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Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs NetApp FAS Series comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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
6.9
Dell PowerProtect DD offers cost-effective backup with data compression, reducing expenses and improving recovery for large enterprises.
Sentiment score
5.8
NetApp FAS Series offers strong ROI with VMware integration, reducing costs through efficiency, consolidation, and strong service value.
If you have the configuration well maintained and configured, you should have good efficiency and compression for the clients and for yourself.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.3
Dell PowerProtect DD support is generally praised for efficiency, but some experience inconsistent service quality and regional variability.
Sentiment score
7.3
NetApp FAS Series' support is generally praised for knowledge and responsiveness, though some note variability in service quality.
They respond within 24 hours of case submission, which is crucial for maintaining the solution.
I have dedicated support from Dell for Vietnam, and they are responsive.
I have encountered an issue before with other brands that would not have occurred with Dell.
Sometimes, the support was inadequate because the initial architecture was poorly defined.
We are also using it ourselves for the SAN and CIFS protocol.
They often provide basic solutions, such as suggesting a failover or a power cycle, which are not the sophisticated solutions we expect from a vendor.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.8
Dell PowerProtect DD offers scalable storage solutions for medium to enterprise environments, with easy expansion and cloud compatibility.
Sentiment score
7.4
NetApp FAS Series offers impressive scalability and efficient data handling, with considerations for cost and planning for expansion.
The scalability depends on the IT department's strategy.
By keeping the increasing data in mind, we decided to go for Data Domain.
The solution is scalable to higher models, both vertically and horizontally.
We normally avoid current versions and use versions that have been running for at least two months in client usage before updating drivers.
NetApp FAS Series is scalable, and it is possible, but you need to pay.
The NetApp FAS Series is scalable and offers numerous solutions, but only if customers are willing to invest in the shelves.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.1
Dell PowerProtect DD is praised for stability, reliability, and performance, with minimal disruptions and strong data continuity features.
Sentiment score
8.0
NetApp FAS Series is highly reliable with minimal downtime, praised for redundancy and continuous operation despite occasional issues.
Dell is especially more stable in the enterprise product.
Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is stable in terms of software performance.
When panic occurs on the node, it reboots itself, and we have experienced numerous hardware-related issues.
Most things are tailor-made, and we avoid downtimes even with primitive CLI commands.
 

Room For Improvement

Dell PowerProtect DD users seek improved integration, ransomware protection, data recovery speeds, UI, scalability, compatibility, and cybersecurity features.
NetApp FAS Series needs better performance, integration, monitoring, pricing, usability, and support to enhance competitiveness and user experience.
The high availability feature is only present in the higher models of Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain).
It is suitable for more customers since it is small, cost-effective, and a good start for any customer to know about Data Domain and DBS solutions.
Medium-level and SME-level businesses can easily utilize this feature, but Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is a relatively expensive solution to propose to customers.
Storage companies should create encrypted storage solutions between the OS and storage to protect against ransomware attacks.
Nutanix leads the business in this approach, and I feel that NetApp is missing some aspects, such as CPU, GPU, and RAM, in its AI portfolio.
There is an opportunity there for NetApp with Cloud Volumes ONTAP.
 

Setup Cost

Dell PowerProtect DD is costly, suitable for large enterprises, with high initial costs and price competitiveness crucial.
NetApp FAS Series is seen as high-cost but justified by features and performance, with negotiable pricing and discounts.
It is almost four times the earlier price.
The pricing has become higher since July, and the license costs are more expensive compared to the past.
The price for PowerProtect DD is not suitable for my customers. It is very high.
The pricing of NetApp FAS Series is not cheap, but in comparison to other vendors, NetApp FAS Series is affordable.
 

Valuable Features

Dell PowerProtect DD is praised for its speed, integration, security, scalability, compatibility, efficient data handling, and competitive pricing.
NetApp FAS Series provides reliable, flexible storage management with high availability, supporting SAN/NAS protocols and VMware integration for cost-effectiveness.
The most valuable feature of Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is its deduplication capability.
Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is highly consistent, durable, easy to install, scalable, and compatible with any software today.
By using Data Domain, we get the advantage of data deduplication, reducing data size.
While NVMe disks are expensive and require three disks for parity calculations, hard drives in NetApp FAS Series are inexpensive, making it more cost-efficient per GB, even with RAID tech implementation.
Our IOPS are very high, reaching somewhere about 50k to 150k or 1.150k.
One important feature for customers is its ease of use and continuity, enabling seamless usage across on-premise and cloud environments.
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerProtect DD (Data ...
Ranking in Deduplication Software
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
Disk Based Backup Systems (1st)
NetApp FAS Series
Ranking in Deduplication Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
109
Ranking in other categories
NAS (3rd), Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Deduplication Software category, the mindshare of Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is 27.2%, down from 29.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp FAS Series is 3.7%, up from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Deduplication Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain)27.2%
NetApp FAS Series3.7%
Other69.1%
Deduplication Software
 

Q&A Highlights

DR
Jun 01, 2022
 

Featured Reviews

Faisal_Zia - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers efficient data management with robust features and reliable performance
Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) can be improved in terms of price. While Dell is providing a proper device, other solutions, such as Symantec, can replicate their data through any NAS storage. Although their deduplication and compression might not be as effective, they can still accomplish the task. Medium-level and SME-level businesses can easily utilize this feature, but Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is a relatively expensive solution to propose to customers.
Srikanth Purushothaman - PeerSpot reviewer
Has supported long-term data protection and backup while requiring better part availability and pricing options
For monitoring purposes, we normally use flash access storage exclusively. We utilize a hybrid system because we need performance, combining NL-SAS for the volume and SAS flash to use as a fast cache system that provides more IOPS. We normally implement RAID 10, which we prefer over RAID 6's n plus 2 combinations. We utilize it for data redundancy, even with write intensity on. Regarding the unified storage architecture for NetApp FAS Series, we normally opt for exclusivity unless budget constraints exist. Our IOPS are very high, reaching somewhere about 50k to 150k or 1.150k. The high performance ensures minimal latency. An advantage we've seen with NetApp FAS Series is that snapshots provide very rapid backup and fast recovery. We basically use snapshots for data protection as first-level protection, with deduplication between the two storages serving as second-level protection.
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Answers from the Community

DR
Jun 1, 2022
Jun 1, 2022
I think they are different types of storage for different purposes. If you are looking for a storage where to put backups data you can think Data Domain is the perfect choice because it is its main use (most or all the backup softwares have plugins in ordere to manage data domains). If you are looking for a primary storage (where to put your servers' data) then you can look to Netapp FAS and Pu...
2 out of 3 answers
GL
May 31, 2022
I think they are different types of storage for different purposes. If you are looking for a storage where to put backups data you can think Data Domain is the perfect choice because it is its main use (most or all the backup softwares have plugins in ordere to manage data domains). If you are looking for a primary storage (where to put your servers' data) then you can look to Netapp FAS and Purestorage. The latter are flash natives so it's simpler to manage and configure. If you look at the Netapp FAS you can also choose storages with HDDs with less performance (and a cheaper price). 
MS
May 31, 2022
@Dhruba Roy, your question conflates very different kinds of storage.  PowerProtect DD is Dell's latest version of Data Domain. It is ONLY useful as target storage for backups. Nothing else, not even archiving. If that is what you want, it does what it's supposed to do. Albeit, it's a bit pricey and underperforming.  There are much faster, cheaper, and more advanced backup target storage. Especially when measuring restore performance. I would suggest you take a hard look at a variety of backup target storage vendors including, Infinidat InfiniGuard, ExaGrid, Quantum, StorONE, iXsystems, and many more. Most backup target storage is all HDD although some are hybrid SSD and HDD. NetApp FAS is a general-purpose storage system for blocks and files. It can be all HDD, hybrid HDD and SSD, or all SSD (all-flash FAS or AFF). It's a solid all around storage system with NetApp pioneered capabilities, but expensive as a backup storage target.  Pure Storage FlashArray//X or //C are block all-flash storage arrays. Their FlashBlades are all flash file and object storage systems. Good performers but overkill and way too expensive for backup target storage. I think you need to define what it is you really need. Of the 3 vendors you asked about, I am going to repeat myself, PowerProtect DD is ONLY useful as a target storage for backups. The other two can do so, but are really not priced nor designed specifically for backup target storage.  If general purpose storage is what you need NetApp and PureStorage are good possibilities among many others.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business32
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise37
Large Enterprise57
 

Questions from the Community

What is your primary use case for Dell EMC PowerProtect DD (Data Domain)?
Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) is an integrated backup appliance-based solution, and our installed base in Pakistan is substantial. We possess high expertise in both pre-sales and post-sales ac...
What do you like most about Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain)?
The product, a disk backup solution, improves our data application tasks. We used tape libraries with Dev drives in legacy architectures, resulting in slow backups compared to modern drives like NV...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain)?
Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain)'s licensing cost was excellent in 2023, but after 2023, the operating environment licensing cost is huge. It is almost four times the earlier price.
Which SAN product would you choose: IBM FlashSystem (FS9500) vs PureFlash Array/X NVMe vs PureFlash Array/XL NVMe?
Have you considered a NetApp FAS Storage for your NAS needs? I am sure it fits very well.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp FAS Series?
The pricing of NetApp FAS Series is not cheap, but in comparison to other vendors, NetApp FAS Series is affordable because they also have deduplication, compression, and inline compression. They fo...
 

Also Known As

DataDomain, Dell EMC Data Domain, PowerProtect Data Domain
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

The US Army, City of Houston, Lloyds TSB, TiVo, Teck, Ingram Entertainment, The New York Mets
Children's Hospital Central California, Plex Systems, PDF PNI Digital Media, Denver Broncos, PDF KSM Legal, Clayton Companies, Virginia Community College
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs. NetApp FAS Series and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
871,688 professionals have used our research since 2012.