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DataCore SANsymphony vs Red Hat Ceph Storage comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

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 Software Defined Storage (SDS)
8th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (16th), File and Object Storage (8th)
DataCore SANsymphony
Ranking in Software Defined Storage (SDS)
4th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
Storage Software (2nd), HCI (7th), Storage Performance (2nd)
Red Hat Ceph Storage
Ranking in Software Defined Storage (SDS)
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
File and Object Storage (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 4.2%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DataCore SANsymphony is 7.1%, up from 6.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat Ceph Storage is 18.9%, down from 21.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Software Defined Storage (SDS) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Red Hat Ceph Storage18.9%
DataCore SANsymphony7.1%
Pure Storage FlashBlade4.2%
Other69.8%
Software Defined Storage (SDS)
 

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.
SigfridCecillon - PeerSpot reviewer
High availability and user-friendliness enhance infrastructure health and redundancy
I would rate technical support from DataCore SANsymphony a 10. Each time I contact the technical support, it's when I don't have a choice because it's very difficult for me on site, and each time, I have good people online who are able to help me solve the problem. Usually, the problems are not very technically difficult, but sometimes they are, and the support team is still there to help us resolve them. The majority of the problems are linked to licensing, so when the license has expired or the number is not correct, they are proactive and change things live, which is very good.
Rifat Rahman - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers reliable performance and availability for large deployments
I would like to see improvements in Red Hat Ceph Storage not because I necessarily think it needs improvement, but because I generally prefer to do things manually rather than following the containerization part. Current deployments are based on containers, but I deploy manually with my scripts and controls. If there are no Kubernetes-like requirements, I often prefer to deploy a whole manual process. I don't ask for improvements in the deployment model because Red Hat has its own philosophy about making things, but it's my personal choice that I prefer things manually. Some features are available only in the containerization part, so if those are also available in manual deployment, that will help.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Speed and ease of use are the two most valuable features."
"The performance of FlashBlade is excellent. It does not necessarily leverage the SOS API that some of the newer products leverage, but I found its speed pretty much on par and comparable. It is fast, and it does what it is supposed to do."
"The solution is able to handle workloads and is easy to use. It allows us to actually manage the boxes in less time."
"It has absolutely simplified our storage because the dashboards on the consoles show a clear understanding of where you are, and it is also very easy to provision. This been a big help for our teams."
"The most valuable features include the ease of implementation, ease of use and the speed that you can do backup and recovery on."
"The most valuable features of FlashBlade include its replication capabilities, reports, and easy allocation. Everything is user-friendly."
"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."
"FlashBlade offers low latency, high throughput, and seamless scalability."
"Our system is designed to be scalable and flexible, so it can grow and adapt to meet the changing needs of our clients."
"Active-active is the most valuable aspect for us."
"Auto-tiering to obtain performance at a lower cost without the customer having to purchase ultra-fast storage is great."
"The documentation repository is really useful and kept updated."
"I am very happy with this product's ability to adapt, increase, and modify existing infrastructures."
"The dashboard is very intuitive, and there are a lot of counters to diagnose what happens during a short period (like when a backup is in progress)."
"The most useful feature of SANsymphony is that it's able to manage any brand of block storage."
"DataCore's ability to seamlessly move virtual volume data between storage pools as well as their synchronous mirroring has made maintenance and disaster recovery planning achievable."
"The scalability feature is used by all users and is critical for our operations."
"Ceph was chosen to maintain exact performance and capacity characteristics for customer cloud."
"High reliability with commodity hardware."
"Data redundancy is a key feature, since it can survive failures (disks/servers). We didn’t lose our data or have a service interruption during server/disk failures."
"We have not encountered any stability issues for the product."
"I like the distributed and self-healing nature of the product."
"Ceph Storage allows us to add value related to cost and offers a unique experience compared to traditional storage."
"Ceph’s ability to adapt to varying types of commodity hardware affords us substantial flexibility and future-proofing."
 

Cons

"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."
"I would like to see better integration."
"I would like to see more VM-Aware features in the next release of this solution."
"I want efficiency. FlashBlade doesn't have efficiency now."
"The documentational aspect of FlashBlade needs improvement."
"They need better integration with public clouds along with a better hybrid solution."
"The speed could be improved."
"The Pure Storage Orchestrator is our biggest pain point at the moment. If we can have more say in future developments of feature sets that we will need to support for our use case, that would be pretty beneficial to us."
"One limitation of this solution is that it's Windows-based, e.g. one requirement to install DataCore SANsymphony SDS is putting it on a Windows server machine. It relies on Windows and that is a limitation because there are some customers who are looking for non Windows systems."
"I would like to see SMPA (Shared Multi-Port Array) technology developed with the aim of allowing a configuration identical to other storage arrays."
"We are waiting for container support (on the roadmap), as well as a user-friendly full web-administration capability, and an improved API."
"For customers or technicians that don't speak and understand English, it could be great to have other languages support, all the more so given the number of countries in which SanSymphony is used."
"We'd like to manage the raid on the disk directly in SanSymphony."
"It would be ideal if they were providing archive licensing with the ability to create a second pool on existing storage nodes."
"I would like to see reporting added, such as a monthly connectivity report."
"Right now, the version used is run on Microsoft Windows Server. Having a Linux version or even an appliance would be better as it would eliminate the use of additional licensing for another piece of hardware."
"It took me a long time to get the storage drivers for the communication with Kubernetes up and running. The documentation could improve it is lacking information. I'm not sure if this is a Ceph problem or if Ceph should address this, but it was something I ran into. Additionally, there is a performance issue I am having that I am looking into, but overall I am satisfied with the performance."
"An area for improvement would be that it's pretty difficult to manage synchronous replication over multiple regions."
"It takes some time to re-balance the storage in case of server failure."
"I have not identified any drawbacks, however, the response to public platform inquiries could be faster."
"If you use for any other solution like other Kubernetes solutions, it's not very suitable."
"In the deployment step, we need to create some config files to add Ceph functions in OpenStack modules (Nova, Cinder, Glance). It would be useful to have a tool that validates the format of the data in those files, before generating a deploy with failures."
"The storage capacity of the solution can be improved."
"We have encountered slight integration issues."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."
"I understand that it is competitively priced compared to other brands."
"Licensing fees are paid yearly."
"It is within reason for what you get. From what we have found comparing it to other vendors, it is in the same range as others. Given the choice, we would definitely redeploy it based on the cost."
"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."
"The price could be cheaper."
"In my opinion, we have paid the right price for the product. I don't think that it is too much or too little."
"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."
"Make sure you are made aware of the annual subscription cost when purchasing."
"The cost is at the same level as other storage solutions and it is easy to understand the licensing."
"DataCore SANsymphony's pricing is very high and should be much cheaper."
"We have licensing costs on a yearly basis. They charge per terabyte, so in terms of cost, it can be very costly. They have three different features, and you have to pay extra for those."
"Pricing has improved but it is still expensive."
"This solution allows the use of off-the-shelf hardware and charges by the TB of storage."
"This product has a good ratio between quality and price. In many cases, it's less expensive to work with DataCore than other storage systems."
"The solution is cost effective."
"We never used the paid support."
"The operational overhead is higher compared to Azure because we own the hardware."
"Most of time, you can get Ceph with the OpenStack solution in a subscription​​ as a bundle.​"
"If you can afford a product like Red Hat Ceph Storage then go for it. If you cannot, then you need to test Ceph and get your hands dirty."
"The other big advantage is that Ceph is free software. Compared to traditional SAN based storage, it is very economical."
"There is no cost for software."
"The price of Red Hat Ceph Storage is reasonable."
"I rate the product’s pricing an eight out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise20
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business36
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise15
 

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 DataCore SANsymphony SDS?
Regarding the pricing of the solution, it's better than before. They have made some improvements regarding the pricin...
What do you like most about DataCore SANsymphony?
The dashboard is very intuitive, and there are a lot of counters to diagnose what happens during a short period (like...
What needs improvement with DataCore SANsymphony?
The area of DataCore SANsymphony that has room for improvement is the support. I cannot determine if certain features...
How does Red Hat Ceph Storage compare with MiniO?
Red Hat Ceph does well in simplifying storage integration by replacing the need for numerous storage solutions. This ...
What do you like most about Red Hat Ceph Storage?
The high availability of the solution is important to us.
What needs improvement with Red Hat Ceph Storage?
Areas of Red Hat Ceph Storage that have room for improvement include more promotion. Many people do not know about th...
 

Also Known As

No data available
DataCore Virtual SAN
Ceph
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL
Volkswagen , Maimonides Medical Center, NASA, Thorntons, Inc., TUI, ISCO Industries, Pee Dee Electric Cooperative, United Financial Credit Union, Derby Supply Chain Solutions, Mission Community Hospital, Bellarmine College Preparatory, Colby-Sawyer College, Mount Sinai Health System, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Quorn Foods, Bitburger, University of Birmingham, Stadtverwaltung Heidelberg, NetEnt to name a few.
Dell, DreamHost
Find out what your peers are saying about DataCore SANsymphony vs. Red Hat Ceph Storage and other solutions. Updated: August 2025.
867,676 professionals have used our research since 2012.