We performed a comparison between Dell EMC PowerStore and IBM FlashSystem based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: When compared, both solutions received similar ratings in all categories except for service and support. Users of IBM FlashSystem were more satisfied with the service.
"Non-disruptive upgrades: You can upgrade at anytime without worry."
"Pure Storage is extremely reliable — it's never failed."
"On a scale of one to ten, where ten is the most comfortable pricing, I rate the solution a nine out of ten."
"All updates, upgrades, and hardware work are all performed on-line with no impact."
"The amount of data that I have moved to it from legacy storage has enabled us to retire units that are three or four times the physical size."
"The stability of Pure Storage is very very good."
"The most valuable feature of Pure Storage FlashArray is the complete set of functions it provides."
"The support team is available all the time and they seem to know what they are doing."
"The initial setup was straightforward."
"The supportability of SCME drives for faster data access from the PowerStore and is the most valuable feature."
"The compression is excellent."
"For access from virtual machines, iSCSI, and NFS, it is very good. It helps increase performance."
"It provides a big benefit when upgrading a new VMware environment. For example, in a big environment with 10 to 30 ESXs, you can take everything and put that into PowerStore. So, it is cost-effective, which is very important and has been massive for us. You reduce almost 80% from the hardware and work directly from PowerStore. Building hardware, especially in a big VMware environment, is a big issue for my organization."
"You can add compute and capacity independently. We have sized the solution based on our current needs, but in the future we can choose to increase capacity if we grow our activity in the market. And if we have more business in our monetary system, we can increase compute. The ability to choose what we increase is a good feature."
"Gives us flexibility, performance, and ease of use. It also has some very good compression capabilities. We were looking for a solution that was easy to install in our VMware environment, that was flexible. PowerStore X is a type of a VMware cluster that you install inside your environment. If you have a VMware environment, like we have in production, it's easy to install and use."
"Pricing is very good. It's very competitive against those of all the others that I looked at in the marketplace, such as Hitachi, IBM, HP, and Pure. Dell is right there in the mix as far as providing the best price point as well as meeting the performance requirements that we have."
"The Flash core models offer amazing performance."
"The performance monitoring feature is useful as it can report in 15 minute intervals by hour, day, week, month, or by a custom date range."
"Most of the features for the reduction in data compression are useful. It is also very easy to use and administer. Its performance is also good."
"One of the valuable features is the performance, it is one of the best in the market."
"The speed and the ease of installation are the most valuable features."
"We've found the solution to be very stable so far."
"The speed of the unit is its best feature. It performs very well."
"The solution is scalable and has varying degrees of scalability."
"I would love to see a true one click upgrade solution. Right now, you have to click and schedule an appointment with Pure Storage to be able to upgrade. I would love for it to automatically download, install, and fall-over every controller as it updates."
"The GUI could improve, it could be more intuitive. There is hidden functionality."
"We would like to see more development on their Copy Automation Tool (CAT) for Oracle, as well as better integration for our customers running Oracle VM."
"We haven't seen ROI."
"The primary drawback is the cost, which can be prohibitive for small configurations."
"In the next release I would like to see integration into other third-party player providers like Google."
"Automation could be simplified."
"In the next version of this program, I would like to see increased security, higher encryption, and faster throughput."
"When you create a case on Dell's support website, you don't always get someone who is experienced in the kind of systems you need help with...making it an area where Dell's support team needs to make improvements."
"I do not like having to use VPLEX for synchronous replication, as opposed to having the store software built-in."
"PowerStore's management console could be improved."
"I would like to see a Snapshot feature. Currently, it is unable to occupy the capacity."
"The UI should be a little more user-friendly to manage."
"The only thing is that with PowerStore, we don't have a solution for the file object."
"The storage could be improved. I would like a feature for how to best secure an appliance and the storage since we are connecting the container to the public cloud. I would like them to develop another level of security, making it more secure than from what they have now."
"With PowerStore, we have to choose between block storage and NAS functionality."
"The generic functionality of IBM FlashSystem, IBM always dismisses using file share or sharing protocols inside their storage hardware, and they only focus on the block-level storage."
"IBM should improve its data reduction development."
"The customer's expectations are what they get on the cloud, they're expecting even in the on-premises deployments, going forward."
"The marketing could be improved."
"Enterprise data storage needs improvement. They should create a feature for data and file storage."
"The solution is not able to replicate data in one-to-many scenario."
"The product needs to improve their scalability."
"The solution's infrastructure technology level could be PCI Express 5 instead of PCI Express 4 for the next version."
IBM FlashSystem products are enterprise computer data storage systems that store data on flash memory chips. Unlike storage systems that use standard solid-state drives, IBM FlashSystem products incorporate custom hardware based on technology from the 2012 acquisition of Texas Memory Systems. This hardware provides performance, reliability, and efficiency benefits versus competitive offerings.
Dell PowerStore is ranked 1st in All-Flash Storage with 46 reviews while IBM FlashSystem is ranked 6th in All-Flash Storage with 105 reviews. Dell PowerStore is rated 8.6, while IBM FlashSystem is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Dell PowerStore writes "It has a very strong NAS that can support a lot of big, heavy environments". On the other hand, the top reviewer of IBM FlashSystem writes "An easy GUI and simple provisioning but our model does not support compression". Dell PowerStore is most compared with Dell Unity XT, NetApp AFF, Dell PowerMax NVMe, HPE Nimble Storage and Huawei OceanStor Dorado, whereas IBM FlashSystem is most compared with NetApp AFF, Dell Unity XT, Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform, HPE Nimble Storage and Dell PowerMax NVMe. See our Dell PowerStore vs. IBM FlashSystem report.
See our list of best All-Flash Storage vendors.
We monitor all All-Flash Storage 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.