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Dell Unity XT vs Huawei OceanStor Dorado 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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
14th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (6th)
Dell Unity XT
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
6th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
196
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Huawei OceanStor Dorado
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 0.8%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Unity XT is 6.7%, down from 10.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Huawei OceanStor Dorado is 4.5%, up from 4.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Eugene Hemphill - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps to save money and resources with the data compression feature
One point I'd like to improve is that the tool should start selling small boxes again. It discontinued some products and is focusing on bigger, more capable boxes, neglecting the SMB market. Even though it's not a big market, it shouldn't have removed them. One way to improve the product is to add an operational assistant that doesn't depend on VMware. It could also establish more alliances with other operational systems.
Syed Habib - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient data replication and fast IOPS have improved operational performance
Dell and a partner jointly implemented this solution in Auvink. We installed the Flash, which makes our IO operations fast and efficient. Replication is available, allowing us to replicate data simultaneously from one site to another. All-flash technology and vTXT enhance speed, and the IOPS are faster. The cache's IOPS are much better. Snapshots provide a unique feature for testing and make management more comfortable and easy. The platform is multi-supported and certification is more convenient and easy to manage.
TOLGA ALNIAK - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers ransomware protection for files stored on servers
Data processing is the most important feature. We are using Huawei OceanStor Dorado, which employs SSD storage on the hardware side. No reported performance issues or improvements are required for our systems because all of the systems run on memory on the host side. The Oracle data and Oracle virtual machines also operate from memory. Additionally, we use Oracle for patching systems, with all data residing in memory. There is some latency during backup times, typically at night, but this is acceptable for us. These latencies occur outside of office hours, so they do not impact our operations during normal times when there is no noticeable latency.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The initial setup was extremely simple and straightforward."
"It is very easy to install and configure. It has got excellent diagnostics. If you really need to see how the box is performing, the console gives you a lot of information. You can set thresholds as well as alerts based on the thresholds, which is a very powerful functionality. They are very proactive. They know how to monitor and manage the systems. They see a problem, and they are all over it before us. They see the problem before we see it, which is very good."
"It has benefited my organization because it has reduced time to insights."
"The tool's valuable features are speed, security, data compression, and reliability. Its data compression feature is the best that we have ever seen. It helps us to save money and resources."
"Everything, especially the VMs inside, is pretty fast."
"The solution uses newer technology for deduplication and compression."
"It has good, reliable, fast storage."
"We're able to get higher-density workloads on the same infrastructure, and we have a smaller physical footprint. The performance is excellent – during our test the bottlenecks are never on the X array, it just keeps picking up the pace to match what you need. The real-time visibility is a differentiator in my opinion."
"Its main advantage over vSAN was the rebuild, the intelligence of the restoration in the event of a hardware drive failure and, of course, the all-flash solution."
"Replication of the communication object (COB) scenarios"
"It's an all-flash Unity, With that compression feature, it's comparable to a hybrid. That is one thing that we definitely like."
"The most valuable feature is the fast cache with functionality rewrite."
"On the Data Domain side, the most attractive feature is the compression ratio, which none of the other products in the market are currently able to provide. On the Unity side, what customers mostly like is the availability guarantee."
"Setup is simple."
"To be programmatically administered is huge, it is one of the key features that we like about it."
"After migration to Unity 300F, we were able to put more DBs on flash, reducing latency. The results were visible in the front-end systems, and all users noticed the improvement."
"The most valuable features are the five chips architecture and the purpose-built NVMe hard disk drive. Additionally, the IOPS feature is good."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the price to performance ratio."
"The most valuable feature for me is that it deduces better, whereby it can be assigned six times the usable capacity, depending on the nature of the data."
"Two things really stand out for me. First, there's group cloning, which is very nice. It simplifies managing multiple clones across the group. Second, Huawei's multi-controller architecture with load balancing is a good part."
"Huawei OceanStor Dorado is fast and has significantly improved data storage efficiency."
"The customer support is helpful."
"The performance is good."
"The most valuable features of the solution are SmartMigration, HyperReplication, HyperSnap, HyperCopy, HyperClone, SmartPartition, and SmartCache."
 

Cons

"In terms of what needs improvement, the dashboard and management could be simplified."
"In the next release, I would like to see real-time analytics for further insight into consumption models."
"Our use cases require more multi-tenant capabilities and additional VLAN interfaces for separating different customers. We currently use it to provide storage, sometimes shared storage, to different customers, but it is less flexible in comparison to a dedicated solution."
"They could add more support for file storage and different types of storage."
"If the customer only needs 500 terabytes and doesn't care how much data they'll put in the server, IBM is cheaper than Pure."
"It is on the expensive side."
"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics should not incur extra charges."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"We would like an AI feature that would protect the backup and minimize the consumed space so we can maintain the quality of the backup. This would help us minimize our IT cost in terms of the backup procedures."
"Last (and I understand that it has a low chance of being implemented) the copy services currently are redirect on write. It would be great if the administrator could choose between redirect on write and copy on write, when configuring copy job."
"The only issue is with the product's scalability because it's not as scalable as the other polished tools in the market."
"Scalability of this solution could be improved."
"We are running VMware, and with the VNXe it was possible to restore. We're using Veeam for VMware backups and with the predecessor, it was possible to mount a backup or restore a backup from a storage snapshot. With the Unity 300, this is not possible."
"Dell Unity XT could improve the compatibility of some of the features. Some of my customers had some problems. Additionally, it would be beneficial for the solution to have advanced AI and ML features."
"Perhaps if they added more 10GB ports to the back of the system, so you have more IOPS out of the box itself to the network, that would help."
"I would like better integration with RecoverPoint. My major issue with the solution, all around, has been RecoverPoint more than Unity. While I like the easy user interface, I would like some more advanced features for troubleshooting built into the product, so that we can do more in-depth problem-solving."
"The product should be better aligned with the virtual environments"
"The solution needs to improve its integration."
"There could be local support services available for the platform. Additionally, they should provide a bundled license, including all protection and encryption rules."
"The initial setup was very complex."
"The technology and the features need improvement."
"This solution does not support VMware VVols 2.0."
"The speeds of the disks themselves need to be faster. The disks are not flash. When we opened our hard drive from the inclusion, I saw a converter, and it's not entirely flash."
"They should add a feature to the platform to help us manage storage communication with one of the vendors."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
"The product is expensive."
"Pretty much everything that you need is licensed when you buy the product. Licensing to me is different than the maintenance cost, but they can bleed into one another. We buy the product, and we expect three years of support bundled into what we negotiate on our storage arrays. I would start to see maintenance costs going into the fourth year, but we're not there yet."
"Its price could be better. It is not too expensive, but it is the high-end cost. It is kind of a Rolls-Royce. You pay a lot, but you get a lot out of it. So, the price pressure on the way down would be great, but at the end of the day, if you need to do the work, you just pay for it."
"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."
"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."
"The pricing was quite okay compared to others. We probably got it cheaper because we were the first ones out of the gate, but I would say that it's good value for the money."
"What they really like is the easy licensing now - Dell EMC has caught up to a lot of their competitors - based on not having to charge for everything, and they can get everything in one bundle."
"We looked at HPE Nimble but the price of the Unity XT was very good compared to the competition."
"The pricing is reasonable. We're using the Flex on Demand pricing. It's really good for us when we pay for what we use. It made it easy to get it inside since it's an OpEx and instead of CapEx expense."
"For costing, you have to have a budget in mind because SANs can be fairly expensive and EMC offers a wide range of products."
"Here is our major complaint with pricing. Dell EMC comes to us and gives us a price. We are like, "Well, this doesn't even compare to what we got on the last project." We say, "No, you should bring it down to this level." Then, they come back again and we are sort of in the middle again. I am like, You already sold us other stuff at a better price. We are not going to just say, 'Yes,' because we are out of time.""
"The price in our country is very expensive and some of our customers opt for lower-cost alternatives."
"The only improvement would be a lower cost per unit/disks, however on the whole we are very pleased with this product."
"The price of Huawei OceanStor Dorado is very inexpensive, it cost approximately $5 per gigabyte."
"We saw ROI in terms of both money and time saved. It is worth the price."
"This product is not too expensive, and the price is competitive on the market."
"There are some costs in addition to the standard licensing fees, depending on the requirements."
"In price comparisons with alternative products, it stands out as a more cost-effective option."
"Huawei has very good pricing. They have some promotions that can be taken advantage of at certain times of the year, such as the end of December. They are providing aggressive pricing. In the Pakistan market, they are ready to beat any vendor in Pakistan because they want to grab the market."
"There are lots of features included with this solution and some of them require additional licensing, such as creating high availability storage using a cluster."
"Huawei OceanStor Dorado is more affordable than the competitor solutions"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
37%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
5%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.
What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics ...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
I saw that you have doubts about what you chose. I have a lot of experience with the constructor, honestly I can reco...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
They’re both great solutions and I’ve used both. EMC is being VERY aggressive on pricing which may be the undoing of...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
First of all the decision should be taken looking at similar products in terms of capacity and performance. I will sh...
What do you like most about Huawei OceanStor Dorado?
The product has the best compression and encryption features. The most valuable features I have found in the tool are...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Huawei OceanStor Dorado?
The products they offer are quite cheap. However, I do not have much information about licensing since we don't buy t...
What needs improvement with Huawei OceanStor Dorado?
Some customers have reported not understanding how the immutable part can be unlocked. From my perspective, it's not ...
 

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
EMC Unity, Dell EMC Unity
OceanStor Dorado V3 All-Flash Storage System
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Draper, Rio Grande Pacific, Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre
Telecom Italia, Hi3G Sweden, KPN
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Unity XT vs. Huawei OceanStor Dorado and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,632 professionals have used our research since 2012.