We performed a comparison between Dell XtremIO and SolidFire based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two All-Flash Storage solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."The Pure1 component is most valuable at this point in time when comparing it with EMC. Pure1 is where you can have your diagnostics in the cloud, so you can look at things from your mobile phone."
"It's helped us because we've changed fundamentally what we talk about. We don't talk about storage and different tiers of storage anymore nor do we talk about servers. We talk now about applications and how applications impact the business and end users."
"We're able to get higher-density workloads on the same infrastructure, and we have a smaller physical footprint. The performance is excellent – during our test the bottlenecks are never on the X array, it just keeps picking up the pace to match what you need. The real-time visibility is a differentiator in my opinion."
"The most valuable features of this solution are its ease of use and performance."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is its ease of use."
"The most valuable features of Pure FlashArray X NVMe are its superior performance compared to other flash tiers, as well as its ease of use, with an intuitive user interface that is simple to deploy and use."
"The solution is very straightforward to set up."
"What I really like about this program, is that it is easy to use and easy to configurate."
"Performance and deduplication. This is a very robust block storage option that offers both performance and data optimization."
"Thin storage allocation"
"The most valuable feature of Dell EMC XtremIO is the data protection (DP) group, it is one of the most advanced features in these types of arrays. The dedupe and compression that this array provides both do a superb job."
"It is great for applications like Microsoft Exchange, ERP, SQL and VDI; basically saved the VDI buy-in from users, as now performance was seamless in comparison to a physical PC."
"It was very easy and straightforward to setup."
"The guaranteed sub-millisecond response time for a 4K block."
"The program is very stable."
"XtremIO is very stable."
"It's got full API functionality and the performance is pretty steady."
"The simplicity of it."
"The quality of service for minimum iOS, to maximum iOS in a multi-terminal environment is very powerful. The SQL service feature is the best part of SolidFire."
"SolidFire is one of the products that does have great APIs right out-of-the-box. It works great. The tools and the other stuff seem to work a little better right out-of-the-box than the ONTAP stuff does, C-Mode."
"Feature-wise, it is a good solution allowing users to monitor and simplify their networks. The solution also provides its users with flexibility by enabling them to utilize its extensions."
"We can just buy them, scale them as we need on demand, and we don't have to spend so many front end cycles on designing the architecture."
"Overall performance of the solution."
"Individual settings you can put on each individual volume, if you want to do that."
"In terms of what needs improvement, the dashboard and management could be simplified."
"We would like to see more visibility into garbage collection and CPU performance in the GUI."
"I would like to see replication and DR features in the next release of this solution."
"Our use cases require more multi-tenant capabilities and additional VLAN interfaces for separating different customers. We currently use it to provide storage, sometimes shared storage, to different customers, but it is less flexible in comparison to a dedicated solution."
"In the next release, I would like to see real-time analytics for further insight into consumption models."
"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."
"You cannot tag a LUN with a description, and that should be improved. What I like on the Unity side is that when I expand LUNs or do things, there is an information field on the LUN. This is the Information field that you can tag on your LUNs to let yourself know, "Hey, I've added this much space on this date". Pure lacks that ability. So, you don't have a mechanism that's friendly for tracking your data expansions on the LUN and for adding any additional information. That's a downside for me."
"We have run into a couple of instances recently where we are running out of space. So we have had to buy some more packs for it and they have deployed fine and it has increased smoothly."
"We've encountered challenges in integrating other products with Dell Xtremio, as it tends to be more vendor-locked. This means we can't easily explore other solutions that might work alongside Dell."
"The management should be improved and the GUI interface could be better and easier."
"I would like to see more scalability."
"Management: At the time, there was no snapshot scheduler, so I had to write XSnapCourier to address it. The sad thing is that even after the newest release, which includes a native scheduler, most customers using XSnapCourier chose to stick with it due to a more feature-rich experience."
"Dell's technical support could be better."
"Right now, external appliances are needed to replicate XtremIO to XtremIO, or to another EMC system."
"Native data replication: To replicate data between XtremIO devices, you need to use EMC’s RecoverPoint appliances to move the data."
"Get rid of the Java aspect of the GUI console."
"It would be good to provide administrative access at the root level to be able to do things with the system, if need be."
"They could make the mNode more user-friendly. Now you need to configure and add nodes by CLI and it’s not really easy to manage. If they created a web interface to do the management of the mNode, that would be great!."
"SolidFire could improve in terms of hardware robustness."
"They could do a file-based NAS: SolidFire NAS-based. It's probably not its niche, but that is our direction, not to use block, and it's block. Solid state block is what it is."
"We are looking for, potentially, on the Active IQ reporting side, to do reporting based on the datastore. Right now, I can report on the whole SolidFire, or I can report on just a certain datastore or a volume. I'd like to take all of my VDI infrastructure, which as an example would be multiple datastores."
"The upgrade process could be better."
"The tool should improve its initial cost which is expensive compared to other products."
"SolidFire should start from two nodes instead of the four nodes. That's the only thing. In a lot of solutions, we have to use four nodes, that's the better thing. But as a starting point, two is better. That's why their starting point is expensive."
Dell XtremIO is ranked 26th in All-Flash Storage with 48 reviews while SolidFire is ranked 19th in All-Flash Storage with 33 reviews. Dell XtremIO is rated 7.6, while SolidFire is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Dell XtremIO writes "Suitable for high IOPS and helps get backup in ten minutes ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SolidFire writes "A versatile storage solution suitable for various workloads in cloud environments providing scalable architecture, granular Quality of Service and consistent performance". Dell XtremIO is most compared with Dell PowerStore, Dell PowerMax NVMe, Pure Storage FlashArray, Dell Unity XT and NetApp AFF, whereas SolidFire is most compared with NetApp AFF, Dell PowerStore, VMware vSAN and Pure Storage FlashArray. See our Dell XtremIO vs. SolidFire report.
See our list of best All-Flash Storage vendors.
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