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IBM Spectrum Accelerate vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 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

Everpure FlashArray
Sponsored
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
232
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (3rd)
IBM Spectrum Accelerate
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (22nd), Cloud Software Defined Storage (4th)
StarWind Virtual SAN
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
213
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st), HCI (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Lead at Wipro Limited
Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades
The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.
reviewer1154616 - PeerSpot reviewer
IS Auditor at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees
A robust solution with good performance and support
This is a solution that scales well, although I think that we have stabilized in terms of use. With respect to scalability, we have an open question as to whether we will be able to grow into a cloud-based deployment. We don't know in what ways this solution will assist us with the migration, or whether we can still use it for DR. We don't know about the type of backup, be it full, incremental, or otherwise. We are also looking for a cost-savings if we migrate. These are things that we will find out over time. We have about two petabytes of data.
Jccerong Heron - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Support team has guided us through deploying virtual storage on legacy hardware and reducing operational costs
The reason I chose StarWind Virtual SAN for this particular scenario is really the features, the ease of use, and most importantly, the price. In my opinion, the best features StarWind Virtual SAN offers are easy integration with the system installed in the data center. The integration with my existing systems in the data center works well, especially with VMware, as we already have a big cluster in VMware, and the easy integration with that is helpful to solve some problems with the platform. StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted my organization by reducing OPEX costs. My OPEX costs have gone down as we reutilize some old servers, and this reduces the CAPEX of hardware in the data center.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The predictive performance analytics are good."
"We find the ease of usability and setup valuable."
"Pure Storage FlashArray's overall speed is its most valuable feature."
"Their support system has insight into errors on our SAN fabric that we can't see. They've brought attention to and raised awareness for us about things that we couldn't see, when we were experiencing problems."
"It allows engineers to focus on other things rather than doing the more manual tasks. It automates tasks, so the ease of use is extreme. It simplifies the storage."
"The product has not gone down in a year, so I would say that it is stable, and we haven't seen any high spikes in read/write latency."
"This is the best all-flash storage array on the market."
"Technical support has been amazing."
"The most valuable feature is the robustness, which is typical of IBM because their software generally just works."
"The ease of use is the solution's most valuable aspect; it's very user-friendly, and the security on the product is very good."
"Implementing this solution has been a very good decision for our in-house data center."
"High Availability is the best feature of product."
"The solution offers easy one-click PowerShell scripts that are ready to run."
"I have never felt that StarWind underperformed or was difficult to manage."
"Integration with Microsoft clustering has been perfect, allowing us to leverage our investment in MS server licensing to the fullest."
"In summary, I think it's the best solution I could buy to achieve my goals."
"One of the standout features of StarWind.com is its remarkable ability to seamlessly integrate with Dell systems. This integration provides users with an unmatched level of convenience and compatibility, allowing for streamlined operations within a Dell environment. This compatibility factor alone can save significant time and effort for IT professionals, ensuring a smooth integration process and optimized performance."
"The ability for us to manage all of our nodes from the same console makes systems administration very easy."
"The StarWind SAN solution has provided numerous benefits to our organization."
 

Cons

"It's not so scalable. It's got moderate scaling capabilities right now. The clustering technology needs a bit of work, they need to improve that."
"Self-backup is the only feature lacking in this solution."
"I want to improve the overall service level of the solution."
"I’d love to view the average, minimum and maximum performance in the reports (Analysis tab - Performance) but it is only graphics and you need to export data in CSV to find this information."
"The capability from Pure as far as sharing out files and things of that nature is a little bit lacking."
"It would be nice if Pure had something in its portfolio that provided higher deduplication and compression for backups."
"In the next release I would like to see integration into other third-party player providers like Google."
"Had some issues with Purity not being entirely compatible with VMware ESXi."
"The interface is not user-friendly so the ease of use could be improved."
"The reporting mechanisms need improvement."
"I would like an automated installation/configuration despite the fact that their service is very collaborative, a customer should be able to deploy the solution by themselves."
"The main thing I would like to see improved is the level of documentation."
"The documentation is sub-par. The pre-sales documentation and information is sub-par."
"In the next release, Starwind should include enhanced integration with cloud services for more seamless hybrid cloud operations. Advanced analytics and reporting tools would improve monitoring and decision-making."
"For improvement, I would like to see how the software determines which networks to use for which purpose. It seems like the naming terminology changes a bit from here to there."
"It is hard to find adequate technical documentation on their support website."
"Performance when in storage-separate configuration needs to be improved."
"The console is something that I feel could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of Pure Storage is all-inclusive. It is very fair, and very easy. In comparison, Dell EMC has licensing that needs to be added if you wan to work in a complex environment or in specific functionalities."
"It's expensive, but you get what you pay for."
"It is light years beyond anything else with the same price point."
"There should be quite a bit of reduction of TCO with just licensing (and stuff) because we run the VM environment off it."
"We implemented Pure Storage FlashArray nine years ago when it was new to the market and obtained it at a preferential price."
"The price of the solution is not expensive."
"We are finding the TCO of flash to be lower than SSD implementations."
"Cost-wise, I imagine that the product's price would probably give you a nosebleed if you were a younger company."
"If you are cost-sensitive then this solution is not for you."
"For a database, on a yearly basis, we pay approximately $3,500 for licensing fees. The solution is sold as a subscription on a yearly basis so there are no other ancillary costs."
"This is the best priced solution for an SMB."
"The cost was ultimately low to implement, which allowed us to be 3-2-1 complaint."
"The setup cost is very low. The pricing is great."
"Licensing is easy and the whole package is cost-effective."
"The licensing is a bit weird. If you license the standard version of StarWind, it allows you four terabytes. Then, they have a pro version, but with the pro version, the only difference is it doubles the terabytes to eight."
"Licensing is based on nodes rather than TBs, which means that the users are free to increase storage capacity without putting thought into licensing."
"We evaluated other options and this one was the most cost-effective."
"If you are looking at a traditional SAN for a small cluster, give StarWind vSAN because you will save thousands without any compromise."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Construction Company
9%
No data available
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business73
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise160
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business170
Midsize Enterprise57
Large Enterprise34
 

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?
Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
I find the pricing of Everpure FlashArray to be quite high compared to other storage solutions; however, the reliabil...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
I believe we have covered the most important features; the architecture of Pure Storage is essential, and features su...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for StarWind Virtual SAN is very simple; that is another good t...
What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
StarWind Virtual SAN has latency that is not as good versus VMware vSAN, but I believe it is more of a Hyper-V limita...
What is your primary use case for StarWind Virtual SAN?
My main use case for StarWind Virtual SAN is that it replaced our VMware vSAN. I transitioned from VMware vSAN to Sta...
 

Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
IBM XIV
StarWind SAN & NAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Silverpop
Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Spectrum Accelerate vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
915,287 professionals have used our research since 2012.