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Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] vs Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converged Infrastructure comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
90
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converg...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Management (29th), HCI (12th)
 

Featured Reviews

Nuno Mendes - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager - Resp.Department at Parvalorem
High performance solution that makes it easy to efficiently manage VM resources
In our case as a credit recovery company working with the state, our infrastructure is fixed and stable as we don't have the same need for growth as other types of companies. That said, one of the biggest problems with HyperFlex HX is that if you want to adjust your solution in terms of processing power, memory, or disk capacity, you have to buy completely new hosts. From a financial perspective, it can be very expensive to do so, and from a legal perspective, there are all kinds of compliance issues we would have to sort out before buying any new solution or application. Since we as a company will only be operating for perhaps the next ten years, when our HyperFlex solution comes to its end-of-life in 2024 our next step will likely not be with HyperFlex or any other solution from Cisco. Instead, from a financial point of view, we will likely turn toward a cloud solution because, that way, we won't have to spend so much money on physical infrastructure. We are, after all, only a small company and HyperFlex can be very expensive for other companies of our size, whether in Portugal or elsewhere like the United States. One other area for improvement is in regard to HyperFlex's integration with VMware. HyperFlex integrates with a specific version of VMware in such a way that HyperFlex doesn't always resolve security issues with VMware at the same pace as what you see in native implementations of VMware. This has happened in one or two situations in the past. On the other hand, the integration is otherwise adequate, especially in terms of availability and virtualization features (such as being able to split up each of our four hosts within VMware).
KashifAli - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Head, Director of Sales and Operations at Core ISP Router
User-friendly GUI, capable technical support team but complicated license mechanism
Sangfor HCI's license mechanism is too complicated. The license agreement is a distributed license. Within the HCI platform, Sangfor HCI has multiple licenses in terms of services. Sangfor HCI has a separate license for the security services, a separate license for the Doctor services, and application services. They have multiple SKUs in separate forms. As per local market requirements, I think they need to couple up these or bundle up the license model.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Go ahead and do it."
"I have many clients using this solution for a number of reasons, such as unified communications and collaboration."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX is the best on the market."
"With our four HyperFlex HX hosts (consisting of processor, memory, and disk), the performance is very fast and we have no problems at all. In all of the five years that we have been using HyperFlex, we haven't needed to increase our budget to buy additional hosts."
"I like Cisco Intersight."
"Cisco HyperFlex is helping us to put everything in centrally so that we can manage in one place."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is essential to our vSAN solution; it's integrated."
"Cisco is key for switching abilities, and the management from the switches to the hyper-convergence solutions, such as the storage or server environment, is quite good and well-developed."
"Sangfor has many solutions, and you can easily manage their machine servers with just one management. They're always striving for greatness, and they continuously update their products. For example, they have now built endpoint security within the firewall. They are continuously improving not only the security but also all other products."
"Sangfor HCI has a bundle of security features that are easy to monitor on the HCI dashboard."
"The manageability feature is the most important aspect of the solution."
"It's a great solution for companies in Pakistan."
"It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten... Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Sangfor HCI has a strong GUI interface in terms of graphical representation for management purposes."
"It was not expensive at all."
"The price of Sangfor is cheaper than other competing products."
 

Cons

"I think the documentation is a big con for Hyperflex. More substantial, straightforward documentation would help end users make more of their investment."
"The platform itself is very stable and robust, but when it comes to upgrading the system, it's not stable."
"This solution is lacking in replication and backup abilities that I would like to see in a future release similar to HPE SimpliVity."
"The initial setup can be complex."
"There are sometimes issues with memory failure."
"The price could be better. I think it's more expensive than VxRail."
"There should be the opportunity to create more than one div group."
"I haven't been too impressed with the Cisco HyperFlex HX, honestly. It's a hard concept."
"I would like Sangfor to have a presence on some public cloud offerings, such as Azure or AWS, to build disaster recovery sites."
"I would want the product to include Continuous Data Protection (CDP) which can help to easily retrieve the data."
"The initialization is not fully automated and has room for improvement."
"Sangfor HCI has room for improvement in terms of integration. So, the integration with Sangfor HCI is not as extensive as in Nutanix."
"It can have more compatibility and new features. I would also like to see better performance. Some of the other HCI solutions already provide the SSD and flash storage and much higher Intel processors. Sangfor HCI can improve on that."
"The documentation and support from the community are not as good or as mature as VMware or Hyper-V."
"Initially, there were issues with wrong sizing and certain features being locked, although these have been fixed."
"One question that has come up frequently in the last week is whether or not the renewal cost for Sangfor's HCI solution is too high."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"HyperFlex is relatively expensive, but you get good value for money."
"Pricing is better if you buy more Cisco products."
"For customers in the private sector, this product can have a very high return on investment."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is a bit pricier compared to other brands in the market...There is a need to make additional payments towards the maintenance and support of the solution."
"I would like a clearer licensing model. It should explain a bit more what you receive if you buy the more expensive license rather than the standard one."
"Its price is high. Cisco needs to work on the pricing model for this product. Nutanix or VMware are cheaper products, and they provide almost the same functionality. Its price is a big road blocker when we are working with an end customer, and Nutanix and VMware are in competition. If they can reduce its price, it is actually a better choice for customers."
"We currently have a perpetual license, which is kind of unlimited, so we don't have the normal licensing cost, yet."
"Here in Brazil... it is very expensive. It's very hard for almost all companies to buy even the small version of this solution."
"Its price should be better, but I don't think they will change the price list. You have to pay for licenses, and you have to pay for support, so you have an annual fee. You can use the product without the fee, but it's really dumb because you need support. We are an IT company. We provide the product, and we need the support too for our customers."
"Sangfor needs to be more aggressive because this is a new market or territory for Sangfor. Nepal is a very price-sensitive market, so Sangfor needs to be a little more aggressive with its pricing. I would rate them 3.75 out of five in terms of the price."
"The product's pricing is less expensive and competitive than other alternatives. I would rate the product's pricing an eight out of ten."
"Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converged Infrastructure is a reasonably priced product."
"The tool’s pricing is better when compared to VMware or Nutanix. The product’s licensing is on a yearly basis."
"I would say its pricing is between cheap and reasonable and would rate it as three out of five."
"The pricing of Sangfor is very competitive."
"It is in the middle range as compared to other hyper-converged infrastructure solutions. There is a three-year warranty on the hardware. The license also includes other features. Sangfor has included Continuous Data Protection (CDP) and a built-in firewall with the license. Other top brands, such as VxRail and VMware, require a separate license for such features."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Construction Company
15%
Marketing Services Firm
9%
Educational Organization
7%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Construction Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business24
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise57
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business23
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

How do I choose between Cisco Hyperflex HX Series and Nutanix Acropolis AOS?
Cisco HyperFlex HS series vs Nutanix Acropolis AOS Cisco HyperFlex gives extended hyper-convergence functions from core to edge and multi-cloud environments. It helps IT and OT teams deploy hyper...
How does VxRail compare with Cisco HyperFlex HX Series?
VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if you are working with a limited budget, this platform offer...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sangfor HCI?
I rate the pricing of Sangfor HCI at a five, as it is thirty to thirty-five percent more efficient than other solutions in terms of total cost of ownership.
What needs improvement with Sangfor HCI?
I would like Sangfor to have a presence on some public cloud offerings, such as Azure or AWS, to build disaster recovery sites. This functionality is currently missing in the Pakistani market.
What is your primary use case for Sangfor HCI?
The primary use case for Sangfor HCI involves running all workloads that were not for SAP on conventional servers using Hyper-V. We migrated all of these instances from Hyper-V to Sangfor HCI. We a...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

BluePearl Veterinary Partners, Ready Pac Foods, Bryant University, Bellevue Group, KPIT Technologies, City Harvest
TOSHIBA TEC Singapore, J&T Express Indonesia, Crowne Plaza Vietnam, Hermina Hospital Indonesia
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