricing an eight out of ten. 

There are no additional costs to the standard license. They have a capital expenditure (capex) cost, but the only operating expenditure (opex) cost is for support. There are no hidden fees or any recurring costs. So, for the price, it's very good, and I would rate it an eight out of ten.

From my side, five years ago, we started the journey on hyper-converged, basically because we are HPCPenney. So, we started the journey with HPCPenney after the acquisition. And since then, the only one and the ones we sorted out, I started myself.

So, HPE is the only vendor I have worked with for HCI products.

However, we are open to working with other HCI vendors in the future because the nature of a distributor should cover the end-to-end. 

So, we are open to working with other HCI vendors, like Nutanix, for example. We can also set up the VMware vSAN through our HP ProLogistix. 

I would recommend using this solution. 

Overall, I would rate this solution a seven out of ten because the product has a lot of room for improvement. The production is at a seven out of ten, but I would only rate it an eight if HPE had more things to do with the product.

I use HPE Hyper Converged in my company as it provides two services, namely, HPE SimpliVity and HPE Nimble Storage dHCI. I use HPE Hyper Converged in my company as a solution to help me with the VDI part.

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that HPE SimpliVity has an in-built backup solution. With HPE Hyper Converged, you get a cost-efficient tool because HPE provides both HCI and hardware. If you go with VMware and Nutanix, they charge you for Hyper Converged HCI software, while you will have to get hardware from Dell or HP.

Customers are more concerned about the applications of their businesses, so HPE Hyper Converged needs to come up with a purpose-based HCI solution.

Though with HPE Hyper Converged, you get everything, the documentation part is very much required, especially if you opt for the solution's subscription-based licensing model. HPE needs to make the documentation part easy.

I have been using HPE Hyper Converged for two years. My company has a partnership with HPE.

It is a stable solution.

With HPE Hyper Converged, my company faces problems since we receive it as a hardware bundled product. It can be scaled up to sixteen nodes in a single cluster while we create a multiple cluster. On the basis of the best practices, sixteen nodes on a single cluster are good enough because we usually see heavy computation on a single node. I don't find any major issues if a user needs to go beyond sixteen nodes in a single cluster.

Around 700 to 800 people in my company use the solution.

With HPE Hyper Converged, you get all the technical support from a single window. You have to raise a ticket with the support team that offers a single window to help with hypervisors, HCI, hardware, or VDI software.

I rate the technical support a ten out of ten.

Positive

Compared to HPE Hyper Converged, Dell and Cisco are good products, but they have certain issues and a particular ecosystem. VDI solution and HCI solution vendors for Cisco recently removed support for Cisco HyperFlex. Now, customers have to rely on Nutanix only because if you see the latest updates, Cisco has started to position Nutanix's HCI solution, not Cisco HyperFlex.

The product's initial setup phase is simple as everything is GUI-based in the solution nowadays. You have to go through the management interface, and you can scale up or scale down your cluster from three nodes to sixteen nodes and then to thirty-two nodes, which is not a challenge.

The product's installation phase can be taken care of in five days.

One project manager and two engineers are more than enough to take care of the product's deployment.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model.

The product's pricing is very competitive because HPE provides a buyback policy to users. Whatever existing hardware you have in your environment, HPE purchases them, so you get an assurance for whatever you plan to purchase or whatever you have already purchased.

Users can make either monthly or yearly payments towards the licensing cause of the solution. HPE GreenLake provides users with an option to make quarterly payments while also opting for HPE's perpetual licensing model. At any point, one can move from HPE's perpetual licensing model to GreenLake's payment model, which is a subscription-based license model.

The maintenance part of the solution is easy, as users can get end-to-end support from HPE. Even if you use VMware vSphere Hypervisor, HPE provides you with L1 and L2 support. HPE support is very good since it provides an automated single window for every problem.

Those who want flexibility, ease of use, and a simple support system can opt for HPE.

I rate the overall tool an eight out of ten.

We use this solution for information systems.

One of the solution's strong points is the deduplication capabilities of SimpliVity. The technology is already matured, and it's one of the strengths of HPE compared to other competitors.

If the solution could further compress the data, it would use less storage.

I have been using HPE Hyper Converged as an end-user for three years. We are using the latest version of the solution.

I rate the solution’s stability a nine out of ten. It works perfectly.

We have more than 500 users, these are mostly end-users of our information systems. I rate the solution’s scalability an eight out of ten.

We used regular servers before. When we used HPE, we recognized its superior performance against regular servers.

It took our partners several weeks to set up because the solution needed to be configured on several servers, connected to the network, and tested.
The setup includes copying and restoring servers. The initial setup will take a week at least, and we need at least three engineers to maintain the solution.

Our partners did the installation.

The entire solution is packaged with all licenses and support. HPE's pricing could be lower.

There is room for improvement, but generally, once you plug it in, it will work. I recommend this product to other users and rate the solution an eight out of ten.

HPE Hyper Converged is a processor.

The product enables me to use any software or database. I can connect it from multiple connections. It is a simple product. I do not have any problem with the solution.

The product must provide more storage capability.

I have been using the solution for four years.

The product is very stable. I rate the stability a ten out of ten.

We have ten users in our organization.

I have personal connections with HPE. I do not have to open tickets with the support team. The quality of support must be improved.

Positive

The initial setup is not simple. The process gets simpler as we do it for many years. If we face issues, we contact the support team. The deployment takes two months. We had a lot of changes to make.

We did the deployment with the help of HPE’s team.

The solutions cost us a lot. I rate the pricing a three out of ten.

Dell PowerFlex is a competitor. It is more reasonably priced.

My data is not big enough to scale up, so I do not need scalability. HPE Hyper Converged is a stable and useful product. If we add more hard disks, we will need a larger power supply to run them. Overall, I rate the tool a ten out of ten.

The solution helps in building virtualized environments faster compared to traditional infrastructure setups.

The solution's technical support services could be better.

We have been using the solution for one and a half years.

I rate the solution's scalability an eight out of ten. We have 300 users in our organization.

The solution's local support services are good. Although, it could be faster.

Positive

We used Nutanix earlier. Later, we switched to HPE as it is cost-effective and provides better support services.

I rate the solution's initial setup process as five out of ten. It has medium complexity. It takes time to learn the process. The deployment involves minimal steps and requires a day to complete.

I rate the solution's pricing as a four out of ten.

I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

The solution's most valuable features are scalability, easy migration, easy recovery, and flexible backup possibilities.

The solution's pricing for the hardware and support could be reduced.

I have been using HPE Hyper Converged for two or three years.

HPE Hyper Converged is a very stable solution.

I rate the solution’s stability a nine or ten out of ten.

The solution’s initial setup is easy.

The solution's deployment takes more than three days with the testing and everything in place.

On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten.

We have three nodes with software-defined storage virtualization based on KVM. We also use oVirt as an open-source solution. HPE Hyper Converged has simplified our data center operations.

Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

We use HPE Hyper Converged for IT infrastructure. 

The solution needs to add a module or plugin of vCenter for clear monitoring and insights. 

I have been using the solution for five years. 

HPE Hyper Converged is stable. 

The solution is scalable. We have more than 1,200 users for the product. 

We get very good technical support for HPE Hyper Converged. 

The tool's installation takes three days to complete. We need two resources to handle the tool's deployment. 

We deployed the solution in-house. 

HPE Hyper Converged is an affordable solution. 

I rate the product an eight out of ten.