We performed a comparison between Cisco Hyperflex HX series and VxRail based on our users’ reviews in four categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: In our comparison, VxRail is the preferred solution. VxRail is easy to use and performs well without causing undue stress to operating systems. The competitive price and overall cost-effectiveness make it an easy choice for many organizations.
"It has been extremely stable for the three years we've been running it."
"Having the ability to migrate machines live in our environment was made possible by this software."
"The most valuable feature is the reliable storage replication, which enables me to create a robust infrastructure to run our business."
"The installation of StarWind Virtual SAN was pretty easy, and the configuration was done in no time."
"It has allowed us to save a lot of time and money by letting us create a vSAN within a Windows VM on the environment it controls."
"vSAN we found was simple to set up, easy to configure and manage and allows us to achieve storage redundancy."
"The ability for us to manage all of our nodes from the same console makes systems administration very easy."
"The StarWind products have enabled our organization to modernize stations where larger and more expensive equipment was not an option."
"Great integration with backup software."
"The management feature is the solution's most valuable aspect."
"It is helpful as a backup solution."
"I find the usability very valuable."
"The technical support has been very good for this solution."
"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."
"Performance-wise, everything is good. So far, we haven't had any issues. There has been no downtime at all."
"The implementation process is okay."
"What I like the most in terms of features is the fact that the VxRail update can be done in one week. It takes much less time to do a whole server upgrade and an infrastructure update as well."
"VxRail performs well in the VDI environment."
"This is a good solution if you want to deploy an ACI Environment but don't have all the necessary resources."
"We like the design and that it meets data storage needs."
"The ease of deployment and management of the solution are the most valuable aspects of the product."
"VxRail can manage the whole cluster at the same time, so it's easy to expand. VxRail has more features vSAN ReadyNodes that make it easier to implement from scratch."
"The stability of VxRail is good, we have not had any issues."
"I have found that the admin deployment, monitoring off-premises, and the many services important features. Additionally, the solution has good integration."
"A web management interface would be good, especially for those coming from other solutions that have one."
"The most disappointing side of the application is the free edition. There used to be GUI attached. That has recently changed to only CLI management of the application."
"There is no Italian-language version of the software available."
"We ran into an issue with alerts."
"Maybe in the future, the replication will be supported in more cloud providers."
"I wish the sync after a failure, such as hardware failure or power-related issues, for example, was faster."
"vSAN's free version does not have a graphical user interface."
"I see no need for major improvements but there could be some improvements in the form of notifications and the simplifying of maintenance mode."
"The initial setup can be complex."
"We'd like the product to offer better integration with other products."
"When it comes to customer needs, the licensing price could be better."
"I would rate the installation of Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series an eight out of ten. It can be complex."
"If we compare it with VMware, the VMware product is basically very open, and it can be easily integrated with any platform. VMware product is also available on the cloud and is not an appliance-based product, whereas Cisco HyperFlex is an appliance-based product. Companies that want to use HCI as a platform or as a service would prefer something without an appliance. A SaaS-based product is better for a customer who is using the cloud and has multiple resources, workflows, and devices on the cloud and wants to go for a hyper-converged solution. This is where improvement is needed. In addition to an appliance-based product, Cisco should provide a SaaS-based product. Its price should be lower. Cisco needs to work on the pricing model for this product. Its price is a big road blocker when competing against Nutanix and VMware, which are its main competitors."
"Lacks some integration and documentation could be improved."
"They should give us a little more information about how to use the CLI and offer more commands."
"The price could be better. I think it's more expensive than VxRail. In the next release, I would like to see a better level of protection and availability with six clients."
"VxRail could be easier to set up. It's tricky to configure the network properly and match the requirements."
"I would like to see VxRail add duplication features to its hybrid solution."
"We'd like to see more automation capabilities in the future."
"When we have a vulnerability or we need to upgrade VxRail, it takes a long time. It takes eight hours each time we upgrade."
"The update for the graphics integration and the media drivers isn't included in the VxRail update."
"The price could be better. The backup mechanism could also be better. Some of our clients prefer to work with backup software from a different vendor. They don't do a built-in backup solution. It would be better if they had guidelines on proper sizing and the whole life cycle from the requirement collection. If there aren't any proper guidelines, how do I go to the customer and evaluate their existing infrastructure? How can you do appropriate sizing to migrate to a hyper-converged environment? I think this is a requirement because most of our clients are migrating to a hyper-converged environment. In the next release, they can improve absolutely anything you can think of to improve the product in general—for example, the clusters and backup software."
"We do not use the storage part of VxRail, we use Pure Storage to map out the VxRail because the disk performance from Pure Storage was far better than the performance of the disk on the inside of VxRail."
"It would be nice if its installation can be simplified, but it is currently not too bad. They can provide deduplication and compression in hybrid configurations. To the best of my knowledge, these features are not there, and it would be nice if these are added. Some of its competitors already have these features, so it will help VxRail to have a better feature set and compete more effectively."
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Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is ranked 8th in HCI with 29 reviews while VxRail is ranked 3rd in HCI with 53 reviews. Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is rated 7.8, while VxRail is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series writes "High performance solution that makes it easy to efficiently manage VM resources". On the other hand, the top reviewer of VxRail writes "It's built on platforms that have been in the industry for more than 15 years, so it's very stable". Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is most compared with VMware vSAN, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI), HPE SimpliVity, Dell PowerFlex and FlexPod, whereas VxRail is most compared with VMware vSAN, HPE SimpliVity, Dell PowerFlex, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) and Dell vSAN Ready Nodes. See our Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series vs. VxRail report.
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