FreeNAS vs HPE 3PAR StoreServ comparison

Why PeerSpot?

FreeNAS and Hewlett Packard Enterprise are both solutions in the NAS category. FreeNAS is ranked #14, while Hewlett Packard Enterprise is ranked #6 with an average rating of 9.0. FreeNAS holds a 3.9% mindshare in N, compared to Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s 4.7% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of FreeNAS users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Hewlett Packard Enterprise users who would recommend it.

FreeNAS

Read 9 FreeNAS reviews

2,220 Views
2,220 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Read 304 HPE 3PAR StoreServ reviews

18,803 Views
4,889 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

FreeNAS

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 7, 2024

HPE 3PAR StoreServ and FreeNAS compete in the storage solutions category. HPE 3PAR StoreServ holds the upper hand due to its enterprise-grade features and strong customer support, though FreeNAS is more cost-effective, attracting smaller operations.

Features: HPE 3PAR StoreServ offers all-flash arrays, remote copy functionality, and ease of use with deduplication and compression. FreeNAS excels in dynamic disk management and supports integrated services like SMB and S3, though it lacks some advanced enterprise features.

Room for Improvement: HPE 3PAR StoreServ could improve its cloud integration and automation, focusing on better InfoSight functionality and documentation clarity. FreeNAS could enhance clustering capabilities and provide better documentation, especially for technical issues and backup operations.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: HPE 3PAR StoreServ is deployed on-premises with strong technical support, though response times vary. FreeNAS is deployed on-premises and in private clouds, appreciated for its simplicity and open-source nature but lacks robust professional support.

Pricing and ROI: HPE 3PAR StoreServ is a premium option with higher costs covering licensing and maintenance, offering good ROI through performance and reliability. FreeNAS, being open-source, primarily incurs hardware costs, appealing to those prioritizing cost-efficiency over advanced features.

To learn more, read our detailed FreeNAS vs. HPE 3PAR StoreServ Report (Updated: September 2026).

Buyer's Guide

FreeNAS vs. HPE 3PAR StoreServ

September 2026

Download the complete report

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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

FreeNAS

Ranking in NAS

14th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Ranking in NAS

6th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

304

Ranking in other categories

Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) (2nd), All-Flash Storage (10th)

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the NAS category, the mindshare of FreeNAS is 3.9%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE 3PAR StoreServ is 4.7%, up from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

NAS Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
HPE 3PAR StoreServ	4.7%
FreeNAS	3.9%
Other	91.4%

NAS

Featured Reviews

Vincenzo D'Aniello

Software developer at TREXON S.R.L.

Open-source with great disk management and task synchronization

The system itself allows you to add any feature. The only bad thing is that this maybe depends on FreeBSD, and sometimes finding documentation is difficult. For example, we knew that previous versions automatically enabled the Linux kernel, yet with the recent version, this was no longer the case. Now, there was the possibility of being able to create Debian-based jails, and finding the documentation was not easy or fast. That said, in the end, we succeeded. If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented.

Read full review

Muhammad Saqib

System Engineer at Hybrid Tech

Uninterrupted upgrades accelerate performance with good support

I would rate the solution eight out of ten. It should be noted that in Pakistan, some parts are not readily available, and we need to import them from Singapore or other countries. We encountered an issue with a customer where the midplane failed and was not available. We had to wait for several days for a replacement, even in a 24/7 support case. Additionally, we faced motherboard failures in the customer's environment, encountering two motherboard failures simultaneously. We obtained one motherboard immediately, yet had to wait ten days for another. These issues should have been resolved promptly given the 24/7 support level.

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

"FreeNAS is much simpler and easier to use than other solutions, but we don't have the complete range of features that come with the full version."

"It integrates well into either Windows or Linux environments."

"What I like about it is that I can work on it from any computer or any device. The initial setup is very simple. The setup wizard is really helpful."

"The stability is quite good; our system is in production and we have not had any problems with it, and when a drive fails, we don't really have any disruption because we can easily rebuild the disk, even if it is very large."

"Its stability is the most valuable. It is reliable, and we don't have to worry too much about it."

"After using FreeNAS I will never spend money for commercial products like Dell or 3Par."

"It has the best storage capacity."

"The ease of use of the 'jail', the management of backups, and copies to easily create test and pre-production scenarios have speeded up the development and distribution of business apps."

More FreeNAS pros

"The technical support has been fantastic."

"I must say the uninterrupted upgrades of 3PAR, the OS, and its RAID-type system are must-have features."

"I think the storage is very good, the way it stores, the thin provisioning it provides, and the data protection. And it's easy to deploy in any environment. We are using VMware. So for me, it's a right click and it's deployed. We can configure and create LUNS very easily with 3PAR management, and the interface is very user-friendly. Easily understandable."

"We've seen a huge improvement in processing times and coming from a traditional SAN over to the HP 3PAR all flash solution, we saw about a 90 percent reduction in the processing time to some of the batch processors that we were running, which for us is very, very huge."

"We can really see that the performance is much, much better and the latencies are much lower."

"The technical support is very good."

"This tool has allowed us to decrease the data import time from nine hours to just one hour."

"We use it for our VND environment; it’s made it easy to make sure we have the highest throughput capable and has helped with our connectivity to our DL servers, making functionality a lot easier."

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ pros

Cons

"FreeNAS should be better prepared for clustering."

"One of my hard drives has failed and the documentation that I've been able to find has not helped."

"The support for S3 needs to be improved."

"If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented."

"They can improve the integration with PSA systems. This functionality could be better."

"Its support for Hyper-V clusters."

"The one thing that I find difficult to do which is very time-consuming is that I like to have a backup of the important files."

"Make it easier to find out how to fix things when something goes wrong."

More FreeNAS cons

"Reliability is one area that needs improvement. I cannot afford to have a 4-node storage array suddenly having 2-nodes reboot for no reason."

"It is suitable for medium-sized businesses and data centers with less number of users and less important data. It is not really an enterprise-level solution. It needs more capacity. It is also not really stable. It should be more stable. It should also support any server model. It is really weak in this area."

"I would you like to see compression included in a future release. That’s what we are missing."

"I would really love to see HPE add some cloud analytics."

"I want artificial intelligence. I don't want anybody from my team to touch it anymore. I want the AI to do everything."

"The Unified Multiprotocol Access to the storage array needs to be improved."

"if it were easier for us to manage the product ourselves without having to get HPE to connect, because it sometimes it does take a bit to get the scheduling worked out with the HPE support. If it were simpler, then it might be easier for us to handle it ourselves."

"On certain of their features that we have to use to migrate data, it tends to go off for about 60 or 90 seconds toward the end of the work."

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its price is okay. It suits our needs."

"Its licensing cost is based on the hardware capacity."

"We use the free version of the program."

"For our configuration, we pay a little bit less than €10,000 ($12,000 USD) per year."

"You need to properly assess your needs before buying the solution since there are chances of overpaying. The type of configuration that you choose can make the price go higher or lower."

"The price of HPE 3PAR StoreServ is reasonable, but buying upgrade licenses are priced very high. There are additional fees."

"We have seen ROI. While the costs were quite high at the time of purchase for our environment, the ease of use and the fact that it hasn't failed all the time, working fine, that makes it worth buying."

"Its price is a bit high for adding another tree, but when we purchased it, it was okay with us. We had compared it with EMC and other solutions, and it was okay at that point in time. Our storage has a lifespan of seven to eight years. When you purchase it, you need to keep a headroom of around 40% to 50%. After three to four years, you generally plan for an upgrade. The price is not so bad today for two years or so, and within a year, I might find that I have to upgrade or increase the storage. This usually happens when there is a radical change or a new application has come that is consuming a lot of data, but generally, there is a plan for the amount of data that we generate and the storage upgrade."

"It makes for less administrative overhead."

"This solution is expensive. We pay every year for support. It's a lump sum because we pay for data center support services, and everything is included in one."

"We are going to buy eight nodes this year and eight nodes next year. Eventually, we are not going to want to buy large storage devices and probably utilize just storage, but in a different manner going forward."

"Our licensing cost are $32,000 annually."

More HPE 3PAR StoreServ pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user182013

Federal Civ/Intel Engineering Lead at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees

May 1, 2015

Measuring Up: EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR

Leading up to EMC World 2015, IT Central Station asked how I would compare EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR. Until recently, the flash storage conversation in my organization and many others has centered on XtremIO and Pure Storage, the leaders of the all-flash array (AFA) space. To that end, I've written a…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Comms Service Provider

20%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Healthcare Company

Construction Company

Outsourcing Company

17%

Construction Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	7
Large Enterprise	2

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	73
Midsize Enterprise	74
Large Enterprise	170

Questions from the Community

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What's the difference between HPE 3PAR StoreServ and HPE Primera?

HPE Primera has many great features but one of the best is that it is very easy to deploy. From an overall perspective, it is reliable, easy to set up, stable, and offers quality block storage. All...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE 3PAR StoreServ?

As a customer, I always prefer to have a lower price. Any customer will always ask for the cheaper price.

See all answers

What needs improvement with HPE 3PAR StoreServ?

I have no specific ideas for improvement at present. We just need to verify whether our current virtual server setup is acceptable to the RBI, as they had raised questions about the VSO, ISO config...

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

FreeNAS

September 2026

Download FreeNAS product report

Buyer's Guide

HPE 3PAR StoreServ

September 2026

Download HPE 3PAR StoreServ product report

Also Known As

No data available

HPE 3PAR Flash Storage, InServ, Storeserv, 3PAR Flash Storage, HP Enterprise Storage, 3PAR Flash Array, HP 3PAR Flash Storage

Overview

FreeNAS, an open-source storage platform, offers easy setup with intuitive management for network-attached storage. It's known for stability and compatibility across Windows and Linux. FreeNAS integrates with CIFS, NFS, and iSCSI while maintaining efficient virtual machine support.

FreeNAS stands out in the realm of network-attached storage by providing robust performance with dynamic disk management and task synchronization. Its container integration enhances versatility, coupled with comprehensive storage options like CIFS, NFS, and iSCSI. Users find value in its capabilities to manage virtual machines and integrated services such as SMB and S3. A vital feature includes data protection during drive failures, maintaining compatibility with both Windows and Linux environments. However, users encounter challenges with backing up large files due to slow network speeds, fragmented documentation, and integration with PSA systems or Hyper-V clusters. Scalability and clearer guidance are areas for improvement. Despite these, FreeNAS is widely utilized for its simplicity in creating users, managing permissions, and offering privacy-focused storage, especially beneficial for organizations with significant data handling needs.

What are some of the key features of FreeNAS?

Easy Setup: Streamlined installation process with minimal technical barriers.
Stability: Reliable performance in managing storage needs.
Dynamic Disk Management: Flexible handling of storage configurations.
Task Synchronization: Efficient task management for optimized operations.
Container Integration: Supports diverse applications effortlessly.
Comprehensive Storage Options: Integrates CIFS, NFS, and iSCSI for varied storage needs.
Virtual Machine Support: Efficient management of virtual environments.
Data Protection: Ensures security during drive failures.

What benefits should users look for in reviews?

Ease of Use: Intuitive interfaces for managing large-scale storage.
Compatibility: Seamless integration with Windows and Linux systems.
Scalability: Potential to expand storage capabilities as needs grow.
Cost Efficiency: Open-source nature reduces license expenses.
Security: Protects sensitive data in research and corporate settings.

FreeNAS is implemented across diverse industries for network-attached storage, primarily serving as a backup for massive files like video files and research data. Organizations employ it for transferring and storing large datasets, and some utilize its 'jail' services for hosting applications such as JavaEE, nodejs, and GitLab. Researchers appreciate the privacy-focused storage and interim backups offered by FreeNAS, suiting their needs for both large-scale data handling and practical application hosting.

FreeNAS

HPE 3PAR StoreServ offers unparalleled performance and flexibility for enterprise storage needs. It is highly valued for its manageability and advanced capabilities, making it ideal for mission-critical workloads.

HPE 3PAR StoreServ is a high-performance storage system known for its ease of use and robust architecture. It supports seamless upgrades and is adaptable to evolving technology, making it an excellent choice for electronic medical records, virtualization, and centralized data management. With integration capabilities supporting applications like SQL Server, VMware, and SAP, it effectively meets diverse business needs.

What are the key features of HPE 3PAR StoreServ?

Ease of Use: Simplifies management tasks with an intuitive interface.
Reliability: Offers high availability and robust architecture for mission-critical workloads.
Flash Storage: Provides fast data access and improved performance.
Dynamic Provisioning: Enhances scalability and resource allocation.
Data Deduplication: Reduces storage costs by eliminating duplicate data.
Tiered Storage: Optimizes data storage with automated tiering.

What benefits should users consider when evaluating HPE 3PAR StoreServ?

Performance: Handles demanding workloads with efficiency.
Scalability: Grows with enterprise needs without compromising performance.
Integration: Seamlessly integrates with existing systems and applications.
Proactive Support: Ensures smooth operation with timely updates and support.

HPE 3PAR StoreServ is employed in industries like healthcare and finance, supporting applications such as Oracle databases and SAP. It enhances data processing and provides essential storage for virtual and real-time applications, meeting the rigorous demands of sectors requiring reliable and high-performance storage solutions.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Sample Customers

Morroni Technologies Inc., Creative Integrations

Just Energy, Latisys, team AG, DreamWorks, BlueShore Financial, Erasmus MC

Buyer's Guide

FreeNAS vs. HPE 3PAR StoreServ

September 2026

Free Report: FreeNAS vs. HPE 3PAR StoreServ

Find out what your peers are saying about FreeNAS vs. HPE 3PAR StoreServ and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.

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