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Cisco MDS Series vs Pure Storage FlashArray 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 MDS Series
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise SAN (3rd)
Pure Storage FlashArray
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
199
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. Cisco MDS Series is designed for Enterprise SAN and holds a mindshare of 7.6%, down 27.8% compared to last year.
Pure Storage FlashArray, on the other hand, focuses on All-Flash Storage, holds 6.3% mindshare, down 8.1% since last year.
Enterprise SAN
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

OğuzKalaycı - PeerSpot reviewer
Ensures consistent availability during updates and integrates seamlessly
I am using Cisco MDS in SAN environments for storage connections and server connections The product is very stable and performs well. During the update periods, the devices do not need to reload, ensuring constant availability. It is easy to set up and use. I do not have a central management…
Nabeel Sayegh - PeerSpot reviewer
Supercharges enterprise storage by way of highly optimized hardware, comprehensive data management and a feature rich interface.
During their early years, I was a member of Pure's Customer Advisory Board. In addition, when we first adopted Pure, they did not have replication GA yet. We got into their beta testing program and help them work out certain issues with that technology. One weakness I can say the array has, still to this day, is limited control on scheduling snapshots. Depending on the type of replication schedule you are building, you may or may not have control on specifying the start time of a given replication schedule. This is not a very big problem in the grand scheme of things, but something nonetheless that has bothered me about the scheduler in general. Another area for improvement would be automatic host alias creation. Other platforms such as EMC Unity/PowerStore will automatically detect the host name, create a alias for it and associate the logged in HBA's to it. Pure does not do this for you and as a result, requires manual configuration. This can be very time consuming especially when you are deploying a large number of new servers.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of the Cisco MDS Series is its reliability, support, and scalability."
"The issues with these switches are extremely rare, and the whole product line is very predictable and stable."
"The most valuable feature of the Cisco MDS Series is security."
"The features I found most valuable are the ease of deployment, it's easy to upgrade, easy to configure and easy to administer. There is no need for vendor professional services which saves project cost. The usage of WebUI for all primary features like hostname, IP address, SNMP traps, zone sets, addition and deletion of zone members or zone sets, backup of switch DB is very simple."
"SAN switches in Cisco MDS Series are a valuable feature of the solution for our company."
"The product is very stable and performs well."
"The product is easy to use."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the devices, databases, and zoning."
"I like the speed, and I like the API and how programmable it is."
"We can store more for a cheaper price as opposed to paying for larger devices and larger rack spaces which get outdated sooner and which we'd have to change every two years. It simplifies storage for us."
"The stability and performance are the best things about the solution."
"The most valuable features of Pure Storage FlashArray are the management view of the solutions, ease of provision, and deprovision, it is fantastic."
"The dashboard is nice. It is easy to manage compared to other storage solutions such as Dell EMC."
"It simplifies storage."
"This solution has improved our organization. In the past, we had reports that were taking up to two hours and after switching to SSD storage the overall processing power dropped to half an hour. The end users saw an immediate performance gain."
"It simplifies the overall management. We don't have to worry about storage anymore."
 

Cons

"The licensing model could be less complicated."
"Cisco MDS Series can improve by having API functionality for automation and programming."
"I do not have a central management software to manage these products due to the licensing cost. It would be beneficial to have central management software for easier handling."
"The product is very expensive."
"Cisco MDS Series could improve by adding more gigahertz. However, they are doing this over time."
"It is quite a stable product. It should be shipped with the latest firmware to avoid download and upload schema at the beginning of the initial setup. There should also be the possibility of downgrading the firmware when required. WebUI needs DCNM instead a web-based GUI should be made available like Brocade san switch."
"The GUI client is Java-based and we know that Java is not secure, so everyone disables it."
"The solution's management interface and GUI need improvement."
"The number of Filesystems is limited, which it is not on the EMC VNX."
"In terms of the future, I have been excited by some of the copy data management stuff that they're talking about building into the environment. There are feature sets where I've done a lot of automation work. So, I am always looking forward to extensions of their API. They're also talking about a phone home centralized analytics database being used as a centralized management console with a list of new cloud features, but this doesn't seem finalized."
"It would be good to have metrics of the box's performance so we can see what it delivers, but currently, I can't see what it's actually doing."
"A noticeable area for improvement is the support for object storage. The FlashArray does not natively support object storage like S3 or Swift, which pushes customers needing these features towards the more expensive FlashBlade."
"I would like to see a Nagios monitoring plugin which watches the health and performance of the system. The only one available just checks volume capacity."
"In some cases, we get into very in-depth conversations around movement of specific data and, what's more, chunk sizes. The documentation lacked any description or information on that."
"I recognize it's a difficult challenge, but I would like to see them make the pricing more reasonable."
"From a scalability perspective, it is a very small storage solution, so it's not very expandable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing cannot be considered an advantageous trait of the solution since it is expensive. I rate the solution's pricing a three out of ten."
"The price of the Cisco MDS Series is high."
"It's perpetual licensing and maintenance is a recurrent cost."
"For pricing, you have to take into account their performance on deduplication and compression in a $/GB comparison."
"There should be quite a bit of reduction of TCO with just licensing (and stuff) because we run the VM environment off it."
"The pricing is very attractive and it delivers performance for the money."
"We have a seen a reduction in TCO. It is definitely a cost-effective solution for us. We have seen ROI."
"You get what you pay for. It is expensive, but it really works."
"The price of the solution is not expensive."
"Pure has been flexible with us on the pricing models."
"It is cost-effective because after buying a subscription, they provide a service to upgrade hardware for free. They are providing so many features. When you consider the features provided, it is cost-effective."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
25%
Government
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Educational Organization
7%
Educational Organization
33%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco MDS Series?
The pricing could be improved as the solution is very expensive. I am on a yearly payment basis.
What needs improvement with Cisco MDS Series?
I do not have a central management software to manage these products due to the licensing cost. It would be beneficial to have central management software for easier handling.
Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?
Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Storage. It may be more expensive, but it should pay for itself for its functionalit...
What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashArray?
We consume less physical storage because of the solution’s deduplication and compression.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
I don't have the billing details right now, but the pricing is high.
 

Also Known As

Cisco MDS 9100, Cisco MDS 9222i, Cisco MDS 9700
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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