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Dell PowerFlex vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerFlex
Ranking in HCI
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
StarWind Virtual SAN
Ranking in HCI
4th
Average Rating
9.6
Number of Reviews
187
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2024, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Dell PowerFlex is 12.1%, up from 7.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind Virtual SAN is 2.2%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Ayodeji  Oyewole - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 12, 2024
A hyper-converged infrastructure that is like a mini data center of its own
Dell PowerFlex is used for on-prem cloud solutions. It's a hyper-converged infrastructure, which means you can integrate it directly into your core network. You get all the computing and storage you need without bothering much about the network connection between the servers because all that comes…
Ahmed Hosni - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 24, 2024
Provides a cost-effective way to run an HCI storage platform for almost any hypervisor
You can maintain and update it with little to no fuss, even the free version is incredibly capable whilst it brings the cost of a Highly Available HCI solution down to a very cost-effective point. Having used Starwind Virtual SAN for many years both for clients and for internal systems, it has always done exactly what it set out to do. It provides a cost-effective way to run an HCI storage platform for almost any hypervisor, but it is most effective with Hyper-V. It's simple and easy to use, The software monitoring should be web-based to be reachable from any VLAN workstation.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Saves us a lot of space in the data center."
"The program is stable."
"Dell PowerFlex is a highly scalable solution."
"The support is highly responsive."
"Dell PowerFlex improves our latency which allowed us to reduce a lot of our Microsoft Enterprise SQL licenses."
"The support team responds quickly."
"The most valuable feature is the overall integration and just seeing the three different layers which make up the machine software. Altogether, it's something that I would say is much better than any other solution that I have experienced before."
"It is easy to use for management and operations teams because the tools are in one place."
"Using our own choice of HW allowed us to price our service to answer our customers' needs."
"The most useful aspect is the hyper-converged SD SAN and the ease to expand it by just adding cheap SSD or NVME disks."
"StarWind has provided us with a top-notch, well-supported, robust vSAN offering when other vendors have moved to hyper-converged solutions that are outside of our average clients' reach from a financial and resource perspective."
"It's very easy to resize disks and they show up in VMware almost instantly."
"Immediately we noticed huge performance gains, even on older hardware and once we implemented a 10GB link between both servers, the sync was near-instant after the initial sync was complete."
"Active-active HA provides top performance and redundancy."
"Their support goes above and beyond with the integration of their software."
"A typical system administrator with minimal experience in Hyper-V, VMware, or Windows can do VSAN configuration and maintain VSAN operations."
 

Cons

"The initial deployment was complicated and required a lot of data nodes, IPs, internal vLANs, data vLANs, and many other things."
"I am not really impressed by the technical support of this solution."
"The tool needs to improve its storage. It should also make migration to the cloud easier."
"I would like to see a more user-friendly interface."
"The solution must be more flexible."
"The tool is a bit difficult to configure, making it an area where improvements are required."
"The support of containers needs to be improved. At present, it is limited to VMware. There needs to be direct communication with the hardware rather than through a hypervisor."
"I think there might be some room for improvement when it comes to pricing, because although I know how to convert customers, at the end of day, it's quite expensive. Sometimes your feature architecture is still coming out much cheaper than hardware costs for your infrastructure."
"It is hard to find adequate technical documentation on their support website."
"High availability for direct attached hardware drives could be useful for increasing the performance of a storage appliance."
"While we had no problems setting the system up, and service technicians from StarWind could assist us very well, they could provide some form of in-depth documentation."
"Android app for monitoring and receiving push notifications as alarms or monitoring I/O from any mobile device could be a good feature and nice to have as we are not always on our desk."
"If there are domain controllers inside the cluster, there needs to be some sort of logic allowing them to boot independently so all the rest of the domain clients can gain the authority they need to come online."
"The cluster configuration is time-consuming and tedious."
"It should be improved in the way it detects the right filesystem image after a complete shutdown of the system or in the case of disaster recovery."
"I would like them to invest time in reducing the complexity of the startup and shutdown procedure."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the price as eight and a half. The tool is expensive."
"We have a good contact in Dell and he prepared all the information and provided everything to us."
"The product is expensive."
"The price could be improved."
"The price of the solution is fair, it is priced in the average range amongst competitors."
"The cost of this solution is fair."
"The solution is expensive and I give the cost a two out of ten."
"I rate the solution's pricing an eight out of ten."
"Their pricing seems pretty good, and their licensing structure is pretty straightforward."
"I think that purchasing StarWind Virtual SAN Professional Edition would be optimal for most."
"The cost seems a bit steep, and I wish it was less expensive."
"If you are looking at a traditional SAN for a small cluster, give StarWind vSAN because you will save thousands without any compromise."
"This solution has a great price for the functionality."
"The pricing is excellent. It will run on anything. You don't have to buy a $100,000 server, with hardware you don't need. You just pay for the license and you're good to go."
"The pricing is more than reasonable."
"The premium support from StarWinds is a must have. The ability to have access to a storage engineer 24/7 is a must for a production environment."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
18%
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 is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerFlex?
If one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the price as eight and a half. The tool is expensive.
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?
If you are comfortable with the solution and you feel that you don't need support, you can begin with the free licences for three nodes.
What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
Areas for improvement in StarWind Virtual SAN include simplifying the setup process, especially for users with limited vSphere expertise. Future releases could benefit from an enhanced configuratio...
 

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: October 2024.
813,418 professionals have used our research since 2012.