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FlexPod XCS vs VMware vSAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

FlexPod XCS
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
295
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (6th)
VMware vSAN
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
232
Ranking in other categories
HCI (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. FlexPod XCS is designed for Converged Infrastructure and holds a mindshare of 9.2%, down 10.0% compared to last year.
VMware vSAN, on the other hand, focuses on HCI, holds 14.4% mindshare, down 17.9% since last year.
Converged Infrastructure
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

John Kevin - PeerSpot reviewer
Enforces standardized setup procedures following Certified Validated Design (CVD) guidelines and offers greater flexibility and control over the system compared to traditional systems
The GUI setup follows the right setup, meaning we have to follow the CVDi.e. Certified Validated Design. Everything is clear, because you can build CI yourself, but without rules, it can be messy. With FlexPod, there are rules to follow, making it more standardized. This helps with troubleshooting and compatibility assessments, simplifying troubleshooting significantly. We also use FlexPod pre-validated architectures to validate the design. It is very, very important to us because we had a bad case in 2015 where separate items integrated poorly due to no version or firmware compatibility certification. Troubleshooting became a nightmare. So, standards are crucial for us, and everything entering production should be verified or at least documented for certification.
Pramod-Talekar - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables efficient multi-environment cluster deployment and resource management with versatile features
While VMware vSAN is quite comprehensive, if we are running multiple infrastructures, applications, databases, and other elements, having a diagnostic tool to identify the actual problem area, whether application-side or infrastructure-side, would be beneficial. A proper monitoring tool that encompasses both applications and infrastructure would help in quickly resolving issues.

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 is not complex. It is user-friendly since it is a single solution with all the components delivered in one package."
"The solution can be innovative when it comes to cloud computing storage and networking."
"One of the easiest solutions to implement, maintain, and scale."
"FlexPod is the primary solution we recommend for clients with high-availability server requirements. Our clients find FlexPod's management helpful. You can manage everything via plugins."
"The advantage is being able to consolidate everything into a relatively small chassis."
"It's flexible. You can scale up or out. Our environment has never needed it, but the option has always been there."
"The solution has decreased the unplanned downtime incidents in our organization by 25 to 30 percent."
"That it works. That it does exactly what it says on the tin."
"it's easy to scale, it's easy to predict IOP needs, and you can design for low latency using all-flash... Also, for setting up new clusters for VDI quickly, it's nice. You don't have to wait on an order for a storage vendor to ship you a system and help you configure it, you do it all yourself. And the sizing guides are pretty straightforward."
"VMware vSAN's most valuable features are the capability to consolidate standalone physical infrastructure into virtualization and the ease of management."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Flexibility, growth, and expansion are probably the more important features for us. As our environment grows, the more users come on, the more VDI workstations that we need, we can easily expand either horizontally or vertically with the environment"
"It is very easy to set up and very easy to use. It is very useful."
"The lower skill cost of maintaining it meant that we could do more with the people that we had."
"I think vSAN's stability is good. It's an underlying solution for both on-prem and in the cloud, especially the VMC on AWS stuff too. VMware has been around for a long time, so it's pretty stable."
"The most valuable feature for our customers is vMotion. It allows them to shut down virtual machines and migrate them to others servers."
 

Cons

"There is a history of issues with hardware availability. For example, we'll buy an array or a filer with a particular configuration and particular size of drive, sizing it appropriately. Then, as we grow, they're like, "Oh, you can always get more." Then when you go to get more, that model or type of disk is no longer available. It becomes this big process to try to figure out what we need to get, how it'll work, and how that'll integrate into the system. That could be simpler. They could do a bit more to guarantee the availability of parts. Obviously, not being the largest storage vendor, I know they can't sometimes control what the hardware vendors do. However, a bit more transparency and communication about this would be helpful."
"We would like more security features."
"The last two calls that I have made to NetApp support have been handled too casually. People are too lax, not quite as professional as I would have liked."
"I would like them to simplify the UCS configuration. I appreciate that they have about a billion options and a million switches that you can mess with, but this creates a lot of confusion sometimes. I feel like you almost need a Master's course to figure out what you're doing with UCS."
"The FlexPod service and support could be improved."
"I would like more orchestration and networking in-between the VMs, the virtualization layer for networking. I would like to see better tools for this."
"I would like to see synchronous replication and easier automation in the next release."
"We would like one-click upgrades."
"The integration could be improved. I would like to see integration with other platforms."
"I would like to see more support for applications. I think currently it only supports applications between two vSAN clusters."
"They should provide Deduplication and Compression over the hybrid drives."
"The usability is pretty good but it could use a little tweaking on the UI, with a clearer definition of exactly what some of the things do."
"The solution must provide better customization."
"I would like to see the availability of more template based VMware systems. Combined with the ability to check and measure multiple and converging data segments. Another issue I've seen is that the tool seems to be slow when first starting up."
"The solution could maybe improve failure protection."
"It could be more robust. The latency is also an issue for us, and the reliability. I would like it to be faster and a little more flexible."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have saved money using FlexPod. We have saved time and money for new service deployments."
"We have saved time and money for new service deployments. Without FlexPod, it probably takes about ten hours. With FlexPod, within two hours, we are up and running. So, we have seen about an 80 percent time decrease."
"We have seen an 80 percent improvement in application performance."
"We have absolutely seen ROI. We have saved between two to four million dollars on travel alone over the past 24 months."
"We definitely saw a lot of operational cost savings using FlexPod. As far as capital outlay goes, that was a little bit too much for us to swallow and we weren't able to recognize enough savings in that area to afford it."
"Sometimes you may end up spending a little more to get it in the first place, but you gain it back in terms of infrastructure upgrade costs and troubleshooting costs. The solution also lasts a surprisingly long time."
"The cost is a little high."
"The product is kind of expensive even from an entry-level standpoint. I would say FlexPod would be the way to go if you are a larger business or one with large data volume."
"The price of vSAN could be lower."
"The solution requires a license. The payment is on a yearly basis and It is not overly expensive."
"The price is expensive."
"​I would like to see this technology be made available to smaller businesses, who might benefit from high availability but struggle with the entry fee.​"
"For a classical node plus storage solution, the price is higher."
"We pay for a license to use the solution through our company CapEx and then we continue to pay annually."
"It is expensive, but you get what you pay for."
"With vSAN, we didn't find the market that competitive."
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Comparison Review

it_user244362 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 30, 2015
Nutanix vs. VMware EVO:RAIL vs. FlexPod
Originally posted at www.storagegaga.com/dont-get-too-drunk-on-hyper-converged/ I hate the fact that I am bursting the big bubble brewing about Hyper Convergence (HC). I urge all to look past the hot air and hype frenzy that are going on, because in the end, the HC platforms have to be aligned…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
20%
Educational Organization
15%
Performing Arts
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about FlexPod?
The system is designed for easy scaling. Because we define everything clearly. So when we plug the system in, we apply the profile, and it scales easily.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for FlexPod?
The pricing is not cheaper, but stability is more important for us now. We focus on business gains, not static numbers. Following XCS rules ensures a stable environment, which is crucial. For me, C...
What needs improvement with FlexPod?
FlexPod should focus more on automation. Integrating an automation tool with FlexPod would enable customers to leverage automation capabilities. More automation would be helpful. Currently, we cont...
What Is The Biggest Difference Between vSAN And VxRail?
While both run on the vSAN technology from VMware, vSAN needs to be deployed on vSAN ready nodes while VxRail is an engineered system. The choice to choose which technology depends on two major fac...
Which would you choose - Nutanix Acropolis AOS or VMware vSAN?
We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We fou...
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 ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
vSAN
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

University of Sao Paulo, WD-40, The Commonwell Mutual Insurance Group
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