Cisco UCS B-Series vs Pure Storage FlashBlade comparison

The compared Cisco and Pure Storage solutions aren't in the same category. Cisco is ranked #4 in Blade Servers , with an average rating of 8.3, and holds a 8.3% mindshare in the category. Pure Storage is ranked #8 in FaOS , with an average rating of 8.8, and holds a 5.8% mindshare. Additionally, 98% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Pure Storage users who would recommend it.

Cisco UCS B-Series

Read 73 Cisco UCS B-Series reviews

1,135 Views
742 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Read 38 Pure Storage FlashBlade reviews

3,679 Views
935 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Cisco UCS B-Series

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Cisco UCS B-Series and Pure Storage FlashBlade based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Dell Technologies, Cisco and others in Blade Servers.

To learn more, read our detailed Blade Servers Report (Updated: May 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Blade Servers

May 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score

8.2

Cisco UCS B-Series enhances performance and efficiency, reducing costs and power usage, surpassing expectations with minimal maintenance and strong returns.

Sentiment score

8.5

Pure Storage FlashBlade boosts ROI by reducing costs, enhancing efficiencies, increasing VM density, and saving 20%-85% in time.

Additionally, we achieved server consolidation, running multiple services on fewer servers without purchasing new ones, resulting in significant financial benefits.

Muhammad AlihyderBhuiyan

Head of IT Operations at NCC BANK LIMITED

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

It does not require much management once you set up correctly, so it saves time, allowing an admin to focus on other work.

Parul-Patel

System admin at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Customer Service

Sentiment score

7.3

Users praise Cisco UCS B-Series support for professionalism, quick responses, and reliable 24x7 assistance, with occasional minor delays.

Sentiment score

7.0

Pure Storage FlashBlade support is praised for responsiveness and knowledge but criticized for slower responses and occasional language barriers.

Cisco's technical support is highly helpful and responsive.

Muhammad AlihyderBhuiyan

Head of IT Operations at NCC BANK LIMITED

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

The support is done through email and is not that great, making it a very problematic area I've been dealing with for over four years.

Parul-Patel

System admin at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

I would rate them an eight out of ten.

Redy ERIYAWAN

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score

7.9

Cisco UCS B-Series offers robust scalability and flexibility, allowing seamless integration and effortless expansion to meet diverse needs.

Sentiment score

8.8

Pure Storage FlashBlade is praised for scalability, ease of expansion, and support, despite some areas needing improvement.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

Pure Storage FlashBlade is scalable.

Parul-Patel

System admin at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Stability Issues

Sentiment score

8.1

Cisco UCS B-Series is praised for its robust stability and reliability, despite minor challenges in certain operations.

Sentiment score

8.8

Pure Storage FlashBlade is praised for its impressive stability and reliability, with minimal disruptions and consistent uptime even during upgrades.

The stability of Cisco UCS B-Series is impeccable, as it has been running smoothly without any need for maintenance.

Muhammad AlihyderBhuiyan

Head of IT Operations at NCC BANK LIMITED

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

In case there is any issue with any blade, the data is moved to another.

Redy ERIYAWAN

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Room For Improvement

Cisco UCS B-Series needs improved storage integration, user-friendly management, lower costs, HTML5 transition, and better support for new technologies.

Users seek better cloud integration, enhanced deduplication, improved support, protocol enhancements, simpler configuration, and a more intuitive interface.

Last year, we faced challenges with firmware upgrades, but they were quickly resolved with assistance from Cisco TAC.

Muhammad AlihyderBhuiyan

Head of IT Operations at NCC BANK LIMITED

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

Technical support definitely needs significant improvement.

Parul-Patel

System admin at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

Its configuration should be easier.

Redy ERIYAWAN

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Setup Cost

Cisco UCS B-Series is costly but offers value and reliability, with discounts available during year-end negotiations.

Pure Storage FlashBlade offers high performance and features, justifying its cost with no extra software fees and fixed support costs.

The management software, Cisco One, is priced a bit high but still considered reasonable.

Muhammad AlihyderBhuiyan

Head of IT Operations at NCC BANK LIMITED

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the past, but one benefit is that they have built-in ransomware protection.

Parul-Patel

System admin at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Valuable Features

Cisco UCS B-Series excels in scalability, centralized management, ease of deployment, virtualization integration, and offers robust performance and reliability.

Pure Storage FlashBlade offers fast, scalable, and user-friendly storage with efficient integration, analytics, and versatility for diverse needs.

Its administration capabilities provide easy access to performance reports, logs, and utilization data, which are essential for effective server management.

Muhammad AlihyderBhuiyan

Head of IT Operations at NCC BANK LIMITED

For more quotes and insights, download the Cisco UCS B-Series report

The best features of Pure Storage FlashBlade include better throughput and better performance.

Parul-Patel

System admin at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

We can plug in many blades, and we can have data up to one terabyte.

Redy ERIYAWAN

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

Categories and Ranking

Cisco UCS B-Series

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Blade Servers (4th)

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

All-Flash Storage (16th), Software Defined Storage (SDS) (8th), File and Object Storage (8th)

Mindshare comparison

Cisco UCS B-Series and Pure Storage FlashBlade aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Cisco UCS B-Series is designed for Blade Servers and holds a mindshare of 8.3%, down 10.2% compared to last year.
Pure Storage FlashBlade, on the other hand, focuses on File and Object Storage, holds 5.8% mindshare, down 6.4% since last year.

Blade Servers

File and Object Storage

Featured Reviews

DavidMbugua

Group General Manager-ICT at SkyLink

Reliable product with efficient automation capabilities

Cisco UCS B-Series manages various processes, including handling payments for over 650,000 growers, running group financials, managing human resources, and operating our main ERP system, SAP. The servers' resilience was particularly impactful. Even during power outages, the servers resumed operations from the last saved point without human intervention. The enhanced processing speed also allowed us to complete tasks that took two days in just one hour. The automation capabilities enhanced efficiency and facilitated integration with our networking components, particularly since we also used Cisco switches. The servers' security was reliable, and formal training on Cisco products made management easier. I rate the product an eight.

Read full review

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

Read full review

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

18%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Computer Software Company

14%

Educational Organization

12%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco UCS B-Series?

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it is easily scalable.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco UCS B-Series?

The licensing cost for three years, followed by an AMC for two years, is reasonable. However, the management software, Cisco One, is priced a bit high but still considered reasonable. No additional...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco UCS B-Series?

Last year, we faced challenges with firmware upgrades, but they were quickly resolved with assistance from Cisco TAC.

See all answers

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power outages when we need to quickly move data between different data centers. It ensure...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and performance it delivers, including quick response times.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

See all answers

Comparisons

HPE Synergy vs Cisco UCS B-Series

Compared 35% of the time

Dell PowerEdge M vs Cisco UCS B-Series

Compared 18% of the time

Supermicro SuperBlade vs Cisco UCS B-Series

Compared 17% of the time

HPE BladeSystem vs Cisco UCS B-Series

Compared 16% of the time

Cisco UCS E-Series Servers vs Cisco UCS B-Series

Compared 16% of the time

More Cisco UCS B-Series Competitors

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 20% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 9% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco UCS B-Series

June 2025

Download Cisco UCS B-Series product report

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

June 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Also Known As

UCS B-Series, Unified Computing System B-Series

No data available

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.

Cisco

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

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

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Find out what your peers are saying about Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Dell Technologies, Cisco and others in Blade Servers. Updated: May 2025.

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