DataCore SANsymphony vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between DataCore SANsymphony and StarWind Virtual SAN based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Software Defined Storage (SDS) solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN Report (Updated: September 2023).
734,678 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
"I found the solution to be very stable.""The most valuable feature of DataCore SANsymphony SDS is its high availability. This solution also exhibits good performance and has high stability.""DataCore SANsymphony's stability is okay.""I am very happy with this product's ability to adapt, increase, and modify existing infrastructures.""It is a very stable solution.""Active-active is the most valuable aspect for us.""It is a stable solution.""SANsymphony is flexible, with many potential options for implementation. SANsymphony's can be used with VMware, Hyper-V, or even with a hypervisor agnostic approach. It can also be used for strictly physical non-virtualized solutions."

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"The install itself is easy as pie.""We are able to execute maintenance on one server while the other is still running.""Virtual SAN runs on iSCSI, which is free and easy to configure. It's easy to manage from StarWind's GUI console, and it only required a few extra switch ports.""With an uptime of 384 days, StarWind has improved overall server reliability.""I like StarWind's high availability. The failover is almost immediate, so the end users have no idea the guest VM moved at all. We can failover all guest VMs onto a single hypervisor, place it into maintenance mode, install updates, and reboot a hypervisor all during the daytime and remotely, with confidence the process will be successful.""It provided the much-needed HA on an extremely low budget.""They offer top-tier support.""StarWind Virtual SAN is essentially hardware agnostic, allowing us to build out a specific hardware layer based upon the customer's unique requirements."

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Cons
"The graphical interface is not always very stable.""If it could integrate to a cloud gateway, then we could carry it directly to storage, instead of having middleware in between the storage and the cloud.""SANsymphony is missing some features that vSAN has. For example, vSAN has a special feature called continuous data protection. It provides the ability to go back in time to a given moment. You can see what was on your disk in the past up to two weeks. That's a great feature because ransomware attacks are increasingly common, and that provides you some kind of protection.""Its interface could be better.""If you're dealing with big databases or transactional databases, it might not be the best-suited solution. The design of DataCore's solution isn't oriented towards this type of data.""The cloud reporting interface is quite poor compared to other vendors.""We'd like to manage the raid on the disk directly in SanSymphony.""There is room for improvement in the graphical interface."

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"Regular updates to the software are required, and subtle design changes would be welcome.""We have, in rare cases, received conflicting guidance between different support folks within StarWind.""A web management interface would be good, especially for those coming from other solutions that have one.""The platform needs to improve user management and the web console.""The most disappointing side of the application is the free edition. There used to be GUI attached. That has recently changed to only CLI management of the application.""For me, the product could be improved by it being made cheaper.""For someone entering the IT sector with little knowledge of storage, iSCSI, and virtual disks, they might not find the GUI immediately obvious.""Perhaps more reporting features on the utilization, usage, and performance of the configured high-availability images and underlying physical disks would be helpful."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "The solution is cost effective."
  • "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."
  • "DataCore SANsymphony's pricing is very high and should be much cheaper."
  • More DataCore SANsymphony Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "For two nodes, it cost us $10,000, and we spend $2,000 a year on support."
  • "If you are looking at a traditional SAN for a small cluster, give StarWind vSAN because you will save thousands without any compromise."
  • More StarWind Virtual SAN Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:DataCore SANsymphony's pricing is very high and should be much cheaper. You buy a license of DataCore SANsymphony, and then you have to add three or four times the price in hardware. You have several… more »
    Top Answer:It's difficult to say if something is missing in this solution. Maybe we'd like to manage the raid on the disk directly in SanSymphony. We essentially use RAID5 for our SAS disk and SSD, and now we… more »
    Top Answer:We like their high availability. It reduces the downtime for our entire organization's environment.
    Top Answer:The Premium ProActive service price is a little high, yet worth the price.
    Top Answer:It is hard to find adequate technical documentation on their support website. However, they have a fantastic technical forum and Premium ProActive email support services. We can find a lot of… more »
    Ranking
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    9.3
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    Average Words per Review
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    Rating
    9.6
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    DataCore SANsymphony SDS, DataCore, SANsymphony-V, Hyperconverged Virtual SAN
    Learn More
    DataCore
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    Overview

    DataCore SANsymphony is a very powerful software-defined storage (SDS) solution that makes it easy for organizations to take control of their data storage operations. It makes it so that users can choose the way that their data storage infrastructure is built and operates. Businesses that choose DataCore SANsymphony find that potential threats to their data are either removed completely or mitigated.

    DataCore SANsymphony Benefits

    Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by choosing to deploy DataCore SANsymphony include:

    • Low operation costs. DataCore SANsymphony is designed so that users can take full advantage of its many features and capabilities without having to pay large sums of money and allocate similarly large blocks of time. The solution enables organizations to leverage whatever storage hardware they are already using to store their data. DataCore SANsymphony is hardware agnostic and, as a result, users can easily integrate it with the physical infrastructure that is most convenient for them. Furthermore, businesses can manage all of their storage devices from a single management console. This cuts down on the costs associated with the administration of an organization’s storage operations.
    • Flexibility. Users of DataCore SANsymphony can conduct their storage operations with a high level of flexibility. They can gather all of their storage capabilities in one place and deliver them uniformly across all of their devices, regardless of the physical infrastructure. Organizations can deploy their storage operations in multiple ways and use many different types of architecture They can easily and seamlessly move between them as their business needs demand it. Should they desire to, they can stick with whatever system they had been using up until that point.
    • Continuous, uninterrupted operation. DataCore SANsymphony keeps the data that users store with it in a state where it can be accessed at any time. It comes with autonomous safeguards that save a user from experiencing a loss of data when their architecture experiences some sort of system failure. Data is saved beforehand and stored remotely so that it can be retrieved if necessary. It also enables users to recover lost digital architecture so that a business can continue running smoothly even if a disaster wipes out a part of or the entirety of their architecture.

    DataCore SANsymphony Features

    Some of the many features DataCore SANsymphony offers include:

    • Data security. DataCore SANsymphony provides users with a high level of data protection. Users can leverage machine learning and artificial intelligence to scan for and analyze potential threats to their data. They can then receive recommendations that enable them to avoid or at least mitigate potential issues.
    • Auto-tiering. An organization’s data can be automatically assigned a hierarchical storage value. Users do not need to classify and create tiers to hold their data. This solution has a feature that classifies and hierarchically stores data without requiring users to intervene.
    • Automatic load balancing. DataCore SANsymphony is built with the ability to automatically balance workloads. The solution will bypass channels that are slow or that fail to ensure that operations run as smoothly as possible. This will take place without the intervention of system administrators.

    Reviews from Real Users

    DataCore SANsymphony is a solution that stands out even when compared to its top competitors. Two major advantages it offers are its synchronous mirroring capability and the high level of reliability that it provides.

    A Systems and Network Engineer at a computer software company writes, “The synchronous mirroring is great. Storage is always available. This is the main feature of DataCore SANsymphony SDS which allows very high storage availability and better protection against environmental incidents (electrical, flooding, etc.).”

    Fernando V., a LAN Engineer at Maimonides Medical Center, says, “The software just works and is reliable. Downtime due to storage maintenance or upgrades is long gone. We have multiple types of software running to differentiate our applications. This gives us more value due to the fact that we can use the application to segment workloads if needed. The bottom line is that the software runs our applications on whatever storage vendor we choose - and it does so reliably.”

    StarWind Virtual SAN provides high availability and fault tolerance for virtualized environments without the need for dedicated SAN hardware. It allows for real-time replication between servers, shared storage for Hyper-V clusters, and enables vMotion and High Availability features for VMware vSphere. The solution reduces costs and leverages existing hardware while providing a scalable and reliable infrastructure. Valuable features include ease of use, scalability, top-tier support, hardware agnosticism, and the ability to use off-the-shelf standard servers to increase storage space. StarWind VSAN has helped organizations improve performance, data availability, and data security while reducing downtime and providing cost-saving storage options.

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    Sample Customers
    Volkswagen, Maimonides Medical Center, The Biodesign Institute, 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.
    Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Non Profit30%
    Computer Software Company12%
    Manufacturing Company6%
    Construction Company6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company25%
    Comms Service Provider8%
    Financial Services Firm6%
    Healthcare Company6%
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company10%
    Construction Company9%
    Educational Organization8%
    Computer Software Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company19%
    Government9%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    Financial Services Firm7%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business49%
    Midsize Enterprise14%
    Large Enterprise37%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business41%
    Midsize Enterprise12%
    Large Enterprise47%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business63%
    Midsize Enterprise22%
    Large Enterprise15%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business25%
    Midsize Enterprise17%
    Large Enterprise58%
    Buyer's Guide
    DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN
    September 2023
    Find out what your peers are saying about DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: September 2023.
    734,678 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    DataCore SANsymphony is ranked 4th in Software Defined Storage (SDS) with 14 reviews while StarWind Virtual SAN is ranked 1st in Software Defined Storage (SDS) with 100 reviews. DataCore SANsymphony is rated 9.2, while StarWind Virtual SAN is rated 9.6. The top reviewer of DataCore SANsymphony writes "Easily scalable with great technical support and very good snapshot capabilities". On the other hand, the top reviewer of StarWind Virtual SAN writes "Easy to set up and maintain with good performance capabilities". DataCore SANsymphony is most compared with VMware vSAN, HPE SimpliVity, StorMagic SvSAN, Pure Storage FlashArray and VxRail, whereas StarWind Virtual SAN is most compared with VMware vSAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct, Red Hat Ceph Storage, StorMagic SvSAN and HPE SimpliVity. See our DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN report.

    See our list of best Software Defined Storage (SDS) vendors and best HCI vendors.

    We monitor all Software Defined Storage (SDS) 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.