Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ vs Qumulo comparison

Dell Technologies and Hewlett Packard Enterprise are both solutions in the NAS category. Dell Technologies is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.7, while Hewlett Packard Enterprise is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.6. Dell Technologies holds a 15.5% mindshare in N, compared to Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s 3.3% mindshare. Additionally, 97% of Dell Technologies users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Hewlett Packard Enterprise users who would recommend it.

Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Read 80 Dell PowerScale (Isilon) reviews

11,424 Views
5,826 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Read 304 HPE 3PAR StoreServ reviews

7,821 Views
1,799 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Qumulo

Read 8 Qumulo reviews

3,217 Views
1,544 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Qumulo

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Dell PowerScale (Isilon), HPE 3PAR StoreServ, and Qumulo based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, CTERA and others in NAS.

To learn more, read our detailed NAS Report (Updated: March 2026).

Buyer's Guide

NAS

March 2026

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Review summaries and opinions

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

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the NAS category, the mindshare of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is 15.5%, down from 17.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE 3PAR StoreServ is 3.3%, down from 3.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qumulo is 5.2%, down from 6.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

NAS Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Dell PowerScale (Isilon)	15.5%
HPE 3PAR StoreServ	3.3%
Qumulo	5.2%
Other	76.0%

NAS

Featured Reviews

Bill Engelmeyer

Systems Engineer at Unisity LLC

Flexibility and reliability have supported seamless data growth

I cannot think of anything to improve about Dell PowerScale (Isilon). The hardest challenge we have is due to how we've bought things over time. The way that we moved to the PowerEdge platform for the newer systems creates a scale problem as I still buy the older style systems, which are more dense storage. They're different chassis, so the problem we run into in the data center is the depth of the actual equipment. The newer equipment, if we buy an FX910 or a 900, it's a lot shorter in scale than if I buy an 83,000, which is much bigger. This makes it more complicated for deployment.

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Cyril Omatsola

Information Systems & Security Administrator at a government with 501-1,000 employees

Ease of use in data center boosts resilience and infrastructure efficiency

I find the HPE 3PAR StoreServ valuable for its ease of use and resilience, which is beneficial. The main benefits I have seen from having HPE 3PAR StoreServ include its use at a small branch I managed for about three years with around 60 users. It operates effectively because it is an HPE product we use there. I have not experienced any significant issues besides occasional IT-related ones, such as local database problems. Since handing over the administration of the system to someone else and moving to another department, there have not been any issues. There are many features that exist but I haven't needed to try. Before moving out of that role in my organization, I knew it was a product I enjoyed working with for infrastructure purposes. After completing my new role, I intend to return to infrastructure.

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VinceVitro

Senior Storage Architect at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Useful data sharing, simple cluster scaling, and excellent support

One aspect of Qumulo that I hoped to see improved was its software upgrade process, which did see significant progress during my usage. Initially, upgrading the software resulted in several minutes of system downtime. However, by the time I departed last summer, the downtime had reduced to mere ten seconds. Although I am unsure if Qumulo has yet achieved a completely outage-free upgrade, I simply performed the upgrades early in the morning before the marketing department began its workday, so any downtime was inconsequential.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Regarding stability, I find no lagging, crashing, or downtime with Dell PowerScale (Isilon), and it is a highly scalable, stable, and reliable solution that I have experienced."

"The recent introduction of inline deduplication and compression has drastically improved our efficiency ratios to make it an economical product."

"Dell PowerScale includes a wealth of features that are important from a security and recovery perspective."

"Dell has the AI to protect the EMA."

"What I like the most about Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is that the storage capacity is very high."

"The flexibility and the user-friendly interface are the most valuable features."

"Dell PowerScale helps in saving costs related to power and rack space, reducing physical hardware from over one hundred to twenty-nine chassis."

"The most valuable feature of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is all the capabilities together."

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) pros

"The optimization features move chunklets or hot spots to faster drives."

"The tool is fast and easy to use. You can also configure it easily. The product also has good performance tuning."

"HPE 3PAR StoreServ is an enterprise storage that is mainly deployed in enterprise scenarios like banking and insurance."

"HPE has been our de facto standard, and the benefits are the integration with the rest of our system, including solutions for system administration of having one interface with OneView and being able to use 3PAR with your storage and manage everything."

"We're using Peer-to-Peer for two data centers and having that fill over instantaneous is what we really needed for disaster recovery."

"We can deploy new servers and new solutions pretty quickly."

"The product stands on its own in heavy enterprise environments."

"It is an enterprise-class storage and meeting approximately almost all the business requirements of NxtraData."

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ pros

"The ratio of total operational cost to complexity versus feature set is very good."

"The most valuable feature is real-time analytics."

"The most valuable features of Qumulo are its rolling updates and all-day availability."

"The most valuable features of Qumulo are the ease of management and special permissions that are quick to enable. The overall performance of the solution is good."

"The feature that I like most is the analytics part of the file system."

"The most valuable feature of Qumulo is the ability to share files and reliability."

"The most valuable feature is real-time analytics."

More Qumulo pros

Cons

"The product needs to improve CLI since commands are complex. The search option is also difficult since you must give the full path."

"If they integrated some functions, as they have on Data Domain with a cyber recovery vault, it would be ideal."

"Isilon has limitations on the number of files that can be generated."

"Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is a little bit pricey, and its pricing could be improved."

"The solution is expensive. It's quite expensive for the amount of storage we have."

"Isilon has limitations on the number of files that can be generated."

"The solution can be a bit complex for those not well versed in the technology."

"I would make Dell PowerScale (Isilon) better by improving SmartSync in the graphical user interface. Currently, everything has to be done through the command line, and I prefer having a graphical interface."

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) cons

"This product has come to the end of its lifecycle."

"It needs better statistics and configuration."

"I think cloud integration would probably be the biggest part because that's where everyone is going and the seamless integration between on-premise and cloud is an important part of any IT strategy today."

"Sadly, the support from HPE has not been all that great. It is tough to get a tech out or get a response from some of the techs that we have."

"I would like to see more flexibility with the cloud. I've actually just been in a presentation about it, here at HPE Discover 2018, so those features are coming."

"3PAR has StoreOnce and replication. I would like it if they worked together."

"Only room for improvement would be to just abandon this product line and start with another."

"There were some minor issues."

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ cons

"The price of the software is a bit expensive, so a reduction in cost would make it more competitive."

"One aspect of Qumulo that I hoped to see improved was its software upgrade process, which did see significant progress during my usage. Initially, upgrading the software resulted in several minutes of system downtime. However, by the time I departed last summer, the downtime had reduced to mere ten seconds. Although I am unsure if Qumulo has yet achieved a completely outage-free upgrade, I simply performed the upgrades early in the morning before the marketing department began its workday, so any downtime was inconsequential."

"The solution could improve availability and improve data protection or data services such as compression of deduplication. In a future release, we'd like to have more cloud API integrations."

"The support for iMac and protocols should be improved, not all features are available."

"Qumulo should continue to expand automation and orchestration capabilities."

"In the future, I would like to see non-disruptive updates."

"The price of the software is a bit expensive, so a reduction in cost would make it more competitive."

More Qumulo cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive; it is not the cheapest solution out there. If you look at it from a total cost of ownership perspective, then it is a very compelling solution. However, if you're looking at just dollar per terabyte and not looking at the big picture, then you could be distracted by the price. It is not an amazing price, but it's pretty good. It is also very good when you consider the total cost of ownership and ease of management."

"It is an expensive solution."

"Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is an expensive solution."

"The solution's licensing cost varies based on capacity and performance requirements."

"Dealing with the product costs and licensing areas is getting easier since Dell is simplifying the licensing process and licensing packages offered to users."

"We paid an additional fee to have Dell's ProDeploy Plus team implement it."

"We use the TNA approach which is a great opportunity for us to better manage the licenses based on how much consumption is available for the different customers so we can use that approach and scalability."

"The general cost for a system like this is expensive. The total cost depends on your use case. You need to pay for every additional feature that you use."

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) pricing and cost advice

"For the entire six node cluster and the two 7200 units plus the Brocade Fibre switches, we financed it through HPE Financial. It was $850,000. We leased that and paid it off in October of 2018."

"There was a one-time cost when we procured this product and there are no monthly or yearly licensing fees."

"The licensing fee is not cheap."

"We paid for five years of support when we purchased the product."

"The solution's price is reasonable."

"We purchased the total package for approximately $60,000."

"We don't pay for any licensing fees."

"Performance is at least two times, if not three times, what we had previously."

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ pricing and cost advice

"The price of Qumulo is reasonable."

"The price of the solution is in the middle range compared to others. We look at the price per terabyte."

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Comparison Review

it_user182013

Federal Civ/Intel Engineering Lead at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees

May 1, 2015

Measuring Up: EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR

Leading up to EMC World 2015, IT Central Station asked how I would compare EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR. Until recently, the flash storage conversation in my organization and many others has centered on XtremIO and Pure Storage, the leaders of the all-flash array (AFA) space. To that end, I've written a…

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Computer Software Company

Construction Company

Manufacturing Company

Marketing Services Firm

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	19
Midsize Enterprise	20
Large Enterprise	44

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	73
Midsize Enterprise	74
Large Enterprise	170

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	2

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?

The solution provides massive performance, scalability, efficiency, and ease of management.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?

As I mentioned before, we did not purchase Dell PowerScale (Isilon) directly. Since our organization is a government ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?

I have experienced a RAM failure in some of the nodes of Dell PowerScale (Isilon), and that required hardware replace...

See all answers

What's the difference between HPE 3PAR StoreServ and HPE Primera?

HPE Primera has many great features but one of the best is that it is very easy to deploy. From an overall perspectiv...

See all answers

What do you like most about HPE 3PAR StoreServ?

The compression features are good.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE 3PAR StoreServ?

As a customer, I always prefer to have a lower price. Any customer will always ask for the cheaper price.

See all answers

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Comparisons

NetApp FAS Series vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 20% of the time

Everpure FlashBlade vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 11% of the time

VAST Data vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 4% of the time

Dell ObjectScale vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 4% of the time

NetApp StorageGRID vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 2% of the time

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) Competitors

HPE Primera vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Compared 9% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Compared 8% of the time

Dell Unity XT vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Compared 7% of the time

HPE MSA vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Compared 6% of the time

Dell SC Series vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Compared 2% of the time

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ Competitors

NetApp FAS Series vs Qumulo

Compared 11% of the time

VAST Data vs Qumulo

Compared 8% of the time

Everpure FlashBlade vs Qumulo

Compared 6% of the time

Nasuni vs Qumulo

Compared 6% of the time

CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform vs Qumulo

Compared 3% of the time

More Qumulo Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

March 2026

Download Dell PowerScale (Isilon) product report

Buyer's Guide

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

March 2026

Download HPE 3PAR StoreServ product report

Buyer's Guide

NAS

March 2026

Download Qumulo product report

Also Known As

PowerScale, Dell EMC Isilon

HPE 3PAR Flash Storage, InServ, Storeserv, 3PAR Flash Storage, HP Enterprise Storage, 3PAR Flash Array, HP 3PAR Flash Storage

No data available

Overview

Dell PowerScale leads in unstructured data management with unified file and object storage, massive scalability, security, and cloud adaptability, enhancing AI, analytics, and enterprise applications with exceptional performance and resilience.

Dell PowerScale Isilon provides a comprehensive platform for unstructured data, excelling in scalability, management, and performance. With features like single-pane management, SyncIQ, and SmartQuotas, it handles large datasets with flexibility and robust security. Its multi-protocol support and seamless expansion improve operational efficiency. While it offers strong data protection, enhancements in cloud integration, cybersecurity, and performance are sought. Users note potential for cost reductions and streamlined configurations and mention desired improvements in object storage handling and NFS support.

What are the key features of Dell PowerScale Isilon?

Single-pane management: Simplifies data control and monitoring through a unified interface.
SyncIQ: Ensures efficient data replication for business continuity.
SmartQuotas: Provides intelligent quota management for optimized storage allocation.
Multi-protocol support: Facilitates cross-platform data access and integration.
Seamless storage expansion: Allows effortless scaling to accommodate growing data needs.

What benefits should users consider when reviewing Dell PowerScale Isilon?

Operational efficiency: Reduces workload with easy management and automation.
Enhanced security: Offers comprehensive data protection and recovery options.
Scalability: Supports large-scale data storage with flexible growth capabilities.
Performance: Delivers high-speed data processing for demanding applications.
Integration flexibility: Adapts to on-prem and hybrid cloud environments for diverse deployment needs.

Organizations across industries utilize Dell PowerScale Isilon for large-scale unstructured storage, supporting applications like video archiving, genomic data storage, and high-resolution imaging. Educational institutions, research centers, and media enterprises rely on its scaled-out storage capabilities, providing centralized, secure storage for diverse applications in hybrid, cloud, and on-prem environments.

Dell Technologies

HPE 3PAR StoreServ is an AI-driven storage solution that prevents issues before they occur by learning and adjusting in real time. The solution offers a tier-1 all-flash foundation for mission-critical workloads. HPE 3PAR StoreServ was designed with more than 3M IOPS and consistent sub-ms latency. It aims to transform midrange and enterprise deployments with solutions that scale from a few TBs to more than 20PBs. In addition, the solution is built to modernize data centers and is made to handle unpredictable workloads effortlessly. By implementing HPE 3PAR StoreServ, you gain automated and rapid provisioning, hardware-accelerated deduplication and compression, and a multi-tenant design.

HPE 3PAR StoreServ Features

HPE 3PAR StoreServ has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

Flexibility: With HPE 3PAR StoreServ, you can easily deploy highly configurable, scale-out storage for multi-tenant workloads.

Always-on availability for your data: HPE 3PAR StoreServ includes an always-on resilient storage infrastructure for your hypervisors and applications. In addition, with Peer Persistence, your virtual machines (VMs), hosts, and data can move freely across data centers rather than being constrained by their physical boundaries.

Fast, scalable performance: HPE 3PAR StoreServ enables you to accelerate consistent mixed-workload performance and also provides necessary QoS levels that are optimized for your highest priority applications.

Performance insights: HPE 3PAR StoreServ helps you gain performance insights in real time, and anticipate as well as prevent issues across the infrastructure stack by utilizing cross-stack analytics.

Flash optimized data protection: With tier-1 data services, multi-tenant security, and copy data management, you can avoid downtime.

Seamless data mobility: HPE 3PAR StoreServ makes it possible for you to not only experience converged data protection, but also experience seamless data mobility services, at flash speed, from the edge to the cloud.

HPE 3PAR StoreServ Benefits

There are many benefits to implementing HPE 3PAR StoreServ. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

Easy to manage. The web interface to manage the units is a great asset and one that makes managing storage easy.

User-friendly GUI

Exceptionally fast and well-managed replication
Low latency

Hybrid storage gives you the ability to assign different roles to different types of storage arrays inside one enclosure

Both file-level and block-level replication

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the HPE 3PAR StoreServ solution.

A SAN Consultant at a tech services company says, “One of the features that I like the most is the data replication element. The reason I like it is due to the fact that it's pretty clean on replicating data over to a second site. The product stands on its own in heavy enterprise environments. It's easy to make changes without affecting the environment. The solution is very easy to use. The product is very robust and offers very good performance.”

A Storage Manager at a financial services firm mentions, "There are a lot of screens for easy management where you can change some settings. But after a few years, the important settings were better after an upgrade, and all the vendors have other ways to upgrade their systems."

A Senior IT Infrastructure & Data Center Operation Engineer at Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) comments, “The adaptive optimization is the biggest feature in 3PAR. 3PAR is very usable with thin volume because it detects zeros while writing. Every time I tell the hypervisor to make the full provisioning, it makes the volume as simple provisioning in 3PAR, not full provisioning.”

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Qumulo is a data storage and management platform that promotes object-based storage for users, backup archives, and surveillance. Its primary use case is to provide a cost-effective and feature-rich solution for managing large data.

Qumulo's data protection algorithm ensures the safety of node data, while its integration with backup platforms like Veeam and Veritas makes it easy to manage backups. The platform offers a good balance between operational cost and complexity versus feature set, making it an attractive option for businesses of all sizes.

Qumulo

Sample Customers

OMRF, University of Utah, Translational Genetics Research Institute, Arcis, Geofizyka Torumn, Cyprus E&P Corporation, Colburn School, Columbia Sportswear, Harvard Medical School, University of Michigan, National Library of France,

Just Energy, Latisys, team AG, DreamWorks, BlueShore Financial, Erasmus MC

County of Riverside Sheriff Department, Hyundai Mobis Automotive North America, University of Arizona, UCSD - San Diego Supercomputer Center, Medical College of Wisconsin, Sinclair Oil, Royal Dutch Shell, Kaiser Permanente, Deluxe Creative, Vexcel Imaging, University of Florida, The Madison Square Garden Company, Arizona State University, Cinesite, San Diego Padres Baseball, Johns Hopkins University - School of Medicine, IHME, EllieMae, Washington State University.

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, CTERA and others in NAS. Updated: March 2026.

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