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Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers vs HPE BladeSystem comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 3, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.6
Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers offer reliability, cost savings, and efficiency, improving performance, integration, and ensuring a stable work environment.
Sentiment score
7.7
HPE BladeSystem offers high ROI, reduces costs, enhances performance, and delivers visible returns within two years.
By not having to worry about it, I would estimate we save two to four hours a week, depending on what's happening, such as if we need to spin up a new server, which would contribute to more time if done the old way.
In my immediate case for antenna analysis, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers offer a reduction from days of computing to half a day or hours.
The value of uptime to us is critical.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.6
Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are praised for effective customer service, with suggestions for faster responses and improved communication.
Sentiment score
6.8
HPE BladeSystem service effectiveness varies by region, with Proactive Care recommended for advanced needs and improvements in support efficiency needed.
It has always been scheduled maintenance, which says a lot for a production environment, as we haven't had to call in a trouble ticket for the actual hardware during its entire run.
Typically, the contacts we have on-site are very knowledgeable, they come in within a day and usually have it fixed and taken care of if there are issues.
When we had a power supply failure out of the box, we called support, and they delivered the replacement within four hours as promised.
I would rate technical support from HPE as an eight on a scale from one to ten.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers offer scalability and customization, enabling seamless integration and efficient performance for growing business needs.
Sentiment score
7.7
HPE BladeSystem is praised for scalability, ease of expansion, and modularity, integrating well with existing infrastructure.
The scalability of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is excellent.
Any outages or blackouts are limited to particular servers, not affecting the whole chassis or enclosures.
We bought our product with scaling involved, and we've been scaling it up anytime we've needed more storage.
I encounter challenges in identifying reasonable prices during the setup cost and licensing process, especially for scalability when we need to contact different vendors for quotes to find competitive offers.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are praised for stability, reliability, and performance, with minimal downtime and robust resilience.
Sentiment score
7.9
HPE BladeSystem is stable and reliable, with minor issues like firmware updates and hardware glitches quickly resolved by support.
Over four years, we've had less than 1 percent downtime.
There is a feature to update the server while it is running, so there is no need to restart.
We have truly not had any downtime on the infrastructure at all.
I do not have to call HP support frequently, which indicates its reliability.
 

Room For Improvement

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers need improved performance, scalability, integration, and support, while addressing pricing, efficiency, and customization concerns.
HPE BladeSystem users seek better scalability, cloud integration, user interfaces, and support while addressing licensing, network, and pricing issues.
We need to know about any upcoming updates so that we can plan accordingly.
The beneficial aspect of that feature was that we could skip the PowerStore and just have the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers alone, as they also served as storage, which helped us save money.
This forces you to go up to a larger server to get the desired processor, which increases the cost.
To do any customization, we need to contact HP technical support, and the process is not user-friendly.
In general, there is a 10% to 15% price gap compared to competitors.
 

Setup Cost

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers offer competitive pricing, transparent licensing, iDRAC management savings, and discounts on bulk purchases.
Enterprise buyers consider HPE BladeSystem's high initial cost justified, though licensing complexity and regional price adaptation are concerns.
They have been stable and running for years without performance downtime or significant disc failures.
Some customers find it cheaper due to contractual agreements, while others find it expensive, especially when scaling up.
The software associated with servers, like VMware subscription licenses, drives costs.
With around 19 years of exposure in working with various servers, including HPE, I encounter challenges in identifying reasonable prices during the setup cost and licensing process, especially for scalability when we need to contact different vendors for quotes to find competitive offers.
In general, there is a 10% to 15% price gap compared to competitors.
 

Valuable Features

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers excel in scalability, management, security, and performance, making them ideal for demanding workloads and organizations.
The HPE BladeSystem is praised for its scalability, manageability, compact design, and seamless integration with existing infrastructure.
They keep running for at least five to seven years without any issues.
With PowerEdge Servers, I don't need a one-to-one ratio redundancy, which leads to about eighty percent downtime reduction.
One of the valuable features is Active Directory, which helps in managing the network.
The integration of storage and networking components within the HPE BladeSystem is quite beneficial as it is easily interoperable if we are using the same system for monitoring with the same software, which eliminates interoperability issues.
The feature I find most valuable is the ease of use.
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers
Ranking in Blade Servers
5th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
208
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (3rd), Data Center Networking (4th), Rack Servers (1st)
HPE BladeSystem
Ranking in Blade Servers
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
139
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Blade Servers category, the mindshare of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is 1.9%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE BladeSystem is 13.9%, down from 15.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Blade Servers
 

Featured Reviews

Syed Masuood - PeerSpot reviewer
Handles workloads and diverse applications efficiently
We have a lot of VMs on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. On a single server, we have probably hosted 14 or 15 VMs. Out of these, 8 to 10 are continuously running, and four of them are backup VMs, so it can handle a good workload. For cybersecurity, it is only accessible on the intranet; it is not accessible through the web. We use it for local development purposes, and it is behind our firewall. Its security is strong. We handle a lot of test data for government and confidential customers. It is safe and strong locally. We have not experienced any security issues. Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers have helped to reduce unplanned production downtime if we need to replace a hard disk, instead of completely shutting a server, there is a hot swap feature. It is quite good in that aspect. Usually, for any activity, there is a downtime of about 30 minutes. It has saved a lot of time. We have tried AI workloads for a development environment for a government customer in Singapore. The servers are hosted in Singapore. It is an ML-based engine with AI. It is a government project where data is processed, and we run it on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. The benefit of running AI workloads on PowerEdge Servers is that it is easy to allocate memory. The application we are running is memory intensive. It is pretty easy to scale memory and storage.
Fatai Akinwande - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables you to manage all resources from a single dashboard using the OneView feature
In terms of improvements, I'd suggest enhancing the stability of the HPE BladeSystem, especially regarding network connectivity. We once had an issue where a system didn’t communicate with the network, and it took a while to diagnose the problem. Eventually, we discovered it was a motherboard issue, but we initially thought it was the network card. Improving the onboard administratordashboard to provide more granular insights, like clearly identifying faultycomponents, would make troubleshooting much more efficient. Aside from that, the system is superb and has been reliable.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Educational Organization
6%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

When shopping for a rack server, would you go with Dell EMC Poweredge or Lenovo Thinksystem?
Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether the Dell EMC Poweredge or Lenovo Thinksystem rack servers were the better fit for us. We ultimately decided to go with Dell EMC Poweredge....
What do you like most about Dell EMC PowerEdge Rack Servers?
It has helped us reduce unplanned downtime by 20% to 30%.
What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerEdge Rack Servers?
Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers have higher hardware costs compared to HPE ProLiant servers, which are cheaper. From reliability, performance, and sustainability perspectives, Dell PowerEdge Rack Serve...
How would you choose between HPE's Bladesystem and Synergy?
For me, choosing between HPE’s Bladesystem and Synergy came down to which solution was more powerful, reliable, and stable. It turns out Bladesystem was the winner. Bladesystem is excellent because...
What do you like most about HPE BladeSystem?
The solution is scalable, offering flexibility and expansion options to meet changing business needs.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE BladeSystem?
With around 19 years of exposure in working with various servers, including HPE, I encounter challenges in identifying reasonable prices during the setup cost and licensing process, especially for ...
 

Also Known As

PowerEdge R
HP ProLiant BL Series Servers, HP ProLiant BladeSystem
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NxtGen Datacenter, Medien-Service Untermain (MSU), Exasol, IndigoVision, Dayco
EMIS Health
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers vs. HPE BladeSystem and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,168 professionals have used our research since 2012.