Dell SC Series vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays comparison

Dell SC Series vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

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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:

Categories and Ranking

Everpure FlashArray

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray is 6.9%, up from 6.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell SC Series is 1.5%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is 1.4%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray	6.9%
Dell SC Series	1.5%
NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays	1.4%
Other	90.2%

All-Flash Storage

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV

Technical Lead at Wipro Limited

Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades

The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.

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Ramnesh Kumar

System Administrator at Lovely Professional University

Storage solutions accommodate diverse drives and offers good resiliency

Technical support is good. I can log complaints online through the portal and have engineers in line. I can also take dedicated engineers if needed, although this involves a different support cost. As far as my requirements are concerned, it is working fine. There are two or three types of support. Standard support involves logging a complaint and receiving a call from the OEM on the same day, but hardware replacement takes two to three days. Advanced support offers instant replacement without delays. Hardware support terms include calling or emailing the company or logging the call in the portal to receive remote support, or getting a dedicated engineer or account manager from Dell.

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Tayo Olubanke

Managing Director at GCET

Offers flexibility and top-notch technology

You can go to bed peacefully if you have a NetApp. If you have NetApp within your data center, you get to know about power failure if you are using it. Your NetApp will still come alive. Even if it does not come alive, I can say that it is not like other tools when it comes to dealing with power failure. The tool is affordable, and the technology is top-notch. It is the only technology that has software for what we call inline compression and deduplication. All the products under NetApp are aiming to use AI. I know that you can achieve whatever you want to do with NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

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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

"When we needed to replace the other arrays, we went straight to Pure and life-cycled them into Pure in every segment we have."

"It's just very easy for general block storage."

"My favorite feature about Pure Storage FlashArray is definitely the simplicity; in one word, it's simple to install, simple to upgrade, simple to maintain, and simple to manage."

"The pricing of the product is very competitive to others in the market for Flash and NVMe storage, and from an ROI standpoint, if you consider compression and de-duplication and all that, you get a pretty good ratio."

"Whoever is using Pure Storage is happy with it, including the latency and everything, and we have not received any complaints related to Pure Storage throughout the four years I have worked here, which is really great."

"The most valuable features of Pure Storage FlashArray are simplicity, ease of use, and dashboard management."

"Cost, racial per terabyte, and speed is why we chose PureStorage. It was no brainer."

"The back-end data reporting for Pure Storage is phenomenal. The data that you can see on the performance of your customers' array, so you can be proactive about upgrades or enhancements, and is a phenomenal tool to have access to as a partner. I haven't seen this type of stuff out of anything of the other storage systems."

More Everpure FlashArray pros

"I definitely recommend Compellent to my customers because it is a very good product that is very scalable, it is easy to use, and Dell offers a good warranty."

"Technical support has been quite good; we are very satisfied with the level of support we receive."

"The performance was staggering and it was more than what we paid for."

"We never had a single crash with this product."

"It is just as stable as any other high-end solution."

"With the hybrid storage approach, we can balance between cheap space and good performance."

"I think that Dell EMC is one of the best technical support services in Ukraine."

"For us, being enterprise-critical and having applications that process lots of transactions every day, we can't take chances on our applications and the ability of our storage to be reliant."

More Dell SC Series pros

"If we compare this storage solution with Concurrent, the price is the same, but the performance is much better."

"We know this solution's software, hardware devices, and support are very good."

"The benefits are better up-time, better response time."

"I would recommend it. It is very stable, fast, and offers good support."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is its speed."

"The most valuable feature is its speed; we had a bake off with another product in our data center, and it blew it away, without any question, being about 100% faster than the XtremIO, just pure speed."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is the performance of the database access."

"This storage solution is both stable and scalable, and it works for our needs."

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays pros

Cons

"We ran into some issues with the program at first and we had to work around those issues to fix our problems."

"If I need to change or troubleshoot the dashboard, I cannot do it without calling support. If I want to move something critical, I cannot do it by myself. The dashboard blocks me from changing those critical things."

"The connectivity needs improvement. You do not have the possibility to have a file and block connectivity at the same time on the same machine. It has limited ability to do so."

"The data reduction that we had initially anticipated when we bought Pure and we move over, is way lower than the expected reduction. It depends on the workloads, of course. But that has been a challenge at times."

"The problem is that we can only make a few groups, around five or six groups. I like groups and we need a lot of them. We had to put all the information in only a few groups and cannot make a more detailed separation of them."

"I like what they're doing, but some of my customers complain that they do not have all the bells and whistles and knobs to fine-tune workloads that some of the competitors have. In my opinion, that's good. All customers don't have dedicated storage gurus, and they can get themselves into trouble if they fine-tune too many of those high-performance knobs, but they do get knocked down. Pure Storage takes a hit in the minds and opinions of some of the customers because they cannot customize things as much as compared to a legacy storage provider's appliance such as NetApp, Dell EMC, or even HPE. I personally think 95% of my customers are better off letting the system fine-tune itself. That was something that you needed to do 12 or 15 years ago, but now with all-flash, the technology can handle what it needs to handle. Customers just end up shooting themselves in the foot if they are tweaking too many default settings."

"It took us a year to get it to stabilize and to get the best out of Pure."

"Everpure FlashArray can be improved as the pricing is expensive, but you do get what you pay for; you are paying a premium for better service, better warranties, less downtime, and other things, so I do not know that a lower price would work out because you probably would not have that high of quality for those things."

More Everpure FlashArray cons

"Dell could improve the upgrading process. It was the lifecycle that made it very short."

"We had times that we needed a file service solution. We've used FluidFS, but it's a solution that is being transitioned out."

"From a performance point of view, it's getting a bit old."

"Overall, I'd like to see more synergy between Dell EMC's higher-tier platforms and their mid-tier platforms. What I have said, constantly, to my partners at Dell EMC is that the clear articulation of the path is really important to us. In that vein, what I'd also like to see is, with the migration strategy that's built into this product, a lot more attention paid to Dell's - in particular - legacy platforms and how we get from some of our legacy EMC platforms onto this platform with a straight-through migration and scaling strategy, not host-based migrations and not piecemeal... Dell EMC would do well to focus more on my ability to skip a generation, rather than having me take individual hops because I can't greenfield my way into a software-defined data center fast enough. This journey of multiple hops is not helpful."

"The price could be improved."

"The only issue with scaling up is that the pricing gets pretty high."

"We can definitely see a need for it being a multi-controller system for customers who want to scale beyond the current capability. That's always a downside. A lot of the new systems are scaling vertically, they scale out, and the Compellent, of course, is controllers with shelves under it, so you don't scale out with it, unless you add another one. But if you do, they don't talk to each other, like some of the other solutions that we sell."

"I would like to have 100% functionality through the web app."

More Dell SC Series cons

"The management interface, while very reliable, it seems a little old now and could maybe use a little modernization."

"The solution should really build out a more hyper-converged product."

"It's very difficult to manage the CLI."

"Their problems are on the software and the controlling of the storage where they lack segmentation and federation."

"I would like to have the ability to replicate data between All Flash and other NetApp storage systems."

"As far as the manageability, being able to port between the two and have to do less training in-house from a customer point of view, that would be the part to improve."

"The support of the product is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."

"NetApp could improve the speed of the rebuilding rate."

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost was initially high, but once more people were using it, the costs came down. This was because the University was reselling it to other departments."

"I'm good with the licensing. Of course, pricing can always be less... It's actually not a bad pricing model, considering I don't have to rip-and-replace."

"You get what you pay for. It is expensive, but it really works."

"Pure is typically more expensive than everyone else. You get what you pay for, but I have lost deals to similar solutions because of pricing. They include everything, and that's another positive about Pure Storage. They aren't trying to nickel and dime their customers for different features. It is all included in one price. The license is by capacity, and the price depends on the capacity and the discount we're getting from the vendor. You get the SKU of the physical appliance, support, and maintenance, and that's it. You're licensed for whatever feature they offer. It is all rolled up into the price of the appliance."

"Its price is almost double than any other flash storage solution."

"It is a cheaper solution."

"Our costs are around $100,000."

"There is an annual or perpetual license required for this solution."

More Everpure FlashArray pricing and cost advice

"The scalability seems a bit more expensive than even buying a brand new one so far. That has been kind of a drawback."

"The SC Series was priced fairly. I wouldn't call it either expensive or cheap because we had a very tight budget, so if they were able to fit in that type of budget, they met our expectations."

"We have found the solution to be affordable."

"This product is too expensive compared to others, and I don't see any value in using it."

"It has a good price point and offers some value-added enterprise features."

"Pricing depends on varying life cycles."

"The pricing of this solution is competitive."

"Compared to other solutions out there, it's affordable."

More Dell SC Series pricing and cost advice

"he price point that we're getting is very competitive in the market. Since we are buying in such a large quantity, they gave us a huge discount."

"The pricing is comparable with other competitors and similar in mid-range solutions, and for high range solutions, it would depend on our requirements or needs."

"They provide licenses upon purchase, so there's no need for additional licenses. Regarding additional expenses apart from the standard licensing fees, such as for support or maintenance, there aren't any. Updates take around twenty to thirty minutes, including rebooting the systems, and we haven't faced any problems with the NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. We utilize various other storages like Fujitsu, IBM, and Dalian SIP, but the NetApp EF-Series stands out as we've had no issues throughout the entire year of usage."

"It's a lot cheaper than what the other vendors have for the same type of environment. It saves us money."

"Cheaper pricing is always good. NetApp has been doing everything the right way. They've been figuring out things really well, going in the right direction."

"The cost of our license is approximately $200,000 over three years for NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. There can be additional costs for storage. For example, if you want to have eight terabytes."

"Price-wise, NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is costlier than Dell. You have to buy a lot of licenses separately."

"The pricing of this solution is competitive with other vendors here in Egypt."

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Construction Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

15%

Construction Company

11%

Outsourcing Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

17%

Comms Service Provider

Performing Arts

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	71
Midsize Enterprise	38
Large Enterprise	159

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	26
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	20

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	12
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	18

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?

Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?

I find the pricing of Everpure FlashArray to be quite high compared to other storage solutions; however, the reliabil...

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?

I believe we have covered the most important features; the architecture of Pure Storage is essential, and features su...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell SC Series?

In our case, we received favorable pricing with Dell because of our strong partnership. While I acknowledge that Dell...

What needs improvement with Dell SC Series?

For us, it is a great product. The deduplication and compression could potentially be improved, though they are alrea...

What is your primary use case for Dell SC Series?

We use Dell SC Series in a VMware environment.

Dell PowerStore vs Everpure FlashArray

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Comparisons

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VAST Data vs Everpure FlashArray

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Dell PowerStore vs Dell SC Series

Compared 9% of the time

Dell Unity XT vs Dell SC Series

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HPE 3PAR StoreServ vs Dell SC Series

Compared 7% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Dell SC Series

Compared 5% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs Dell SC Series

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Compared 10% of the time

Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 10% of the time

Dell Unity XT vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 9% of the time

Dell PowerStore vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 6% of the time

DDN IntelliFlash vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Everpure FlashArray

Download Everpure FlashArray product report

Dell SC Series

Download Dell SC Series product report

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Download NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays product report

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays report

Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray

SC Series Storage, Compellent

NetApp EF540, NetApp EF-Series

Overview

The FlashArray family delivers consistent, high-performance data services across block, file, and object workloads. As part of the Everpure Platform, it provides the foundation for a unified data plane, enabling applications to reliably access, protect, and manage data across environments with simplicity and predictability. With built-in capabilities such as inline data reduction, snapshots, replication, and ransomware resilience, FlashArray ensures efficient operations, protected data, and consistent application uptime.

As the foundation of the (unified) data plane, FlashArray enables policy-driven automation, monitoring, and centralized management while integrating across cloud and on-premises environments. Built on an Evergreen architecture, it supports non-disruptive upgrades and continuous performance improvements over time while simplifying operations at scale.

What Key Features Does FlashArray Offer?

Simplicity and Speed: Easy management and rapid performance enhancements.
Data Reduction: Effective deduplication and compression.
Flash Architecture: Seamless upgrades and outstanding resilience.
VMware Integration: Excellent compatibility with virtualization platforms.
Predictive Analytics: Strong insights for proactive management.

What Benefits Should Users Consider?

Reliability: Proactive support with minimal downtime.
Efficiency: Reduced storage footprint and enhanced data management.
Performance: Faster processing speeds and low latency.
User Experience: Simplified management with Evergreen model.

In industries like finance, banking, and healthcare, FlashArray supports high-performance storage needs focusing on virtualization and database environments. Employed for VMware workloads, disaster recovery, and storage provisioning, it ensures application performance in private or hybrid cloud setups while enhancing management of virtualized environments.

Everpure (formerly Pure Storage)

Dell SC Series provides a high-performance, cost-effective storage solution with ease of management and robust support. Users appreciate its scalability, flexibility, and efficient storage management, making it a reliable platform for diverse environments.

Renowned for its key attributes such as auto-tiering, replication, compression, and deduplication, Dell SC Series enhances scalability through Live Migrate and high availability features. Its efficient management with thin provisioning and data progression enhances resource utilization. The series is favored for stability, reliability, and integration capabilities, making it suitable for diverse deployments like private and public clouds, production workloads, virtual environments, large databases, and more.

What are the key features of Dell SC Series?

Auto-tiering: Optimizes performance by automatically moving data between storage tiers.
Replication: Ensures data protection and disaster recovery.
Compression and deduplication: Reduces storage costs and optimizes space.
Live Migrate: Facilitates seamless data movement without downtime.
High availability: Provides continuous access and performance.
Thin provisioning and data progression: Increases efficiency in managing storage resources.

What benefits should users look for in reviews?

Cost-effectiveness: Reduces overall storage expenses.
Ease of management: Simplifies administration through intuitive control.
Scalability: Expands to meet growing data needs seamlessly.
Flexibility: Integrates with different environments, supporting varied use cases.
Reliability: Delivers stable performance and dependable service.

Dell SC Series serves as a versatile storage solution across industries, supporting applications in converged infrastructure, disaster recovery, and VMware environments. Users rely on its performance for critical business applications such as Oracle and SQL file systems, maintaining its relevance and effectiveness in ever-changing technological landscapes.

Dell Technologies

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays excels in high-performance storage with fast speeds and low latency, suitable for demanding environments like databases. It offers simplified management and integration, making it an efficient and reliable choice for data-intensive tasks.

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays provides robust storage for applications needing exceptional IOPS and low power usage. Renowned for ease of integration and management, they seamlessly fit into existing infrastructures. While known for dependable performance in SQL and Oracle databases, they are popular for blending ease of use with advanced storage capabilities. However, the need for larger and faster drives, improved NVMe integration, and a more intuitive interface remains. Desired features also include enhanced monitoring, smooth cloud integration, comprehensive encryption, and clearer licensing.

What are the key features of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays?

High Performance: Delivers high speed and low latency for demanding applications like SQL databases.
Management Simplicity: Streamlines deployment and integration for hassle-free management.
Diverse Connectivity: Offers various connectivity options to fit into different infrastructures.
Cost-Effective: Balances affordability with robust performance and reliability.

What benefits should you look for when evaluating NetApp EF-Series?

Improved IOPS: Boosts application performance with high IOPS capabilities.
Low Power Consumption: Reduces operational costs with efficient energy usage.
Reliable Database Access: Ensures consistent performance for critical applications.
Comprehensive Integration: Enhances compatibility within diverse IT environments.

In industry-specific implementations, companies utilize NetApp EF-Series in virtualized environments and private clouds, often incorporating hybrid models. It's prevalent in sectors like banking, oil and gas, and gaming, where speed and dependability are critical. Tech consultancies deploy these arrays for diverse data management tasks, including CCTV solutions.

NetApp

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas

TGen, Frost Science, Gerrie Electric

RP Data, Western Oregon University, Toei Animation

Dell SC Series vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays