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Dell SC Series vs VAST Data comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

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
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
231
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Dell SC Series
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
19th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
Frame-Based Disk Arrays (2nd)
VAST Data
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
28th
Average Rating
10.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
File and Object Storage (19th), NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (10th)
 

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 VAST Data is 3.0%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray6.9%
Dell SC Series1.5%
VAST Data3.0%
Other88.6%
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
RK
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.
Alan Powers - PeerSpot reviewer
HPC CTO at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Stability-wise, a device that has been up and running for years
The failover capability and resiliency are some of the solution's valuable features. The big thing is resilience because it has richer coding in it, so multiple devices can't fail. Also, one can still access a number of CBoxes that can allow one to access their file system. Once a device fails, it fails the transparency of the end-user, and it just starts using another resource. The encryption capability, the snapshots, along with a whole bunch of features make the tool valuable. VAST Data keeps adding more and more features all the time.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Simplicity and reliability are the most valuable feature of Pure Storage FlashArray."
"The speed is the most valuable feature, along with the ease of getting it connected. We were able to get it online in less than a day."
"Deduplication is an excellent feature. I also like the NAS and support."
"Pure gives us better compression, it's easier to manage, a lot less hands-on."
"Redundancy and the fault tolerance of the platform are the most impressive."
"It allows engineers to focus on other things rather than doing the more manual tasks. It automates tasks, so the ease of use is extreme. It simplifies the storage."
"This solution has improved our organization. In the past, we had reports that were taking up to two hours and after switching to SSD storage the overall processing power dropped to half an hour. The end users saw an immediate performance gain."
"The support from Pure Storage Flash Array is amazing."
"It's very scalable, especially with federation. If you outgrow the number of spindles that a unit can support, depending on the model, you can go into federation."
"In terms of stability, it's good enough. It's okay."
"We like the integration, the nodes themselves, the way that everything is integrated together, and it seems like it's less hardware to keep up with while speed and performance seem to be good on the hardware side."
"It's allowed us to have one hundred percent uptime over the last five years — maybe more."
"Dell SC Series offers a lot of performance, being one of the best performing storages Dell ever made."
"Overall, the underlying technology they are using is really great."
"With federation, you can have multiple systems across sites. You can treat them as one, and with a live migration, volumes don't go down. You can move them from site to site, doing maintenance, and keep your environment up."
"Technical support is good; they have good information and good remote monitoring of the systems, with good accessibility and knowledgeable engineers, so overall we have a very good impression of the support of this solution."
"This has been one of the most reliable storage systems that I have ever used."
"The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations."
 

Cons

"A noticeable area for improvement is the support for object storage. The FlashArray does not natively support object storage like S3 or Swift, which pushes customers needing these features towards the more expensive FlashBlade."
"This product has only two active controllers, whereas other solutions can have more. This is something that needs to improve."
"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."
"I would prefer that they lower their pricing."
"The price of this solution is high and should be lowered."
"There are a lot of things to improve."
"The backend of this solution utilizes an Active/Passive architecture, rather than an Active/Active architecture, which is a disadvantage, when compared to some of its competitors. Its storage capacity should be expanded in the next release."
"They could improve the price."
"While the scalability is good, there are certain limitations. Our racks are at their limit, so we do not have the requisite scalability to expand."
"We had some issues with the battery in the previous version that we were unable to resolve."
"This solution could be improved if overall performance was improved and operated with a higher speed and supported a higher volume of RAM."
"I would like to see higher compression, dedupe, faster I/O, and bigger drives."
"We had times that we needed a file service solution. We've used FluidFS, but it's a solution that is being transitioned out."
"If Dell SC Series could have supported the protocol NVMe over TCP, that would have been great. It does not."
"I would like the ability to monitor and manage the storage. The web GUI is not fully there."
"It's not very efficient anymore. There are better products out there."
"The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement."
"The write performance could be improved because it is less than half of the read performance."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I have had a couple of customers who have complained about the cost. It can be a little more expensive than some of the other platforms. After it has been installed, I have never had a customer say, "I wish we wouldn't have spent all that extra money." They have always been happy with the product after it has been installed. They might be on the fence about it because of the price, but everybody who I have ever seen install it, they are always happy with it."
"We do not incur additional costs beyond the licensing fee."
"Pure Storage FlashArray's pricing is very competitive."
"We purchased a license to use this solution and we pay for the storage ourselves."
"Pure Storage is all-flash, so this sometimes tends to make it a bit more expensive in the beginning."
"In terms of other contemporary arrays, Pure is something you need to have a use case for, as it's not priced for you to buy one off-the-shelf. If you have a use case, heavy lift Oracle Databases, any type of noticeable virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), or need low latency and high throughput, you should consider all-flash at least and probably Pure Storage."
"Because of the SSD, it is cheaper because I am not purchasing so many disks."
"We have seen a reduction in total cost of ownership (TCO)."
"It's a very affordable solution."
"We have reviewed many platforms over the years. It is probably the best solution for its value."
"The maintenance is usually pretty good. It's not like some of the others where they increase it in the fourth, fifth, or sixth years."
"There are costs involving the solution, vendor fees and product safety which are additional."
"We have the basic license for the use of this solution and it is a permanent license. The overall cost could be less, it is expensive."
"It's absolutely affordable. Again, not having to do a forklift upgrade like some of the others have had to do in the past, it's very affordable for our customers and they continue to buy."
"Pricing depends on varying life cycles."
"This product is too expensive compared to others, and I don't see any value in using it."
"We acquired VAST Data as a one-time, capital purchase."
"Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Construction Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business71
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise159
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise20
No data available
 

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.
Ask a question
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Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
SC Series Storage, Compellent
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
TGen, Frost Science, Gerrie Electric
Norwest Venture Partners, General Dynamics Information Technology, Ginkgo Bioworks
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell SC Series vs. VAST Data and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
908,745 professionals have used our research since 2012.