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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 (17th), HCI (12th)
 

Featured Reviews

Nuno Mendes - PeerSpot reviewer
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
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

"Overall, the solution is extremely easy, flexible and secure."
"The compression and deduplication are very high. Therefore, we can use the size of the product more efficiently than other storage solutions."
"It is a stable solution...It is a scalable solution."
"It is a stable and scalable solution."
"The management from the switches to the hyper-convergence solutions are quite good and well-developed."
"The automation is a valuable feature, it's interesting."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the connectivity, consistency, and that we now have fewer vulnerabilities on the network."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX has improved the way our organization functions in the way that the time to deliver a VM takes me five minutes. In comparison, my cloud team's response is a couple of days based on all their overhead policies, procedures, and ticket requests. This is substantial."
"The extraordinary product quality, unmatched support services, and the third-generation HCI offering are some of the most valuable features of Sangfor HCI."
"Very user-friendly and simple."
"Sangfor is user-friendly and simple to upgrade."
"The most valuable feature is the three nodes and the free hypervisor."
"I am impressed with the product's firewall and virtualization."
"Sangfor HCI's best features are the ability to scale to a bigger size and the roadmap, whereby if they need to replicate their production to disaster recovery, they can do so on the same platform."
"It was not expensive at all."
"Sangfor HCI has a bundle of security features that are easy to monitor on the HCI dashboard."
 

Cons

"When it comes to customer needs, the licensing price could be better."
"It needs improvements in terms of I/O. Sometimes I have felt it is slightly slow while we are trying to provision VMs or access VMs."
"The product needs work in the area of deduplication which currently is inefficient."
"There are sometimes issues with memory failure."
"It is quite new solution, so it is not very stable."
"They can't get a POC to work because there are big latencies between the two sites we have. Even though we have a private fiber connection and everything else works well, they can't get the two products to talk to each other. They are not able to build it up. It looks like it's a firmware issue. They said it isn't but now it's looking like it is. I hope we can sort it out."
"Cisco's technical support originally was outstanding, but it has declined over the last 12 months. I've heard they're trying to do better, but I haven't been overly impressed with their support recently for HyperFlex."
"The solution could improve by having more customization."
"As far as I know, no hyper-convergence solution includes security, so you have to buy security from another brand. For example, you buy SimpliVity or Nutanix. They don't really have a security solution inside the product. It would be good if there is a security solution inside this solution so that it is not only for the virtualization of CPU, RAM, disk, and network but also for security."
"The initialization is not fully automated and has room for improvement."
"The cost must be improved."
"The processing speed and cost should be improved."
"I would like Sangfor to have a presence on some public cloud offerings, such as Azure or AWS, to build disaster recovery sites."
"Sangfor HCI has room for improvement in terms of integration. So, the integration with Sangfor HCI is not as extensive as in Nutanix."
"There is a feature to upgrade multiple VMs simultaneously, but it crashes."
"Stability is also an area for improvement here as well."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Comparable solutions with switches, storage, and services are cheaper than HyperFlex. It should be cheaper."
"I would like the pricing to be cheaper."
"It's much more expensive than rack servers. It was an issue, but when you compare it to the number of people who were administrative assistants before, it's on the positive ROI side. It's much cheaper."
"We would not have invested if we didn't feel the return was there for our customers."
"HyperFlex is relatively expensive, but you get good value for money."
"The licensing is perpetual and the only thing that you may need to pay for on a monthly basis is if you're going to use their cloud-based management features."
"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."
"The pricing is a bit expensive."
"Considering the capabilities provided, the product is expensive."
"The pricing of Sangfor is very competitive."
"I would say its pricing is between cheap and reasonable and would rate it as three out of five."
"Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converged Infrastructure is a reasonably priced product."
"From a business perspective, we use Sangfor HCI due to its competitive pricing compared to other competitors such as Nutanix."
"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 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 solution is on-premise which does not have a subscription. However, there is a need to purchase support. The solution is on a perpetual license model. There is not any extra cost other than the standard licensing fees."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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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 do you like most about Sangfor HCI?
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.
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.
 

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
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, VMware, Nutanix and others in HCI. Updated: May 2025.
859,687 professionals have used our research since 2012.