Dell PowerVault vs NetApp AltaVault comparison

The compared Dell Technologies and NetApp solutions aren't in the same category. Dell Technologies is ranked #2 in ES , with an average rating of 8.3, and holds a 32.2% mindshare in the category. NetApp is ranked #47 in CB , with an average rating of 6.5, and holds a 0.3% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Dell Technologies users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 88% of NetApp users who would recommend it.

Dell PowerVault

Read 23 Dell PowerVault reviews

1,158 Views
145 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

NetApp AltaVault

Read 18 NetApp AltaVault reviews

319 Views
53 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

Dell PowerVault

NetApp AltaVault

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Dell PowerVault and NetApp AltaVault based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, Cisco, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and others in Enterprise SAN.

To learn more, read our detailed Enterprise SAN Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Enterprise SAN

June 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 859,957 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Dell PowerVault

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise SAN (2nd), Fibre Channel (1st)

NetApp AltaVault

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Backup and Recovery (55th), Deduplication Software (12th), Disk Based Backup Systems (7th), Cloud Backup (47th), Cloud Storage Gateways (6th)

Mindshare comparison

Dell PowerVault and NetApp AltaVault aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Dell PowerVault is designed for Enterprise SAN and holds a mindshare of 32.2%, up 4.6% compared to last year.
NetApp AltaVault, on the other hand, focuses on Cloud Backup, holds 0.3% mindshare, up 0.2% since last year.

Enterprise SAN

Cloud Backup

Featured Reviews

SigfridCecillon

Director at Arsium

Offers good stability and simplicity

The room for improvement lies in the responsiveness and real-time feedback of the web server setup. We could set up the installation through a web server, but it's not very reactive on the web server. For example, when you launch a task, and you don't know exactly if the task has begun or if the task is in progress, or if it's finished. You have to wait for three to five to ten minutes to be sure that the task is running or in progress or finished. So at that point, it's not very good. For the rest, we have a good organization for the platform. And it's working everywhere. Another area of improvement is duplication.

Read full review

Naveen Radhwani

Head IT at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Reliable, fulfils compliance requirements, and enables to manage data backups easily

I use the solution for backup and recovery Our systems have become more stable and scalable after using NetApp AltaVault. The dashboard is useful for managing data backups. The deduplication technology helps me take offline backups efficiently. The workload on the end team has been reduced. It…

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features are that it's easy to set up PowerVault. I also like the provisioning of storage."

"The most valuable feature of Dell PowerVault is its ability to provide small to medium-range storage. It doesn't have any specific standout features, but it's great for applications, such as surveillance where a large number of videos need to be recorded and performance isn't a priority."

"The solution is reliable and stable."

"The storage has been good."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is that it is easy to manage and easy to use."

"The most valuable features are stability and response time."

"The stability is quite good. Once you deploy all the equipment, it's very stable."

"Dell PowerVault is cheap."

More Dell PowerVault pros

"The solution is very easy to use and it offers great support."

"Being able to move data seamlessly from one-premise to the cloud (Azure). It works great. The backup solution is perfect for us."

"The deduplication engine. Right now, we're at about 10.5 to 11 times deduplication of our backup data."

"The most valuable feature is the portability of large archived data. You're able to put things on large on-prem, low-cost storage and then augment that with even lower cost storage in the cloud."

"You can store backups for a while."

"Most importantly is having that island into that datacenter, and being able to address things in the same console. Thus, it is irrelevant where it's stored."

"It's pretty simple. Once you set it, it goes; and then the idea of being able to get it to the cloud very quickly. It's kind of a set-it-forget-it."

"The solution can be used for all Office 365 applications."

More NetApp AltaVault pros

Cons

"We could set up the installation through a web server, but it's not very reactive on the web server. For example, when you launch a task, and you don't know exactly if the task has begun or if the task is in progress, or if it's finished. You have to wait for three to five to ten minutes to be sure that the task is running or in progress or finished. So at that point, it's not very good."

"I would like Dell to improve on the configuration of the disk groups. Only one group is expandable. Once you configure the other disk group types, you cannot expand them. It limits scalability. If you want maybe to grow a disk group, you lose information, and then you need to build it up again, which is not a good use case for customers."

"I would like to see improvements made to the user interface."

"The tool needs to improve its UI."

"There have been situations when our customers requested professional support and the price of that feature is quite high."

"Dell PowerVault is block-oriented storage only."

"PowerVault doesn't integrate with Active Directory. Other storage solutions offer SAN and NAS unified storage in a single appliance, but PowerVault is only SAN."

"The high prices of the solution are an area of concern where improvements are required."

More Dell PowerVault cons

"The product must provide multi-gate connectivity."

"NetApp's own competing products complicate things."

"The initial setup phase of the tool was difficult."

"More capacity with the basic model of the AltaVault would probably help out."

"The solution needs faster indexing."

"It's a good product, but it's becoming outdated and moving to their other primary architecture."

"More than a 500 volume limit. At the moment, it only supports up to 500 volumes for SnapMirror and that's a problem. We've got 750, so a larger limit for volume replicas for SnapMirror."

"What could be helpful is different user base authentication so then maybe we could allow different customers to point to a single appliance and they only see the backups and things that they have."

More NetApp AltaVault cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Dell PowerVault's price is the tool's main attraction."

"I rate the product price a nine on a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high."

"I rate the solution's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"The price is reasonable and we are satisfied with it."

"It is important to remember that the retail price may seem high, but the final price is usually different."

"I rate the price of Dell PowerVault a nine out of ten."

"The price of Dell PowerVault could be reduced. It is more expensive than some IBM solutions."

"They are offering a wide range of support models for the customers such as basic support that is budget-friendly, but they also provide a professional support solution that is a bit costly"

More Dell PowerVault pricing and cost advice

"You could compare it to a Dell EMC or ECS, and I think it's probably a little less costly than that. Within the marketplace, it's a medium cost."

"The pricing is not too bad, but could be a little better."

"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution, which comes to around 3,000 USD."

"The price is a bit high."

"In one use case, and we have several, to run for a particular customer, the price is about $375,000 a year."

"It's quite cost-effective."

"It is a rather expensive program."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Enterprise SAN solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

859,957 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

12%

Computer Software Company

Real Estate/Law Firm

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Dell PowerVault?

Dell PowerVault offers valuable full flash storage.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell PowerVault?

I rate the solution's pricing a seven to eight out of ten.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Dell PowerVault?

The product is generally stable, but there have been instances, to my knowledge, where we faced issues in the controller during software upgrades. The availability is not at the desired level durin...

See all answers

Is NetApp AltaVault compatible with AWS?

Hello. Yes, it is compatible with AWS but the great thing about it is that it's actually working with so many cloud providers, it may be just for everyone. Besides the Amazon cloud services, NetApp...

See all answers

Can AltaVault be used for data reduction?

Hello, you can definitely use NetApp AltaVault for reducing your data and giving yourself some more storage. This product offers you deduplication and compression, helping you achieve that. I'm su...

See all answers

What kind of security does NetApp AltaVault give you?

My organization is very happy with the security that NetApp AltaVault gives us for our data on the cloud. First, it gives us the option for data recovery, which is very good, especially if someone...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerStore vs Dell PowerVault

Compared 64% of the time

HPE StoreOnce vs Dell PowerVault

Compared 14% of the time

Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs Dell PowerVault

Compared 10% of the time

Lenovo Storage V Series vs Dell PowerVault

Compared 4% of the time

ExaGrid EX vs Dell PowerVault

Compared 2% of the time

More Dell PowerVault Competitors

HPE Zerto Software vs NetApp AltaVault

Compared 69% of the time

Rubrik vs NetApp AltaVault

Compared 31% of the time

More NetApp AltaVault Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Dell PowerVault

June 2025

Download Dell PowerVault product report

Buyer's Guide

NetApp AltaVault

June 2025

Download NetApp AltaVault product report

Also Known As

PowerVault

AltaVault

Overview

PowerVault MD3 storage arrays help you cost-effectively address the challenges of data growth with versatile solutions that are optimized for smaller-scale storage consolidation, flexible virtualization projects and high business continuity.

Dell Technologies

NetApp AltaVault is a cloud-integrated storage solution created to increase recovery capabilities and lower cost and risks. It is better than traditional backup and recovery solutions because they are considerably slower, more expensive, risky, and can be too complex for the comprehension of many users. NetApp AltaVault solves issues related to backup, archival, and restoration. Compared to on-premises solutions, this software claims to be up to 90% less expensive while solving multiple issues related to data storage in the cloud. AltaVault presents three solutions to its customers: backup and recovery, cold storage and archives, and disaster recovery.

1. NetApp’s backup and recovery solution works with Kerne-Based Virtual Machine, Microsoft Hyper-V, and VMware vSphere, creating a solution for mid-sized businesses as well as for bigger companies that want to protect their offices in different locations. The usable local cache capacities of this solution range from 32TB to 383TB, providing clients with enough storage for their important data while giving them the option to retrieve it if something goes amiss.

2. NetApp AltaVault can be configured in cold storage mode and used for data that is not often used. The solution is scalable, thus allowing minimal costs for operating with cold data and allowing fast access to it at the same time.

3. AltaVault offers disaster recovery for Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure. Your data will be secured on the cloud, providing you with a secure backup if the need for disaster recovery arises.

NetApp AltaVault Features

NetApp AltaVault’s many valued features include:

Data reduction: NetApp AltaVault applies deduplication and compression, reducing data up to a 30:1 ratio.
Network and cloud optimization: AltaVault can increase data transfer speed by up to 4 times due to its built-in WAN optimization.
Data restoration: Because data is restored from the local cache, recoverability is up to 32 times faster than other methods.
Deployment and scale: Users can choose their preferred method - virtual, physical, or cloud-based in Azure or AWS. Since NetApp AltaVault starts at 2TB and can scale up to 57PB, it is one of the most scalable products in its category.
Compatible with existing backup software: NetApp AltaVault is compatible with NetApp SnapMirror, EMC, IBM, Commvault, Veritas, and Veeam, meaning it offers a vast array of options for its users when it comes to backup software.
Cloud choice and agility: AltaVault supports NetApp StorageGRID, Azure, Google, IBM, and AWS. This provides users with the assurance that their data is safely stored, even if their cloud provider experiences technical issues.

NetApp AltaVault Benefits

The benefits of using NetApp AltaVault include:

Efficient solution for data reduction
Compatible with leading public and private cloud storage providers
Provides data encryption

Reviews from Real Users

A Pre-sales Manager at a computer software company says NetApp AltaVault has fair pricing with a good GUI and a straightforward setup.

NetApp

Sample Customers

Dayco, FAW Foundry, University of Cambridge, Finder, Stadtwerke Pforzheim GmbH & Co.

Blach Construction, NASA, Riggs, Counselman, Michaels & Downes, Seminole County Public Schools and Spot Trading

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, Cisco, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and others in Enterprise SAN. Updated: June 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

859,957 professionals have used our research since 2012.

We monitor all Enterprise SAN reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.