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Dell PowerFlex vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 2024

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
7.4
Dell PowerFlex users reported significant ROI through reduced SQL licenses, bundled support, and ongoing value over time.
Sentiment score
7.3
StarWind Virtual SAN offers cost-effective, high-availability solutions with quick ROI through reduced downtime, maintenance, and hardware expenses.
We don't sell a lot of redundant servers, so it's not a massive ROI, but the ability to rely on their technical support and the software's ease of setup allows us to reduce labor costs and go to market competitively.
The cost benefits, as far as we consider, are much better with a StarWind VSAN solution, and the training requirements with the ease of administration simplify and reduce our administrator and professional services costs.
Regarding cost savings, for my client, it was about 20K USD for his specific use and as for extending capacity, StarWind made that process easy.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
3.8
Dell PowerFlex support is responsive and helpful, but users note delays, inefficiencies, and need for better expertise.
Sentiment score
8.3
StarWind Virtual SAN’s support is praised for expertise, quick responses, and comprehensive assistance in technical and account-related issues.
The level of support needs improvement as the front-line support staff lack knowledge when we raise cases.
We do not have local Dell technical support.
Even in the instances where my technical team does not have the ability to manage or troubleshoot or resolve an issue, StarWind's technical team supports and resolves on our behalf very quickly.
They have some awesome guides online that show you exactly how to configure the product, how to do the initial setup, and you can speak with them directly who will be able to connect, verify your setup, run its parameters, and see exactly what's working and what is not, and adjust it, and they really help you with that.
When we set it up, they validate our settings and configurations to ensure we don't miss anything.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Dell PowerFlex is scalable and user-friendly, excelling in performance and adaptability while meeting enterprise demands efficiently.
Sentiment score
7.7
StarWind Virtual SAN excels in scalable storage, easy expansion, broad capabilities with premium licensing, and infrastructure growth compatibility.
The scalability is very good and is one of the key features of Dell PowerFlex.
I believe that scalability should be further improved, especially considering the possibility that environments may grow exponentially.
I have never needed to scale up or add additional nodes with StarWind Virtual SAN, but we have had to expand, and customer support has been excellent.
StarWind Virtual SAN's scalability is good, and I have had an easy experience adding more space to the system.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
9.0
Dell PowerFlex offers reliable, stable performance with high ratings, ensuring robust security and redundancy for diverse, properly configured environments.
Sentiment score
8.5
StarWind Virtual SAN is stable, reliable, and handles workloads seamlessly, with issues often due to external factors, not the software itself.
In my experience, StarWind Virtual SAN is very stable, and I have never had a single instability issue.
It has been working for five years and the customer is still happy with it.
In my experience, StarWind Virtual SAN is stable as I haven't encountered any downtime or issues.
 

Room For Improvement

Dell PowerFlex needs better support, automation, pricing, and user-friendliness, with enhancements in storage, integration, and educational resources.
StarWind Virtual SAN needs better automation, documentation, interface, and centralized management for enhanced user experience and efficiency.
They could have more AI functionality in the future.
The level of support needs improvement as the front-line support staff lack knowledge when we raise cases.
A more intuitive interface or an improved dashboard for monitoring the cluster would also be helpful, as it would facilitate performance tracking and help identify potential issues before they affect services.
There have been cases where not understanding exactly what's failing on the Virtual SAN has been an issue.
Limited feedback in the management GUI is the main area where I would like to see StarWind Virtual SAN get better.
 

Setup Cost

Dell PowerFlex pricing is perceived variably, with users citing competition with Nutanix and HP and noting deployment cost strategies.
StarWind Virtual SAN is praised for cost-effectiveness, flexible licensing, affordable pricing, and excellent support for small enterprises and nonprofits.
The costs are acceptable and very competitive compared to other hardware-only HCI solutions.
I talked to the sales team, they gave me a quote with a perpetual license with the support and everything went through smoothly.
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was that it was easy to implement, license, and the cost was very good.
 

Valuable Features

Dell PowerFlex provides scalable, high-performance integration and management, enhancing security, efficiency, and flexibility with seamless upgrades and reliable resource utilization.
StarWind Virtual SAN offers ease of installation, high availability, excellent support, and integration with existing hardware for seamless virtualization.
The scalability is very good and is one of the key features of Dell PowerFlex.
Thanks to its seamless integration with Proxmox, the implementation of high availability servers has drastically reduced downtime, which is crucial for our security-focused company.
StarWind Virtual SAN helps us keep customer satisfaction and provides the solutions we need without having to hire many IT specialists.
StarWind's storage virtualization and failover capabilities have made a difference for my clusters through uptime improvements, with zero downtime specific to server host maintenance or even maintenance of the StarWind software itself.
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerFlex
Ranking in HCI
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
28
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
StarWind Virtual SAN
Ranking in HCI
5th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
196
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Dell PowerFlex is 11.2%, up from 10.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind Virtual SAN is 2.0%, down from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Serdar De - PeerSpot reviewer
Initial setup has been straightforward and it has reasonable pricing
We are new to this, so we are still learning about the valuable features The solution is okay overall. It could be easier to learn. We haven't had any issues. They could have more AI functionality in the future.  I have been using the solution for six months. I have not encountered any problems…
Vladimir Simion - PeerSpot reviewer
Achieving seamless cost-saving implementation with exceptional support
The best features that StarWind Virtual SAN offers include the price because comparing to other virtual SAN solutions, this one is the best, and it also has a great support team behind it. My experience with their support has been positive, as their guides regarding the integration are very useful. They have some awesome guides online that show you exactly how to configure the product, how to do the initial setup, and you can speak with them directly. They will be able to connect and verify your setup, run its parameters and see exactly what's working and what is not, and they really help you with that. StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted my organization and my customer through initial cost saving. They use this product in a dark site, so I'm not able to provide any additional details about this, but they were really glad about it, they're still using it, and they asked for extending the capacity for it and the support. They really want to use it and are enjoying using it.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What are the major differences between VxRail and Dell EMC PowerFlex?
VxRail vs. Dell EMC PowerFlex VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if the user is working with a l...
What do you like most about StarWind Virtual SAN?
It is easy to use and can monitor system synchronization and check Storage status. StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN) combines flash and disks of the cluster and forms a virtual shared storage “pool” acce...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?
I have had no setup costs and no challenges with setup and installation for StarWind Virtual SAN. The costs are acceptable and very competitive compared to other hardware-only HCI solutions.
What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
There are times when the feedback in the event of an impending issue or an actual failure can be limited. The remediation steps are usually fairly simple to resolve the issue, but the management GU...
 

Also Known As

VxFlex, VxRack FLEX, PowerFlex
StarWind SAN & NAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Canopy, 8x8Inc., Atos, Canadian Pacific, City of Denton, CenturyLink, BNP Paribas, Asyaport, EDF, CSC, Fox Sports, Insight, Hunter, KPIT, Paetec, Rosetta Stone, Sonda, Xerox
Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell PowerFlex vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,687 professionals have used our research since 2012.