Dell Unity XT vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series comparison

Dell Technologies and Lenovo are both solutions in the All-Flash Storage category. Dell Technologies is ranked #5 with an average rating of 8.6, while Lenovo is ranked #21 with an average rating of 10.0. Dell Technologies holds a 5.7% mindshare in AFS, compared to Lenovo’s 2.0% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of Dell Technologies users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Lenovo users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

Dell Unity XT and Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series are two competing storage solutions. Dell Unity XT is preferred for its robust software capabilities, while Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is appreciated for its hardware reliability and scalable performance.

Features: Dell Unity XT users value its comprehensive data management features, strong integration with cloud services, and robust software functionalities. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is praised for its high throughput, effective data protection mechanisms, and scalable performance.

Room for Improvement: Dell Unity XT users suggest improvements in hardware upgrade processes, need for faster support responses, and better hardware reliability. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series feedback indicates a demand for more intuitive monitoring tools, better documentation, and improved user guidance.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Dell Unity XT is highlighted for its relatively straightforward deployment, but has mixed reviews regarding customer service efficiency. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is recognized for quick and flexible deployment options, receiving positive feedback for responsive customer service.

Pricing and ROI: Dell Unity XT is perceived as costly, but users believe it offers good long-term ROI due to its comprehensive feature set. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is favored for its competitive pricing and immediate performance benefits, delivering a quicker ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Dell Unity XT vs. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series Report (Updated: February 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Dell Unity XT vs. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

February 2026

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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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 1.5%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Unity XT is 5.7%, down from 8.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is 2.0%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

All-Flash Storage Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Dell Unity XT	5.7%
Pure FlashArray X NVMe	1.5%
Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series	2.0%
Other	90.8%

All-Flash Storage

Featured Reviews

Jaehoon Oh

Chief Technology Officer at Lambda256

Supports efficient storage management through volume snapshots and offers reliable non-disruptive upgrades

I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could be enhanced. I can see the performance statistics in the Pure Storage console, but it does not show the performance by 4K byte unit. It displays IOPS and bandwidth, but IOPS is about real use, and I want to know how many IOPS are currently running in 4K byte units. I cannot see that IOPS because most storage systems report their performance by 4K byte unit. I want to see Pure Storage performance by 4K byte unit to compare with other storage or other internal NVMe SSD.

Read full review

Deepak Kannan

Sales Account Manager - BFSI Sector at Frontier Business systems

Customer needs are addressed effectively with collaborative sales and service support

Recently, customers have been asking for a cloud tiering option in storages. Some Dell storages do not have cloud tiering, which is an optional commercial feature. NetApp's FSA model 2750 comes with an inbuilt cloud tiering option. In the future, if Dell storages include this option, especially for Unity, it would help us target SME or medium enterprises for quicker closures and support the sales team.

Read full review

Giorgio Pozzi

System Administrator at PORTGUARDIAN.COM SRL

Performance and cost-effectiveness are maximized with seamless setup and significant ROI

I use Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series to replace the old storage in our infrastructure. Additionally, I use it in customer infrastructures to migrate from the old storage to the new one On the M storage, I find the best features to be deduplication and compression. On the DE storage, the most…

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

"One of the best features is the support, which is excellent."

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use."

"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."

"The most valuable features of this solution are its ease of use and performance."

"Everything, especially the VMs inside, is pretty fast."

"The Pure1 component is most valuable at this point in time when comparing it with EMC. Pure1 is where you can have your diagnostics in the cloud, so you can look at things from your mobile phone."

"It has benefited my organization because it has reduced time to insights."

"What I really like about this program, is that it is easy to use and easy to configurate."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe pros

"Dell Unity XT offers data integration features."

"It's very reliable. I have not had an issue with Dell EMC Unity."

"It will certainly help us scale bigger. If I look at the footprint, the VNX's was multi-rack. Now, all of a sudden, we're only at a portion of a rack. And, obviously, if we can scale within the same rack - we can certainly see that by the number of hard drives we've had to put in - we can scale a lot more easily."

"One of the things that I like the most about it is how they have changed the Unisphere GUI, and how it is now HTML5. It is so easy to use. Also, the array itself is so simple, easy to set up and easy to use, but it still has that great Dell EMC technology behind it."

"Quick Snapshots and cloning are key features."

"Compared to older generations of arrays there is quite an improvement, compared to the older VNXs, for example. It depends on you use it, but for our purposes, we find Unity simple to use."

"Being all-flash makes everything super-fast. It's also great to manage. That's the easiest part. We also have another SAN, from Pure, and the Unity is easier to manage than the Pure."

"The valuable features of Unity include that it's flexible, has a friendly user-interface, and provides good performance."

More Dell Unity XT pros

"The solution is very easy to troubleshoot. It's one of the most valuable features. It also doesn't take long to deploy and normally it comes with a three-year warranty."

"This solution is good for virtualization and meets the need for CPU and RAM requirements."

"Fewer features is not necessarily a negative as it leads to simpler operation and lower price."

"The solution is very easy to set up."

"Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is simple to use"

"I would rate the stability of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series as a ten."

"The solution's initial setup process is easy."

"We have been working with the solution for around a year and so far it has shown itself to be stable."

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series pros

Cons

"The tool's pricing is higher than competitors."

"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."

"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."

"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."

"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."

"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."

"We would like to see more visibility into garbage collection and CPU performance in the GUI."

"Right now, the box itself is just strictly working as a backend storage system. It would be fantastic if we could access it directly like a NAS device through network access or SIS drives. I think they have an interface, but I am not sure how good it is. If we could address a box directly on the network without having to go through a server, it would be great. The replication schemas could be improved. We are not using replication on the storage level right now. We use a different type of replication. If their replication would be as good as the one that we have, I would probably run the replication schema because it might be faster, but I don't know that for a fact. So, I cannot say that they have good replication. All I can say is that they need to inform us better."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe cons

"Stability is the problem. We've had stability issues with it. We've had problems with the iSCSI interface. We've had it for two years now and for two years we've had problems where a service processor will drop, we'll lose connectivity to LUNs, we'll lose connectivity to the storage, issues like that. No matter how we've tried to chase it down, everybody just points fingers at each other. The only thing that changed in our environment was that the Unity solution was installed."

"I would like to see more compression and deduplication added to the solution. Today, our compression is about 2:1 and other solutions give us about 4:1 or 5:1."

"In terms of what could be improved, I would say its capacity and its connection."

"I would like it to be a little bit easier to contact support. We can contact support, but we have to go through a phone tree. We get routed to different places. I might call support to say that I need a drive replaced and get transferred to three different groups before I get to the group I actually need."

"This is a tier-three solution and it gives us what we need for archiving and backups."

"The interface can be a little challenging for someone new."

"One of the issues we've had is that controllers have crashed several times... We've had a lot of problems with the storage processor, SPBs. We've actually had them crash."

"This product lacks deduplication and compression at the current version 4.1.0. LACP is not available for iSCSI either."

More Dell Unity XT cons

"The type of connection that is used in Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series should be improved."

"In the next release, I would like to see more functionality. But, again, it is an entry-level product."

"The solution could be more scalable, although it suits our present needs."

"It would be useful to have structured solutions replicated to other sites."

"The product could support advanced software integrations."

"ThinkSystem could be better integrated with backup software like Commvault, Veritas, or Symantec."

"Improvements can be made to the product's performance."

"The difficult part comes when dealing with the host. You have to enable multi-pathing and other aspects that are needed for proper configuration. I don't know if there is room for a more hyper-conversion structure to work with, but this would be easier."

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."

"The licensing is on a yearly basis."

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."

"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."

"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."

"The tool's pricing is cheap; I rate it a six to seven out of ten. Most of our sales are not subscription-based. We sell the hardware, and customers keep using it. They only renew the service part annually. The support can be a bit pricey, but the solution is more cost-effective than anything else out there."

"The product is expensive."

"Given its price, Pure is not the first option."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe pricing and cost advice

"The pricing of Dell Unity XT is good."

"Currently, we buy directly from Dell EMC. We've tried going through resellers before, but we've found that if we go directly through Dell EMC, we get a good a price from being with the government."

"It's an expensive solution, particularly for medium companies. One device costs about 30,000 euros. The support contract is quite expensive as well. We are currently looking for other lower-cost solutions."

"The return on the investment was simply speeding up our entire vSphere stack, which allowed our developers and engineers to get their workloads done faster and simpler. We were experiencing VM snapshot times of 45 minutes to two or three hours, and it shrunk it down to under five minutes."

"Pricing for this product is manageable, though slightly higher than comparable products."

"Go with the virtual appliance versus the hardware."

"The price of the solution should be less expensive. However, at some point, you need to pay for facility and performance."

"It is priced at around or under $50,000."

More Dell Unity XT pricing and cost advice

"The price of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is a one-time purchase. There is a global price list available to find the price of the solution."

"For an all-flash setup, the cost is around $20,000 for a decent configuration."

"We have a five-year contract for providing support."

"The pricing for this solution is good compared to HP or Dell EMC."

"The best thing about this solution is its price, which reduces our costs."

"The pricing is fair and low compared to other products in this category."

"It is an expensive solution."

"The solution's price could be better."

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Comms Service Provider

Computer Software Company

16%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

University

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	15
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	62
Midsize Enterprise	49
Large Enterprise	94

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	10
Midsize Enterprise	3

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.

See all answers

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

The price of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is very expensive, though I do not know the actual price because I am using the E...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could ...

See all answers

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...

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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...

See all answers

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...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?

The price of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is very good. We chose this type of storage for the performance and the price.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?

The type of connection that is used in Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series should be improved.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?

I use Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series to replace the old storage in our infrastructure. Additionally, I use it in custom...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerStore vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 15% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 11% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 10% of the time

TrueNAS R-Series vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 9% of the time

TrueNAS X-Series vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 5% of the time

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Dell PowerStore vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 33% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 12% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 9% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Dell Unity XT

Compared 5% of the time

More Dell Unity XT Competitors

Dell PowerStore vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 22% of the time

IBM FlashSystem vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 10% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 9% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 8% of the time

HPE StoreOnce vs Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Compared 5% of the time

More Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure FlashArray X NVMe

January 2026

Download Pure FlashArray X NVMe product report

Buyer's Guide

Dell Unity XT

February 2026

Download Dell Unity XT product report

Buyer's Guide

All-Flash Storage

February 2026

Download Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series product report

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X

EMC Unity, Dell EMC Unity

ThinkSystem DE Series

Overview

Pure Storage FlashArray//X is the world’s first enterprise-class, all-NVMe flash storage array. It represents a new class of storage – shared accelerated storage, which is a term coined by Gartner – that delivers major breakthroughs in performance, simplicity, and consolidation.

Pure Storage

Dell EMC Unity XT is one of the best all-flash storage arrays on the market today. Dell EMC Unity XT arrays are designed for performance, optimized for efficiency, and built for a multi-cloud world. In addition, they support digital transformation, enabling businesses to reach the full potential of their data capital quickly and easily. Dell EMC Unity’s All-Flash and Hybrid Flash storage platforms provide the performance, efficiency, enterprise-class software, and virtualization integrations required for running a wide range of virtualized applications.

Dell EMC Unity XT Features

Dell EMC Unity XT has many valuable key features, including:

Unified storage flexibility: With Dell EMC Unity XT you can consolidate separate storage platforms into a single Unity XT unified storage system via a simple and intuitive (HTML5) management GUI that also connects you to CloudIQ.
All-inclusive data protection: Dell EMC Unity XT offers a reliable way to protect application data with all-inclusive data protection services, including snapshots, data-at-rest drive encryption, replication, thin clones, and dynamic pools.
Software-defined solutions: Dell EMC Unity XT provides software-defined storage and HA for on-prem and in the cloud solutions.
Multi-cloud alignment: With Dell EMC Unity XT you have the ability to build and manage an effective data-first multi-cloud strategy. It allows you to consolidate public and private cloud resources that align with your business goals.
Metro node: This feature enables automated business continuity with zero RPO and RTO. It also provides greater flexibility through multi-platform support and replication to any array and has zero performance impact on the storage array.
Scalable file system: Dell EMC Unity XT is built with a robust 256TBu file system. The UFS64 file system includes up to 256 independent VMDK clones, 16 thin clones, space efficient snapshots with a simple space reclaim and low IO impact, file system shrink that can reclaim free blocks, simplified Quotas for User, and much more.
DevOps integrations: Dell EMC Unity XT supports the Container Storage Interface (CSI) plugin to run Kubernetes workloads.

Dell EMC Unity XT Benefits

Some of the benefits of using Dell EMC Unity XT include:

High-speed data access
Low latency
Dual-active controller architecture
Multi-cloud
Intuitive user interface
Cost efficient
Solid performance

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by Dell EMC Unity XT users.

A Systems Engineering Manager at a manufacturing company says, "It is definitely one of the most robust, solid, well-performing products that I have dealt with. It is set it and forget it, which is pretty amazing." He also mentions, “We can do both block and file storage on one unit without purchasing a separate device.”

Peter S., Senior Technical Specialist at a healthcare company, states, “The most valuable feature is reliability. At the end of the day, it just runs. This solution is easy to work with and easy to maintain.”

PeerSpot user Melvin T., Senior Systems Engineer at Prosperity Bank, explains that the solution is “easy to use and we can add LUNs or space without interruption to end-users. We're able to access it from just about anywhere, as long as we have access to a browser. That feature is really neat because sometimes we will go to a different data center or a different site, and if we need to access it to see a LUN or to see any type of storage, we can do that. That's one of the big takeaways with Unity."

Dell Technologies

The DE All-Flash Series delivers the performance of more than 2,000 15k rpm HDDs, yet requires only 2% of the rack space, power, and cooling. Because it consumes 98% less space and power, DE Series can significantly improve the overall efficiency of your IT operations while continuing to meet your performance requirements.

Lenovo

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company

Draper, Rio Grande Pacific, Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Dell Unity XT vs. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

February 2026

Free Report: Dell Unity XT vs. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Unity XT vs. Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.

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