Cisco UCS B-Series vs Lenovo Flex System comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Cisco UCS B-Series and Lenovo Flex System based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Blade Servers solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed Cisco UCS B-Series vs. Lenovo Flex System Report (Updated: March 2023).
688,083 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
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 features of the Cisco UCS B-Series are reports for virtualization and the large memory it has.""The initial setup is pretty simple and straightforward.""The feature that I found the most value is the abstract and stateless capacities.""The architecture of this solution is very valuable; it has five traffic interconnects, and uses a network highway so bandwidth is never an issue.""The most valuable features are monitoring and processing, which can handle a lot of throughput and are more powerful than the HPE series.""The most valuable feature is the ability to replace a server with another one, simply by applying the profile""Cisco UCS B-Series is scalable.""The scalability is good because it comes with Fabric Interconnects, and you can directly add more blades as you go. Therefore, scalability is not a problem."

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"One of the most valuable features of this solution is its ease of use.""Flex System's best features are its performance and stability.""The product is very user-friendly and has many resources at the enterprise level.""The initial setup is straightforward.""The most valuable feature of the Lenovo Flex System is the storage system."

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Cons
"The price of the solution could improve.""The upgrades could be improved.""The license is expensive. Cisco should decrease the delay in the delivery of their products.""Integration with storage could be improved.""This model does not support virtualization of the switch.""The GUI is not the greatest.""Compared to the deployment of servers such as Dell XCDs, the deployment of UCS servers is more complex. They take longer to deploy.""Cisco UCS B-Series competitors have similar features as they do, Cisco needs to make some changes to make their offering better."

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"Flex System's integration with the XClarity Management System could be improved.""Forced restarts due to free upgrades is an issue that needs to be resolved. We can manage this as we have high availability and redundancy, but without that it could be a real problem.""The product could improve its integration capabilities.""The most valuable feature of the Lenovo Flex System is the storage system.""The solution could improve by providing more integration with other platforms."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Pricing will be based on your requirements so it is important to plan, engage, and negotiate directly with the Cisco Account Manager."
  • "UCS is expensive, and we will be migrating to the cheaper HP servers."
  • "Cisco UCS B-Series is an expensive solution."
  • "This is a premium device and our clients are not as concerned about the reasonableness of the price compared to satisfaction with their productivity."
  • "The licensing cost is a little bit expensive because by default, it depends on your fabric interconnect model. Most of the time, however, Cisco provides a lot of promotions to the customers, so the cost can be waived for many projects. The price of the chassis itself is fair."
  • "The cost of the blade servers is okay, but the cost of Fabric Interconnects ends up increasing the overall costs. For example, suppose it costs 3,500 USD per blade server. When you include the Fabric Interconnects, you could pay up to 30,000 USD. Therefore, compared to the cost of servers from Lenovo, Huawei, Dell, or HP, the cost of Cisco servers can be high. However, Cisco gives good discounts (about 90% to 94%) to partners and to customers who are already using Cisco servers. New Cisco customers do not get the level of discount that an existing customer does. Because you can get discounts with Cisco, I would give pricing a rating of four out of five."
  • "Cisco UCS B-Series is an expensive solution."
  • "Compared to the more in-demand hyper-converged environments such as Nutanix or DVX rail, Cisco UCS B-Series is even more costly due to the expensive fabric interconnects."
  • More Cisco UCS B-Series Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "There is a one-off payment to buy the equipment and the support is purchased annually."
  • "The is an annual license cost to use the Lenovo Flex System. If the price was less expensive and flexible overall and for additional features, our customers would be happier."
  • "The 14 blade server allows significant room for upscaling before having to invest in another chassis. You would have to purchase another chassis much sooner in the case of an eight or nine blade server."
  • More Lenovo Flex System Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:I like that it's very manageable very easy to use and configure. I am not an expert, but the graphic user interface is quite simple very easy to use. It's a complete solution.
    Top Answer:I was not involved with the specific pricing agreement, so I don't know. However, I am familiar with some of the aspects. Generally, the cheaper, the better. I believe that this is part of the… more »
    Top Answer:We have to have Java to manage the infrastructure. It would be great if we can manage the infrastructure through a web browser. We have Dell EMC, and I would like to connect my product directly to the… more »
    Top Answer:The Lenovo Flex System is very stable.
    Top Answer:The price is interesting. I am able to quote a client based on their needs and offer them either Lenovo or Dell.
    Top Answer:It does not have the same module flexibility that was present in IBM Blade. On the Blade System, I was able to choose between the Cisco module, or BMC module. Since the switch to Lenovo, I have not… more »
    Ranking
    3rd
    out of 22 in Blade Servers
    Views
    2,344
    Comparisons
    1,701
    Reviews
    13
    Average Words per Review
    461
    Rating
    9.0
    6th
    out of 22 in Blade Servers
    Views
    842
    Comparisons
    570
    Reviews
    5
    Average Words per Review
    326
    Rating
    8.0
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    UCS B-Series, Unified Computing System B-Series
    Flex System Blade Servers, Flex System SN Series
    Learn More
    Overview
    Based on Intel Xeon processor E7 and E5 product families, Cisco UCS B-Series Blade Servers work with virtualized and non-virtualized applications to increase: Performance, Energy efficiency, Flexibility and Administrator productivity.

    Flex System is Lenovo’s proven, 2nd generation blade, that efficiently runs your infrastructure applications with up to 80% better density than standard rack server deployments.

    Offer
    Learn more about Cisco UCS B-Series
    Learn more about Lenovo Flex System
    Sample Customers
    Aegean Motorway, Anilana Hotels and Resorts, Anonymous Banking Group, Artoni Transporti, Bellevue, BH Telecom, Bowling Green State University, Children's Hospital Colorado, City of Biel, Dimension Data, Dualtec Cloud Builders, Hertz, Houston Methodist, Kuwait Petroleum Italia, Lufthansa Systems GmbH & Co.KG, Outscale, Sony Corporation, Talbots
    Information Not Available
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm30%
    Manufacturing Company20%
    Government10%
    Energy/Utilities Company10%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company19%
    Comms Service Provider11%
    Government11%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company23%
    Financial Services Firm15%
    Comms Service Provider11%
    Government8%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business29%
    Midsize Enterprise18%
    Large Enterprise53%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise67%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business29%
    Midsize Enterprise29%
    Large Enterprise43%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business27%
    Midsize Enterprise22%
    Large Enterprise51%
    Buyer's Guide
    Cisco UCS B-Series vs. Lenovo Flex System
    March 2023
    Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco UCS B-Series vs. Lenovo Flex System and other solutions. Updated: March 2023.
    688,083 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Cisco UCS B-Series is ranked 3rd in Blade Servers with 17 reviews while Lenovo Flex System is ranked 6th in Blade Servers with 5 reviews. Cisco UCS B-Series is rated 9.0, while Lenovo Flex System is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Cisco UCS B-Series writes "Processing of our system has greatly improved due to the CPU, functionality and security features". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Lenovo Flex System writes "Provides a high initial ceiling before upscaling is required, user-friendly and rich in resources, but has occasional stability issues". Cisco UCS B-Series is most compared with HPE Synergy, Dell PowerEdge M, HPE BladeSystem and Super Micro SuperBlade, whereas Lenovo Flex System is most compared with HPE Superdome X, HPE Synergy, Dell PowerEdge M and HPE BladeSystem. See our Cisco UCS B-Series vs. Lenovo Flex System report.

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    We monitor all Blade Servers reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.