IBM Spectrum Scale vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize comparison

IBM Spectrum Scale and IBM Spectrum Virtualize are both solutions in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category. IBM Spectrum Scale is ranked #7 with an average rating of 9.3, while IBM Spectrum Virtualize is ranked #12 with an average rating of 9.0. Additionally, 100% of IBM Spectrum Scale users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of IBM Spectrum Virtualize users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

IBM Spectrum Virtualize and IBM Spectrum Scale compete in the data management category. IBM Spectrum Scale seems to have the upper hand due to its wide-ranging features, making it valuable for data-intensive environments.

Features: IBM Spectrum Virtualize provides advanced storage virtualization with a unified view of storage resources and enhances data efficiency through compression and de-duplication. It simplifies storage management across heterogeneous systems. IBM Spectrum Scale offers scalable, high-performance data management with parallel file systems for fast access, a benefit for big data and analytics, and supports numerous data protocols.

Room for Improvement: IBM Spectrum Virtualize could improve in supporting newer storage technologies faster and enhance its performance analytics tools. It may also benefit from more cloud integration features. IBM Spectrum Scale's complexity in deployment can be reduced, and its user interface could be more intuitive. It might also expand support for emerging data protocols.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM Spectrum Virtualize provides an easy deployment process and excellent customer service support, integrating seamlessly into existing infrastructures. IBM Spectrum Scale requires a more detailed deployment approach due to its architecture, but is backed by comprehensive documentation and a responsive customer support team.

Pricing and ROI: IBM Spectrum Virtualize generally has lower initial costs, providing immediate ROI with storage efficiency. IBM Spectrum Scale may have higher upfront costs but offers significant long-term ROI through performance and scalability in handling data-intensive tasks.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Spectrum Scale vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Scale vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

April 2025

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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

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

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Bernd Stroehle.

Enterprise Architect at kosakya

Deliver improved performance in data processing and foster extensive AI initiatives

I find IBM Spectrum Scale to be an excellent product known for its fast parallel file system. It achieved the best results when integrated with IBM hardware. Even though it is complex, it provided significant performance advantages in large-scale data management. Its fault tolerance mechanisms and integration capabilities make it popular for extensive AI initiatives and data processing tasks for organizations like Daimler Benz and Bosch.

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MD.Faisal Alam

Manager, Technical Services, IBM Storage & Backup Solutions. at Thakral

Built-in compression enhances data management efficiency

I have noticed that the technical support for software issues, such as with Spectrum Protect, needs improvement. The case logging process is efficient, but resolving software problems takes too much time. This delay can hinder customers and strain vendor relationships. For hardware issues, IBM handles them efficiently, but software-related support requires enhancement. Overall improvement in support for software cases is necessary.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It helps simplify our storage, because the user interface is very simple and the installation is easy."

"It has absolutely simplified our storage because the dashboards on the consoles show a clear understanding of where you are, and it is also very easy to provision. This been a big help for our teams."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is user-friendly. It's replication feature is great because it has active replication and active DR. That's the beauty of the product. It's a perfect solution for block storage."

"The solution is able to handle workloads and is easy to use. It allows us to actually manage the boxes in less time."

"It uses the same platform for connectivity so integration is seamless."

"The onboarding and integrated monitoring tools are pretty good."

"The initial setup is pretty easy and simple."

"It performs well and it is also very fast."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"It has been pretty reliable throughout the years. As far as capacity is concerned, it can handle most heavy loads."

"The high performance of the solution is its most valuable aspect. If you compare it to other storage solutions, it's much better."

"Its great servicing high availability. That is what it is used for."

"Allows us to share files across multiple environments."

"It is a scalable solution."

"The profile share is a valuable feature."

"GPFS monitoring is the best feature."

"Technical support has been very helpful. They provide us with pretty good solutions that we can implement moving forward."

More IBM Spectrum Scale pros

"The ease of management, the simplicity of the CLI, the speed of that interface, and the well-architected design of the product in general are valuable features."

"I like all the features, but the most impressive recently has been the introduction of IBM's Flash Core Modules. They are a form of a flash drive, but they have many more features."

"It lowers cost. It does so by getting more efficient use out of the technology behind it."

"IBM offers excellent customer service."

"The SVC gives excellent performance with tiered storage behind it."

"The ability to add the virtual machine on the Spectrum environment to sort out the data movers(DMs) and their schedules is a valuable feature. You are able to have, for example, four data movers to balance them so you do not have too much work on one data mover."

"There are many benefits to this solution. Storage virtualization and the ability to migrate massive amounts of data to other systems without impacting your client are the most valuable. It is non-disruptive for my users. We migrated 350 terabytes of data in one night to a new machine without a small system going down and a single user complaining about the performance. You have to fine-tune a lot of storage machines constantly for performance and for making sure that they are optimal, but IBM Spectrum Virtualize does this by itself. It does the adjustment on its own, and it does it right. That's what makes it different. I had a huge VSP from Hitachi, which is also a type of virtualization-based engine but with a decent size. It was a continuous performance-tuning exercise. I never had that issue with IBM Spectrum Virtualize."

"Although the GUI from the XIV was used (in my view), IBM has polished and refined the GUI providing a pleasant and easy to navigate GUI experience."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize pros

Cons

"There could be improvements in public cloud integration."

"In terms of scalability, it doesn't expand out quite as robustly as some of the others, but it covers 90% of the market in what it does."

"The feature that we're waiting on is better integration with the cell services."

"On our dedupe during our initial buy, we were expecting a number a little higher like 4x. However, we are getting about 3.6. While it is close enough, it doesn't quite hit the numbers. So, this has been a challenge."

"Its configuration should be easier."

"To improve FlashBlade, some analysts suggest enhancing its handling of relational database management systems and SQL queries."

"In the realm of micro-services, I think that Pure Storage can do well if they start getting in there and making their arrays more micro-services ready."

"I want efficiency. FlashBlade doesn't have efficiency now."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"The solution's pricing could be better."

"Integration with other vendors is not available."

"The pricing and licensing model for this solution are complex and it is sometimes difficult to explain it to customers."

"We do have some issues where Spectrum Scale does not work as expected. We have seen our Spectrum Scale servers go down unexpectedly, but because we have a cluster, it does not take out the entire organization."

"I believe there is no graphic user interface, so they should include it."

"I wish there were some graphical user interface to access the GPFS file system creation and monitoring."

"Making it a little easier to add bad file sets would help. There is a transition to how you add storage and how you add a file set, so making that a little smoother would probably be my recommendation."

"The biggest problem is that it is not able to provide block storage."

More IBM Spectrum Scale cons

"GUI should be developed in HTML5 as opposed to Java."

"I would like to see them provide a unified platform that offers block, file, and object-based protocol access."

"They are actually working on one bug we found, which was with flash restore. This was the user interface design for virtual environments."

"There are things that occur when you get to this size and capacity. We're very large, i.e., petabytes. When you get to that sheer volume of the numbers of things, it is too big for people to keep track of."

"IBM could improve IBM Spectrum Virtualize by bundling Storage Scale and Storage Virtualize into a single appliance. This would provide a more appealing and cost-effective solution."

"The case logging process is efficient, but resolving software problems takes too much time."

"Anything which improves performance and the ability of our systems would be a nice."

"There are big arrays now, and if a customer wants add more disks to it, you have to have another array. Adding disks to existing arrays is one of the most demanded things from our customers."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is within reason for what you get. From what we have found comparing it to other vendors, it is in the same range as others. Given the choice, we would definitely redeploy it based on the cost."

"The product is very expensive."

"The price is a little high."

"We used a reseller for the purchase."

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."

"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is a hardware appliance, and it's very expensive if you compare its price with other solutions. You can get the same features and benefits from its competitor, VAST Data, but for half the price of Pure Storage FlashBlade."

"The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"The licensing is based on the number of terabytes."

"The solution is costly but reliable."

"The licensing model is complex and depends on factors such as the number of processing cores and the amount of storage."

"Do a proof of concept, if you are not comfortable jumping in, but do it."

"I am very happy with the pricing. There is no comparison when it comes to pricing. I have looked at all solutions from EMC, Veritas, Hitachi, Dell, etc. None of them compares to IBM when it comes to pricing. I get great pricing from them."

"The entry point of pricing for this product is the most amazing price ever in the industry."

"We would like the CPU cycle to save more on the licensing costs for us."

"It has a lot of advanced functions for a reasonable price."

"I think it is a good value for the price."

"We have struggled with Pure Storage, but people are understanding that much of Pure has been consumer grade SSDs. Therefore, when the customer is really understands what they are getting, they realize that IBM presents the same sort of value as existing vendors."

"Generally the bundled licensing is more cost effective and gives flexibility to the solution. Linking into the Spectrum Suite can also be advantageous, but depends on the scale of the enterprise."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

29%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

14%

Educational Organization

Computer Software Company

21%

Financial Services Firm

15%

Government

12%

Real Estate/Law Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

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What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

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What do you like most about IBM Spectrum Scale?

It is a scalable solution.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Scale?

IBM Spectrum Scale is very expensive with complex pricing models usually based on the amount of storage used or the n...

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What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Scale?

There is room for improvement in the web interface. There could be more information available, such as charts and gra...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

IBM Spectrum Virtualize is not an expensive product. It offers flexibility with different flavors, whether appliance-...

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What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

IBM could improve IBM Spectrum Virtualize by bundling Storage Scale and Storage Virtualize into a single appliance. T...

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What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

I primarily use IBM Spectrum Virtualize ( /products/ibm-spectrum-virtualize-reviews ) when I have different hardware ...

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Comparisons

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 21% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 12% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

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Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 28% of the time

Portworx Enterprise vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 14% of the time

DDN IME vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 14% of the time

IBM Spectrum Accelerate vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 9% of the time

Veritas Access vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 4% of the time

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VxRail vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 28% of the time

Dell VPLEX vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 24% of the time

VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 17% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 15% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

April 2025

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Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Scale

April 2025

Download IBM Spectrum Scale product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Virtualize

April 2025

Download IBM Spectrum Virtualize product report

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

IBM Spectrum Scale is a cluster file system that provides concurrent access to a single file system or set of file systems from multiple nodes. The nodes can be SAN attached, network attached, a mixture of SAN attached and network attached, or in a shared nothing cluster configuration. This enables access to this common set of data to support a scale-out solution or to provide a high availability platform. IBM Spectrum Scale has many features beyond common data access including data replication, policy based storage management, and multi-site operations. You can create a cluster of AIX nodes, Linux nodes, Windows server nodes, or a mix of all three. IBM Spectrum Scale can run on virtualized instances providing common data access in environments, leverage logical partitioning, or other hypervisors. Multiple IBM Spectrum Scale clusters can share data within a location or across wide area network (WAN) connections.

IBM

IBM Spectrum Virtualize is a dependable solution that improves data value, security, and simplicity for new and existing storage infrastructure. Proven over 12 years in thousands of deployments, its innovative virtualization capabilities help organizations achieve better data economics by supporting new workloads that are critical to their success. IBM Spectrum Virtualize software helps make new and existing storage more effective and standardizes functions traditionally deployed separately in disk systems for greater flexibility and potentially lower costs.

IBM

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Information Not Available

Pelephone, Sprint IT Enterprise Services

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Scale vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

April 2025

Free Report: IBM Spectrum Scale vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Spectrum Scale vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

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