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Cohesity SmartFiles vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon) comparison

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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

Pure Storage FlashBlade
Sponsored
Ranking in File and Object Storage
8th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (16th), Software Defined Storage (SDS) (8th)
Cohesity SmartFiles
Ranking in File and Object Storage
17th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.5
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Dell PowerScale (Isilon)
Ranking in File and Object Storage
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
66
Ranking in other categories
NAS (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the File and Object Storage category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 5.8%, down from 6.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cohesity SmartFiles is 0.5%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is 8.8%, up from 8.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
File and Object Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Eric Black - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
SM
Enables effective data management with reliable backup and recovery
Cohesity SmartFiles ( /products/cohesity-smartfiles-reviews ) aids in data management with features like full-text search through indexed documents. The architecture supports backup, ransomware awareness, and data management on a converged platform, offering triple-protocol access (NFS, CIFS, and S3 ( /products/amazon-s3-reviews )) while facilitating gradual improvements in access rights management. It allows for redundant setups, with automated backup and recovery options in a cloud environment.
Scott Taylor - PeerSpot reviewer
Manages large data sets efficiently with hybrid cloud integration
My organization is quite large, with about 30,000 employees. The growth has been substantial in areas such as radiology and genomics. One of the best features we've utilized recently is offload to cloud pools due to capacity constraints on-premise. We didn't want to expand Dell PowerScale (Isilon) straight away, so we utilized cloud pools to offload some data to Azure. That's really saved us in certain areas as we didn't have funding to expand Dell PowerScale (Isilon) until next year, which is why we utilized the cloud pools functionality to offload.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Using this solution has made our backups more reliable."
"Pure Storage FlashBlade is user-friendly. It's replication feature is great because it has active replication and active DR. That's the beauty of the product. It's a perfect solution for block storage."
"The solution provides many controllers."
"I like its size. It is smaller than the other competitors. We can plug in many blades, and we can have data up to one terabyte."
"It is very easy to use, and it is very fast."
"The onboarding and integrated monitoring tools are pretty good."
"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 ensures efficient replication and helps maintain our data centers' uptime."
"The tool's most valuable features are data warehousing, speedy recovery, and analytics. Its latest release is cost-effective."
"Cohesity SmartFiles aids in data management with features like full-text search through indexed documents."
"The flexibility and the user-friendly interface are the most valuable features."
"Customer service is absolutely satisfying, rating at least nine out of ten, as they have managed previous issues well."
"Dell PowerScale helps in saving costs related to power and rack space, reducing physical hardware from over one hundred to twenty-nine chassis."
"I rate Dell PowerScale (Isilon) a ten out of ten, and we continue to keep buying it."
"My experience when deploying Dell PowerScale (Isilon) was very straightforward, as we had Dell come on site to do all the actual setup, which was a big help."
"It's easy to manage. The web UI is very intuitive, and there's CLI also that you can use to manage it."
"This has been a valuable solution for our business overall. It offers business continuity and replication features."
"Dell PowerScale overall is easy to use."
 

Cons

"Its configuration should be easier."
"I would also like to see better support for CIFS workloads."
"It's on the expensive side, as expected for a niche product."
"I would like to see the licensing fees improved as well as the price per terabytes."
"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."
"In terms of technical support, the experience has been mixed. 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."
"It usually comes down to just what you hit and the value you're getting when you spend the money and license the products. I would always go, "If you want to make things better, lower your price and make your licensing simpler." There's always an opportunity around that."
"I want efficiency. FlashBlade doesn't have efficiency now."
"Users must remember that running DataProtect and files on the same cluster could threaten access if there is a platform failure. It's not suitable for applications needing high I/O or low latency."
"The management and monitoring tools comprise a disparate suite of products and the roadmap is very unclear. We've got four different products that look after the Isilon, management-wise, and it's a bit of a mess."
"Improvements could be made on the object storage side."
"It is a bit higher priced than some of the other systems."
"We lost our technical sales reps about two years ago. We haven't gotten one assigned to us and we'd love to have one."
"The analytics could be improved."
"The price always has room for improvement."
"Isilon has limitations on the number of files that can be generated."
"The pricing could be reduced."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is very expensive."
"In my opinion, we have paid the right price for the product. I don't think that it is too much or too little."
"The price could be cheaper."
"The price of this solution could be made more affordable."
"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."
"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."
"I feel that the price could always be lowered."
"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."
Information not available
"Dealing with the product costs and licensing areas is getting easier since Dell is simplifying the licensing process and licensing packages offered to users."
"I always want things to be less expensive. However, I would say the pricing is fair. Their costs are in alignment with their competitors. It is a good value for the money."
"The only drawback for us is that it's a large upfront investment. This was a huge decision for a startup company to make. It took a bit for us to get over the line on it, but we have not regretted it."
"The pricing for this solution is reasonable."
"It is an expensive solution."
"The pricing is expensive, but I think it's a fair value because it does manage itself. It definitely is much simpler than any of the other scale-out storage platforms that we've looked at in the past."
"Our company finds the pricing high, but it decreases over time."
"The general cost for a system like this is expensive. The total cost depends on your use case. You need to pay for every additional feature that you use."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
No data available
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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 out...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?
The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the pas...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?
I believe there is not much improvement needed because they have everything we need, but the interface is a little bi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cohesity SmartFiles?
SmartFiles is an economical solution, priced per terabyte on the backend. Initial setup and licensing costs align wit...
What needs improvement with Cohesity SmartFiles?
Users must remember that running DataProtect and files on the same cluster could threaten access if there is a platfo...
What is your primary use case for Cohesity SmartFiles?
Our customers use Cohesity SmartFiles ( /products/cohesity-smartfiles-reviews ) in conjunction with Cohesity SpanFS (...
What do you like most about Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
The solution provides massive performance, scalability, efficiency, and ease of management.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
We have to go through a certified reseller for Dell PowerScale (Isilon). From a value standpoint, it performs very well.
What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
There will always be room for improvement with Dell PowerScale (Isilon). They should add some new services that shoul...
 

Also Known As

No data available
No data available
PowerScale, Dell EMC Isilon
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL
1. Acer 2. Adobe 3. AIG 4. Airbus 5. Allstate 6. Amazon 7. American Express 8. Aon 9. Apple 10. ATT 11. Autodesk 12. Bank of America 13. Barclay's 14. Bayer 15. BlackRock 16. Boeing 17. BNP Paribas 18. Cisco 19. Coca-Cola 20. Comcast 21. Dell 22. Deutsche Bank 23. Equinix 24. ExxonMobil 25. Ford 26. GE 27. Google 28. HP 29. IBM 30. Intel 31. JPMorgan Chase 32. Kroger
OMRF, University of Utah, Translational Genetics Research Institute, Arcis, Geofizyka Torumn, Cyprus E&P Corporation, Colburn School, Columbia Sportswear, Harvard Medical School, University of Michigan, National Library of France,
Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat, Dell Technologies, Nutanix and others in File and Object Storage. Updated: June 2025.
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