Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers vs IBM Power Systems comparison

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers vs. IBM Power Systems

Download the complete report

Helped 849,686 peers since 2012

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

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Ranking in Rack Servers

1st

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

171

Ranking in other categories

Converged Infrastructure (3rd), Data Center Networking (4th), Blade Servers (5th)

IBM Power Systems

Ranking in Rack Servers

4th

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

8.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Rack Servers category, the mindshare of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is 27.8%, down from 28.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Power Systems is 9.1%, up from 8.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Rack Servers

Featured Reviews

Syed Masuood

Country manager at Asta Innosys

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.

Read full review

Omobolaji Olaloku

Senior Enterprise System Engineer at Zenith-bank

Extremely stable, good ROI, and scalable

The most valuable feature of our machines is their ability to replace faulty parts without causing any downtime. Our servers are equipped with advanced technology, making it possible to replace defective parts without having to bring down the servers. This is crucial, as any disruption to our services would result in inconvenience to our customers. Therefore, being able to service the machines and replace parts without causing any downtime is highly beneficial.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"From a technical perspective, the iDRAC system's most valuable feature is its performance, while from the customer's perspective, it is the other features."

"PowerEdge Rack Servers are very good for handling the evolving needs of high-performance workloads."

"The most valuable features are that they are very reliable, and Dell's technical service is also optimal."

"iDRAC is the most valuable feature because of the ease of use and management and everything that it provides is super useful. The security features that PowerEdge provides, including firmware threat detection is good."

"I rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers 10 out of 10. Nothing we have tested has been better."

"The configuration and BIOS management are flexible. It's easy to install 10 GB network cards on the rack. They have a good selection that simplifies the network connections."

"We are very satisfied with Dell in terms of servers and service. We are happy with Dell servers. They are aligned with our services. They are robust."

"You can use Dell PowerEdge hardware for anything. It supports everything such as file servers, web servers, and DB servers. It can support all critical servers and applications. There are bank applications running on PowerEdge servers."

More Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers pros

"The most valuable feature of IBM Power Systems is its performance."

"The virtualization and the quality you get from it is one reason we like the solution."

"It is a very scalable solution."

"The best features of the solution are its robustness and service level."

"The most valuable features of the solution are disaster recovery, replication, and the ability to migrate to another location."

"The main feature that I have found most valuable is PowerVM - its virtualization feature which is the most powerful."

"Power Systems' best features are that it's reliable, stable, and easily available. It's also really scalable and can be virtualized without third-party software support."

"BM Power Systems get updated every two years and are scalable and stable."

More IBM Power Systems pros

Cons

"There is room for improvement in certain aspects of the deployment process as it is a bit complex."

"All of the marketing terminologies from Dell are very complicated as they have names that sometimes involve the same technology."

"It's more from the pandemic, however, the logistics part of it could be better."

"There are issues, of course, but not major issues. On a scale of one to 10, the stability is a nine."

"Access to specific card models can be limited, and sometimes we require smaller cards than those offered by Dell."

"As the disks and memory should be expandable, I would highlight scalability as an issue."

"We use Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers in the data center. We put the racks in bays. They can improve the compactness so that we can put more of them."

"I would like to see more information about server health and the server's state, on the front. HP has a little screen that shows server utilization, how many disks there are inside, and the power consumption. HP also shows an alert if there is a malfunction of any device inside."

More Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers cons

"In the next release, I would like to see additional graphical dashboards to help the administrators access information more easily."

"One of the features that we would like, and I think they are also adapting to the latest trends in the market, is to make it more open, more flexible... With VMware, anybody can create a virtual machine without any knowledge of the server side. But with AIX it's a bit difficult."

"The pricing of the product could always be lowered."

"In my country, there are power supply interruptions. IBM could find ways to make the product stable through these interruptions."

"Sometimes, the availability of additional services can be a challenge. Certain IBM software takes time to deliver to the client. It can be slow."

"The price is a bit high and could be improved."

"Price and complexity related to the management of the solution are areas of concern in the solution where improvements are required."

"The solution is quite expensive."

More IBM Power Systems cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The high cost of Dell PowerEdge Rack Server licenses is attributed to the pre-installed Windows Server operating system from Microsoft."

"We weren't paying very much, but it was at the end of the lifecycle. We are now using the VxRail hyper-converged infrastructure, and the pricing was very similar for the same amount of power but with easier automation."

"When you compare public cloud solutions to PowerEdge in terms of cost, initially the cost of Dell servers or Dell technology was really high. However, right now it's on par or, maybe, even cheaper when we use Dell hardware. If we don't swap it out in three years and if we stretch it to four or five years, then we can get even more of an ROI versus cloud cost."

"The pricing for this solution is reasonable. We pay a basic premium with a military premium on top of that."

"The pricing is fair enough."

"The tool's pricing is very good."

"I don't know about the product's licensing part. Price-wise, it is an okay product. I believe that the cheaper the better, but I think that the product's price is okay."

"The cost structure associated with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers aligns closely with the prevailing norms established within the information technology hardware sector."

More Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers pricing and cost advice

"The pricing of the solution is very good because we can beat any other competitor with the pricing. Lately, they have offered good pricing for their customer."

"Power Systems is a bit more costly than other products in the market, but in terms of ROI and the longevity, performance, and reliability that Power Systems provides, it's worth it in the long run."

"The price of IBM Power Systems is expensive and could improve."

"There is a yearly licensing cost, and it's an expensive solution."

"The price of the solution could be somewhat better and this is what lowers my rating of it to a seven or eight out of ten."

"When there is an error in the SAS drive of 10,000 RPM, my company buys support for 1,500 USD."

"The licensing costs are okay. With IBM Power Systems, it's inclusive, so you can differentiate the price of the hardware from the software itself."

"The solution's pricing is very, very high compared to other platforms."

More IBM Power Systems pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Rack Servers solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Answers from the Community

Leonel Simões

Owner at Euritex

Jan 16, 2022

Dell EMC PowerEdge Rack Servers vs IBM Power Systems: which product to choose and why?

2 out of 3 answers

Md. Shohel Rawshan Sarker

Manager at Mutural Trust Bank

Aug 16, 2021

IBM Power Systems vs Dell PowerEdge Rack Server IBM Power Systems is a RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) system that contains 8 threads or over per core. This processor performs super-fast due to the RISC algorithm technology than any other Intel-based hardware (e.g., Dell, HPE, Cisco). In Intel, there are only 2 or 4 threads per core and it performs according to CISC (Complex Instruction Set Computer). IBM Power system is a sustainable, reliable and obviously costly solution compared to any other Intel-based solution. Generally, IBM Power system is used in mission-critical systems.

Read full answer

Nicolae

System and Solutions Architect at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

Jan 3, 2022

IBM Power comes with virtualization integrated (PowerVM), highly optimized (practically with no performance impact) - no need for VMWare, HyperV etc. For database it is the recomended platform - even is Hana, Oracle (best combination with AIX) or DB2 (DB2 for me is the most autonomous database that you can have). The downside of IBM Power could be the lack of support for Windows and the initial cost.

Read full answer

See all 3 answers

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

22%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

University

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

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 pretty much progressed a lot if we look at what features are on them now. I don't know what more could be asked for, perhaps just faster performance. Every ( /produ...

What do you like most about IBM Power Systems?

IBM Power Systems provides very good performance and stability compared to other brands or processors.

What needs improvement with IBM Power Systems?

IBM should provide a platform where users can learn about the storage and security of IBM Power Systems.

What is your primary use case for IBM Power Systems?

In my company, we use the system for the data center and our IBM Cloud Pak System.

HPE ProLiant DL Servers vs Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Comparisons

Compared 41% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem Rack Servers vs Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Compared 31% of the time

Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers vs Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Compared 9% of the time

Huawei FusionServer RH Series Rack Servers vs Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Compared 5% of the time

HPE Apollo Systems vs Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Compared 3% of the time

More Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers Competitors

Intel Server System vs IBM Power Systems

Compared 41% of the time

Oracle SPARC Servers vs IBM Power Systems

Compared 17% of the time

HPE ProLiant DL Servers vs IBM Power Systems

Compared 15% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem Rack Servers vs IBM Power Systems

Compared 6% of the time

HPE Apollo Systems vs IBM Power Systems

Compared 2% of the time

More IBM Power Systems Competitors

Product Reports

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers

Download Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers product report

IBM Power Systems

Download IBM Power Systems product report

Also Known As

PowerEdge R

IBM OpenPOWER LC

Overview

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are designed to optimize performance and efficiency in a data center environment, supporting various applications. Dell stands as the leading vendor in accelerated servers for AI, commanding a 33.8% revenue share. Based on user reviews, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers supporting tasks from basic web hosting to more demanding applications like data analytics and virtualization. They are engineered to offer high performance, reliability, and scalability. With a focus on automation and integrated security, these servers simplify operations and protect against threats, making them a smart choice for businesses of all sizes.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are a robust, secure, and scalable solution that can meet the diverse needs of businesses, backed by comprehensive support. Benefits to look for in reviews include performance, reliability, scalability, and customer support.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers key features include:

Scalability: These servers can easily scale to meet growing business needs, supporting more workloads and processing power.
Integrated Security: From hardware to firmware to the operating system, Dell PowerEdge servers are designed with security in mind, offering layers of protection.
Energy Efficiency: Advanced thermal design and energy-smart technology help reduce operational costs and environmental impact.
Automation: With Dell EMC OpenManage, the management of servers is streamlined, allowing for automated deployment, monitoring, and updates.

In terms of implementation, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are used across various industries, from small businesses to large enterprises. They serve as the foundation for IT infrastructure, powering critical applications in healthcare, finance, education, and more. The adaptability of these servers means they can be tailored to specific industry needs, from handling large datasets in research institutions to supporting high-transaction databases in financial services.

Dell Technologies

IBM Power Systems are built to crush the most advanced data applications - from the mission-critical workloads you run today to the next generation of AI.

IBM

Sample Customers

NxtGen Datacenter, Medien-Service Untermain (MSU), Exasol, IndigoVision, Dayco

Cipher

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers vs. IBM Power Systems