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IBM PureSystems vs VxRail comparison

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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

IBM PureSystems
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (9th), Converged Infrastructure for SAP HANA (2nd)
VxRail
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
135
Ranking in other categories
HCI (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. IBM PureSystems is designed for Converged Infrastructure and holds a mindshare of 5.6%, up 4.1% compared to last year.
VxRail, on the other hand, focuses on HCI, holds 9.6% mindshare, down 16.1% since last year.
Converged Infrastructure Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM PureSystems5.6%
FlexPod XCS12.7%
HPE ConvergedSystem11.1%
Other70.6%
Converged Infrastructure
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VxRail9.6%
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)8.9%
VMware vSAN7.7%
Other73.8%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

it_user6186 - PeerSpot reviewer
Independent Analyst and Advisory Consultant at Server StorageIO - www.storageio.com
PureSystems, something old, something new, something from big blue
PART I For a certain generation of IBM faithful or followers the recently announced PureFlex and PureApplication systems might give a sense of DejaVu perhaps even causing some to wonder if they just woke up from a long Rip Van Winkle type nap. Yet for another generation who may not yet be future…
John Kevin - PeerSpot reviewer
Infrastructure Director at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Automation has streamlined lifecycle management and improved ongoing operational efficiency
For the first three years, I have a combo pricing policy. For the fourth year and fifth year, I have to buy separately for the licensing from VMware and from VxRail, so I think the combo cost for the fourth and fifth year is huge and does not make sense. Due to the pricing policy, I would not like to see additional functionalities at this time as it is not in my strategy. I would rate VxRail an eight out of ten because of the pricing.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The strengths of the system is how the Flex scales from a very powerful, next generation BladeCenter all the way up to an IaaS platform."
"t's a very good solution with multiple options with VxRail series like based on customer requirements whether they're focused on compute, storage, scalability and high performance, etc. Whether a customer you are going to start your IT Infrastructure footprint with a limited budget, you have freedom of choice and non-disruptive expansion in the future, whether in the main data center or branches. Any idea coming in system admins mind to run this setup continuously and keep service 100% 24/7 is possible in this product line. Hyper-converged appliances allow a datacenter in a box approach, with G, E P, Vand P series."
"I've used Cisco in the past, and I find this solution is easier to implement and offers good hardware and software integrations."
"The product allows us to have the capacity for the future to be able to add applications to help us better serve our customers."
"The product is very stable, and I rate its stability as nine out of ten."
"Customers can get many benefits with utilizing VxRail and all the innovations that are coming up, specifically being able to move VxRail workloads into the various public cloud solutions."
"VxRail has improved our organization by providing our admin team with an easy-to-use interface."
"It is truly a hyper-converged infrastructure, so everything is there together: The storage, the network, and it is all in one package, so it's easily deployable in a very quick fashion."
"VxRail has high performance and has great efficiency."
 

Cons

"The FSM does not quite deliver in the areas it plays too. A fairly sluggish interface that is more complex and less streamlined than it perhaps could be, holds it back and deployment of certain functionality from the switches requires more user intervention than feels necessary."
"There could be better documentation and they should allow everyone to access the simulator."
"The version upgrade process should be simplified."
"From a hardware and software perspective, there could be an improvement in the sales cycle, as there are a lot of hoops to go through to get pricing on a solution."
"If they can provide deduplication compression through the traditional hard drives, as Cisco does in the HyperFlex system, it will be very cost-effective, especially when it comes to archiving workload. VxRail doesn't allow the mixing of old flash clusters and hyper clusters. When I'm starting with an old flash cluster and it comes to archiving workload, I will also need to attend the new cluster. So, I either manage two different clusters, or I pay and upload my work with the archiving mobile hard drive, which is not cost-effective at all. The main key is to allow mixing between two types of clustering, like Nutanix, or allow deduplication of completion over the period of shared hard drive on SAV. It will be much better."
"They're getting better with their one-click upgrade. The success factor is now between 85% to 87% with the latest release. They should just continuously improve on that one-click factor and make it more seamless."
"You cannot install another operating system such as Microsoft or Hyperflex or Nutanix. We have also had a hardware problem."
"We believe Dell's vShpere support falls short of the mark."
"All updates are supposed to be done through VxRail, however, the vCenter actually showed that there was an update it needed. I've just started using the product. I didn't know what I was doing. I actually updated my vCenter and that actually threw the VxRail system offline. We had to spend some time trying to get that working again. If possible, they should make the process a bit more clear so we don't make mistakes like this in the future. There should maybe be some sort of pop-up that can direct you."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The price is a little bit on the higher side but the system and management are so quick and easy that it's worth it for the customer."
"Fees vary by license type."
"The pricing is very accurate, and we haven't had any problems with the licensing costs."
"I do not believe that the price should be lower, as I feel it to be reasonable."
"We were expecting Dell EMC to bring us something that would work very quickly and easily, but also be at a reasonable price point, and they did."
"While one could argue, from a strictly corporate standpoint, that the cost of VxRail has been in the higher range, the true evaluation lies in the return on investment."
"We made a one-time purchase of the solution and the price is expensive."
"There is an advantage for those who have a good deal with Dell. Its price is good. From a company's perspective, it is always too expensive, but it is about value for money."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
10%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business42
Midsize Enterprise43
Large Enterprise57
 

Questions from the Community

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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...
What are the major differences between VxRail and Dell EMC PowerFlex?
VxRail vs. Dell EMC PowerFlex VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if the user is working with a l...
 

Also Known As

PureSystems
VCE VxRail
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ABT Online, Ascent Solutions Inc., Desert Research Institute (DRI), Reflexis, Esri, Avcilar Municipality, ValeCard, Computer Gross Italia S.p.A., DynaFront, Silvermoon Business Systems, Diasoft, BPTP, Temenos, Innovation Group, OneTree Solutions
World Wide Technology Inc, Renault Sport Formula One Team, 8x8 Inc, Brownes, Canadian Pacific, Canopy, Denton, EDF, Unilin, Xerox
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, Rackspace Technology and others in Converged Infrastructure. Updated: September 2026.
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