Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Qumulo comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerScale (Isilon)
Ranking in NAS
1st
Ranking in File and Object Storage
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Number of Reviews
49
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Qumulo
Ranking in NAS
7th
Ranking in File and Object Storage
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2024, in the NAS category, the mindshare of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is 26.5%, up from 22.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qumulo is 8.6%, up from 8.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NAS
Unique Categories:
File and Object Storage
8.0%
 

Featured Reviews

KL
May 21, 2024
Helps reduce costs, protect data, and scale seamlessly
Dell PowerScale has helped reduce our costs. Most state agencies were using old equipment that cost a lot of money. With Dell PowerScale they can migrate their data and pay per gig pennies on the dollar compared to their old systems. Dell PowerScale has saved the state money. PowerScale allows us to get granular with users' access and protection of their data. I have not gone through all the features but everything is protected as far as the permission we give through the PowerScale app that enhances the internal audit features that we need for compliance with the state. PowerScale has helped reduce our overall risk. I review the audit reports annually and since we have been using PowerScale, the reports come back almost clean because PowerScale passes all the vulnerability and security tests.
Jakub Reda - PeerSpot reviewer
May 5, 2023
High performance, easy to manage, and reliable
We are using Qumulo to store live organization materials. For example, from Disney, Warner Bros, etcetera. Additionally, for online storage. I checked the quality of the media and would send it to the vendor Since using Qumulo our work at our company has been quicker and more effective. The most…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This is the best platform that we could have for storage utilization. It is affordable and scalable. At the end of the day, it's something that we find very easy to use."
"The stability of the solution is good."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its performance."
"The solution is stable."
"There are also the policies that you set up on replication and purging files, and policies for something called WORM. That's a "write once, read many," where you can't overwrite certain files or certain data. It puts them in a "protected mode" where it becomes very difficult for someone to accidentally delete. We use that for certain files or certain directories, because we're dealing with video and some video has to be protected for chain-of-custody purposes. The WORM feature works great."
"Dell PowerScale overall is easy to use."
"The recent introduction of inline deduplication and compression has drastically improved our efficiency ratios to make it an economical product. This solution has also had a positive impact on our employees' productivity because it reduces the amount of admin that our staff needs to handle."
"Dell PowerScale includes a wealth of features that are important from a security and recovery perspective."
"It is a very stable product. I never faced any issues."
"The most valuable features of Qumulo are its rolling updates and all-day availability."
"The most valuable feature is real-time analytics."
"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 ratio of total operational cost to complexity versus feature set is very good."
"The most valuable feature of Qumulo is the ability to share files and reliability."
"The data protection algorithm to protect the data between the nodes has been the most valuable feature. The integration with backup platforms such as Veeam and Veritas has also been valuable."
 

Cons

"PowerScale is not suitable for virtual environments."
"The UID mapping and how to configure mapping-related things is a struggle."
"Dell PowerScale can improve on its multi-tenant part because as a service provider, we have bigger clusters in data centers where we can serve multiple customers and grant them dedicated management points and automation features that can be managed in a multi-tenant environment."
"It would be nice to see tools like Superna Eyeglass built into PowerScale."
"Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is a bit expensive compared to other products."
"Dell PowerScale's deployment is not easy."
"We used to have a chat feature available on the support site. It's not available to us anymore."
"The solution’s interface and pricing could be improved."
"In the future, I would like to see non-disruptive updates."
"Qumulo should continue to expand automation and orchestration capabilities."
"In the next release, I would like to see the ability to have more control at a terminal level of the file system."
"Some anti-theft permissions do not transfer well to Qumulo."
"The support for iMac and protocols should be improved, not all features are available."
"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."
"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 price of the software is a bit expensive, so a reduction in cost would make it more competitive."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's licensing cost varies based on capacity and performance requirements."
"Dell PowerScale is expensive on the start-up side but we can recoup those costs quickly by not having to reapply the savings to other equipment."
"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."
"The price of the solution can fluctuate. The price can be competitive or other times not. The price of the solution could be better."
"It is an expensive product with a high storage capacity suitable for large data requirements."
"Price was also a significant factor in our decision to go with PowerScale. The team at EMC, now Dell EMC, came through with a highly competitive offer that tipped the scales towards their solution. There was only one other solution around the same price point, but it could not match PowerScale on features. That other solution is no longer on the market."
"The only drawback for us is that it's a large upfront investment. This was a huge decision for a startup company to make. It took a bit for us to get over the line on it, but we have not regretted it."
"Dell PowerScale is an expensive solution compared to other products like Qumulo."
"The price of the solution is in the middle range compared to others. We look at the price per terabyte."
"The price of Qumulo is reasonable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
24%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
Dell PowerScale is expensive on the start-up side but we can recoup those costs quickly by not having to reapply the savings to other equipment.
What do you like most about Qumulo?
The most valuable features of Qumulo are its rolling updates and all-day availability.
What needs improvement with Qumulo?
Initially, the failover was supposed to be implemented in Qumulo itself. This failed to happen mid-case, so we had to devise a middleman solution. It was not the cleanest of solutions, but we did g...
What is your primary use case for Qumulo?
We use Qumulo for end-user storage and some application storage as well.
 

Also Known As

PowerScale, Dell EMC Isilon
No data available
 

Overview

 

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,
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 PowerScale (Isilon) vs. Qumulo and other solutions. Updated: July 2024.
793,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.