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Dell XC Appliance vs HPE SimpliVity comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 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

Dell XC Appliance
Ranking in HCI
16th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.5
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HPE SimpliVity
Ranking in HCI
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
155
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Dell XC Appliance is 1.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE SimpliVity is 6.3%, down from 8.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
HPE SimpliVity6.3%
Dell XC Appliance1.7%
Other92.0%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Enables seamless integration with multiple software and outstanding AI tools
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it. I find it overly reliant on VMware. In cases of company mergers involving different platforms, software that can handle a multi-hypervisor environment would facilitate quicker integration.
Mohammed Lokman Hossen - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager, Enterprise Technology Services at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Has integrated solutions and rapid recovery made management smoother and more reliable
There is the latest update from HPE regarding HPE SimpliVity. For virtualization, HPE has to depend on other manufacturers, OEMs such as VMware or Hyper-V. Recently, HPE declared the VM essential virtualization solution. In the future, if HPE integrates HPE SimpliVity with VM essential, that will be a great combination. Functionality-wise, I am totally satisfied with HPE SimpliVity, but for improvement, if HPE integrates its own virtualization solution, this combination and integration will be beneficial because this integration can be configured with the cloud-based system. A VM can be uploaded to the cloud from this, which will be advantageous for backup to other sites.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"When we compare it to normal hardware servers, I'd say it is quite easy to configure and deploy."
"Dell's appliances provide several key benefits, including horizontal and vertical scalability up to 64 nodes, proprietary artificial intelligence tools that are uncommon in the industry, seamless iDRAC integration with VMware to monitor VM details, performance, and hardware issues from one screen, and CloudIQ software that proactively addresses configuration errors."
"To other customers who are looking to implement Dell XC, it's a very good hyper-converged solution."
"The solution's hardware is great."
"The most valuable features are the deduplication and the compression features."
"The solution's best feature is its simplicity."
"The most valuable feature is the low management overhead, and the lower skill set required to manage it."
"The most valuable feature is that you can assign a volume to an off-shore workload on the fly."
"As a product, SimpliVity is better than others due to the fact that it has its own WAN optimizer optimization technologies then dedupe and compression ratios are high, and we can get support from a single vendor."
"Technical support is perfect. They explain to us the solution in a very clear and simple way."
"A very small package but with lots of memory and CPU."
"I am very pleased with the performance and ease of use."
"The solution simplifies IT life, as in terms of resources such as OT and data backup one can save a lot in cost, around the clock one need not worry about having comprehensive backup, the entire system remains up and running during office hours and there is no need to wait for anything, and overall one is assured that all the data is backed up and can be restored."
"SimpliVity meets all of our requirements and also address other future requirements that were not in the scope of the primary storage project."
"With Simplivity we are able to backup file servers every 4 hours and restore them in less than 20 seconds."
"The technical support is exceptionally good."
 

Cons

"We are not always advised of new features or updates, so we must research to stay up to date."
"Dell needs to do a lot of work to simplify the maintenance and life-cycle upgrades for the product."
"Currently, there is no support for the servers that are not in the cluster."
"To improve this product, I think there is a lot of work that is required by Dell to simplify the maintenance and life cycle upgrades."
"We are not always advised of new features or updates, so we must research to stay up to date."
"There should be more provisioning capabilities within the solution."
"To improve this product, I think there is a lot of work that is required by Dell to simplify the maintenance and life cycle upgrades."
"The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it."
"To install or to update it is more complicated than other solutions."
"It would be better if it could integrate more easily with other vendors."
"We're getting ready to replace it with something because SimpliVity has completely stopped supporting their solution on Cisco hardware."
"​I have some worries about the support after the acquisition. ​The support was better before HPE acquired SimpliVity."
"To install or to update it is more complicated than other solutions."
"Standalone HPE SimpliVity is more expensive than other OEMs and solutions."
"Its deployment should be easier."
"High availability for large production environments needs to be offered."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is dependent on the technology and is in direct relation to the manufacturer and the components."
"We received a good price from Dell."
"The pricing for Dell EMC solutions is quite expensive and not really made for small or medium-sized businesses."
"The price point is very fair for a product in this category but can vary depending on the components selected within the family of products."
"The pricing is good."
"The licenses from the product are expensive compared to the other solutions in the market."
"We did get some quotes from Nutanix, and they were ballparks. So, it is not cheap, and there is nothing free, but those two were comparable."
"If we compare the price of HPE SimpliVity with other vendors that are selling the hyper-converged infrastructure, all of them are not cheap and are priced similarly. However, the price we pay and what we receive makes it a good price."
"The only thing that I think we are paying for is the VMware licenses, but we are enterprise, so it is not horrible."
"We spent $250,000 back in the day, and that was for two servers in my data center for that cluster. We then ran what they call an arbiter, and that took the place of a third server or the third node in the cluster. My DR site was one standalone server, and its horsepower was more than the two at my main site. It included my Cisco Switches that I needed to re-upgrade. It was comparable to what we were paying a year in VM."
"Its licensing is yearly."
"It is not too expensive, but it is quite expensive for me."
"This solution, while costly as all these solutions are, was in fact less expensive than upgrading my old SAN."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise2
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business67
Midsize Enterprise49
Large Enterprise80
 

Questions from the Community

What advice do you have for others considering Dell XC Appliance?
My advice for people who are selling this product is to first make sure that you educate the customers. The customer doesn't often know much about HCI and what the need to be using it for. If they ...
What needs improvement with Dell XC Appliance?
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's applian...
What is your primary use case for Dell XC Appliance?
Dell offers several benefits with its appliances. Primarily, I can combine them horizontally and vertically, reaching up to sixty-four nodes. Additionally, Dell employs its own artificial intellige...
How does HPE Simplivity compare with VMware vSAN?
HPE SimpliVity is a hyper-converged infrastructure solution that is primarily geared to mid-sized companies. We researched VMware vSAN but found HPE was a better option for us. HPE SimpliVity has ...
What do you like most about HPE SimpliVity?
The solution's technical support is good.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE SimpliVity?
Standalone HPE SimpliVity is more expensive than other OEMs and solutions. Regarding the software side, VMware is costing significantly more nowadays compared to other solutions in the market. The ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
SimpliVity, HPE HCI
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cardlytics, AEW Energie, Aubert, Zhongtong Information Service, Commune de Villepinte, Teikyo University Hospital
Red Bull Racing, Mandarin Oriental, Brigham Young University, UCLA, Merlin Entertainments, Sasa Cosmetics, Travelport, St. John’s Riverside Hospital, Princess House
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell XC Appliance vs. HPE SimpliVity and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,438 professionals have used our research since 2012.