We performed a comparison between Dell Unity XT and Pure Storage FlashArray based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two All-Flash Storage solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."It impacts customer retention because of its overall ease. When you are running a business, where time is a factor, that is the biggest selling point. Things happen really rapidly, when they happen, and being able to say, "Yeah, we can get this up and running in a day, if you want," or even less time in some cases. Sometimes, that can be what makes or breaks our case."
"We have had issues before on our infrastructure where 20 to 30 percent of the people would come to us pointing the finger at the storage technology or storage back-end. That is now virtually zero."
"Technical support has been okay."
"It simplifies data management for NAS environments with its ease of management, ease of share creation, and Active IQ feature. These features are good overall. It helps us manage data quickly and sufficiently. Also, compression features, like dedupe, give us a good ratio."
"The most valuable features are the performance and the storage efficiency, due to the compression and deduplication... The efficiency is very important because we can buy fewer disks for more data."
"We are a large-scale company, and our growth has been pretty significant over the last five or six years. We like the scale, and the way NetApp grows, so that's why we use it. It's mostly for block storage."
"It also helps to accelerate databases in our environment. First of all, there is the reliability of things staying online and the small response time as well, from the MetroCluster, for all of the data that we're serving; and the applications are talking to the MetroCluster. It provides a very fast response time."
"The performance is outstanding when it's all Flash. That's the biggest bang for the buck that we get."
"The solution allows for easy, useful replication with good features for VPLEX and VIVO."
"The most valuable feature is the dynamic cache of this product. It is very important. We have the physical cache and we can boost this cache using disks. All the products are mainly flash now and this is one of the main characteristics which our customers like."
"The most valuable features are its performance and simplicity."
"Initial setup is a simple process."
"The solution overall has high performance."
"My storage team likes Unity's replication features. Three-site replication is a unique feature that EMC offers us."
"The complete block and file sharing are the most usable features."
"I like how it separates the iSCSI drives from the standard shares. It has two different routes to it. I know most of the other solutions do this, but I just like the way that Dell EMC does it."
"FlashArray has many valuable features. It's very user-friendly and it has high availability, so there is comparatively less downtime. During maintenance, there is no shutdown procedure, so you can directly power off the Array and manage the shutdown process without any data loss, which is a unique feature. Managing replication and data migration is also very easy."
"The most valuable feature is replication."
"The code upgrades are very smooth."
"The compression and deduplication features help to make the best use of the capacity."
"NVMe data storage platform that's easy to set up and easy to use. It's stable, with a lower response time, and quick technical support."
"The all-flash disc is the most valuable feature of this solution."
"Provides fast access and is user-friendly."
"I use all the features of this solution and I find them to be easy to use and functional, such as the compression and capacity to expand."
"When it comes to the connectivity on the back end, where the hardware is concerned—the cabling and the like—it could also be simplified to ease the communication between the nodes and between the other components of the infrastructure. I still find that a little bit complicated."
"After the three-year prepay, the extended warranty is a little expensive."
"It can get a little expensive if you need to add more disks. The cost is a pain point for us, especially in terms of expansion."
"We have been seeing some challenges around the application layer implementation. We are having some teething problems now with the cooperation between the application layer and backups to things, like SnapCenter. This may be a question of product maturity."
"The size of NetApp could be better. They're always about 40 pounds without the hard drives in them, so it would be great if there's a way to make them smaller yet keep the functionality. That would reduce the physical footprint."
"The initial setup has a lot more steps in it than are probably necessary for a base deployment, unlike other vendors where it's more straightforward. It could be a little bit more streamlined."
"There is room for improvement in terms of support. I have noticed that if I sometimes call their customer care for a particular issue, they will give me another number and ask me to call that other team. It would be better if they could do a warm transfer. That would save customers time from calling all the numbers again and speaking to another team."
"There is room for improvement with the user interface. There are a few things that cannot be done in the GUI. We do a lot of things through the CLI, but that's grown out of a lack of ability to do them in the GUI. An example is QTrees. You can manage them within the GUI, but the GUI is missing a few options."
"It could be a little easier to attach it to a network file system."
"The pre-sales technical support and technical engagement could be made better for this product."
"We would like to see more advanced integration capability added to this solution."
"Issues with slow responses from the support team."
"It could go faster. Make it bigger, better, and faster at a lower price, and I am there."
"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."
"This is a tier-three solution and it gives us what we need for archiving and backups."
"They can certainly improve in terms of monitoring."
"We need to add more storage in Pure Storage FlashArray with the cluster mode activated for us to have better performance."
"The price should be lower."
"Its price could be cheaper. It is not the cheapest one out there, but I'm not directly involved in the figures and negotiations."
"When we were doing some tests, we found that there was an I/O freeze when they were switching the controller."
"A minor issue that comes to mind is that, every once in a while, a hard drive will go bad."
"The system has dual controllers but does not have a high level of resiliency built-in."
"Pure Storage FlashArray could improve in the area of cryptographic information in the consoles. The user-friendliness could improve. The Pure Storage FlashArray team should come and log into the system with their maintenance credentials and then pull out the information as evidence of cryptography."
"It was not proactive communication."
Dell Unity XT is ranked 4th in All-Flash Storage with 43 reviews while Pure Storage FlashArray is ranked 2nd in All-Flash Storage with 42 reviews. Dell Unity XT is rated 8.4, while Pure Storage FlashArray is rated 9.0. The top reviewer of Dell Unity XT writes "Price / Quality ratio is good and since OE 5.03 code the array family reached a rather good maturity level". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Pure Storage FlashArray writes "Provides protection against ransomware threats with immutable snapshots, and it is well known for its scalability, ease of use, and non-disruptive upgrades". Dell Unity XT is most compared with Dell PowerStore, HPE Nimble Storage, HPE 3PAR StoreServ, IBM FlashSystem and Dell PowerMax NVMe, whereas Pure Storage FlashArray is most compared with Dell PowerStore, VMware vSAN, IBM FlashSystem, HPE Nimble Storage and Pure Storage FlashBlade. See our Dell Unity XT vs. Pure Storage FlashArray report.
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