IBM Spectrum Scale vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance comparison

IBM Spectrum Scale vs. StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Download the complete report

Helped 869,566 peers since 2012

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

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 4.1%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Spectrum Scale is 3.9%, down from 4.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind HyperConverged Appliance is 2.2%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Software Defined Storage (SDS) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Pure Storage FlashBlade	4.1%
IBM Spectrum Scale	3.9%
StarWind HyperConverged Appliance	2.2%
Other	89.8%

Software Defined Storage (SDS)

Featured Reviews

Parul-Patel

Senior Network Engineer at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

High performance and throughput enhance IT backup management

The multi-dimensional scale-out design feature of Pure Storage FlashBlade is not in use in our environment. Regarding data reduction technologies, we don't get much deduplication because the data is already deduplicated from our FlashArray before we get to backup, so there is no benefit of deduplication. Regarding the integration with cloud-native ecosystem tools, we are not on cloud; we are strictly an on-premises solution. Pure Storage FlashBlade is not used by any end-user; it's used only for IT backup, with only about four people in our group managing it. I cannot recommend Pure Storage FlashBlade to other users depending upon their financial situation because it's an expensive solution, and the cost is very high, including licensing and renewal every year. I rate Pure Storage FlashBlade an eight out of ten.

Read full review

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.

Read full review

Russ Le Puill

IT Manager at St Peter's Church of England Aided School

Proactive support with improved speed and resilience

There was a long delay with shipping, which we weren't expecting, but we were kept updated throughout. It wasn't made clear to us that we needed to provide our own SFP modules to connect to our infrastructure, so that could have been a bit clearer. It would be amazing if there was, perhaps, a more automated process for updating the hosts themselves, although the maintenance mode works well. Our StarWind command center doesn't seem to have all the options available currently, which support is investigating for us.

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

"The product is scalable and easy to expand."

"The solution provides many controllers."

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

"The initial setup is pretty easy and simple."

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

"The main feature I have found to be product replication."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is performance."

"The most valuable features include the ease of implementation, ease of use and the speed that you can do backup and recovery on."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"I would rate my overall experience with IBM Spectrum Scale as nine out of ten."

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

"It is a scalable solution."

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

"GPFS monitoring is the best feature."

"It makes our file system sharing a lot easier, even across different continents. We have had file systems shared across different continents with no performance degradation."

"We use GPFS Scale for parallel file access, the file management, and it's an essential part of our operations."

"It is incredibly scalable and stable."

More IBM Spectrum Scale pros

"We also substantially reduced network complexity by eliminating that standalone SAN. That reduced complexity has allowed us to concentrate on improving other areas of our network."

"StarWind is very resilient and built off of quality vendor hardware."

"The added speed of using standard HDD and SSD meant we could increase what services are stored on the servers without having to have additional servers."

"The initial setup is straightforward once you know what you're doing."

"The hardware footprint is perfect. It fits in our rack perfectly, and we were able to condense a lot of physical servers we had. It has greatly eliminated the excess stuff in our server rack..."

"We were able to set it up via the documentation and only needed their support a handful of times."

"Reliability and overall uptime are key as we're also hosting client environments in addition to our own."

"The customer service has been the most valuable feature of the product to me."

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance pros

Cons

"We initially encountered challenges with the assembly process due to issues with the documentation required during setup, an area where Pure Storage needs improvement."

"I would like to see more deduplication."

"I would like to see more monitoring capability included in the next release of this solution."

"The solution is expensive."

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

"Its configuration should be easier."

"An area for improvement in Pure Storage FlashBlade is its price. It could be reduced. The technical support for Pure Storage FlashBlade also needs improvement. It used to be good, with more experienced engineers. Nowadays, it isn't, and it takes longer for support to solve problems."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade should improve on more cloud integration."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"The initial setup is complex, especially if trying to avoid erasure coding, as it requires more discs. Avoiding erasure coding can significantly increase costs."

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

"Maybe it needs integration with HA."

"Integration with other vendors is not available."

"There can be improvements in fault tolerance and making erasure coding faster."

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

"They should probably simply the Red Hat implementation portion. This portion was not as straightforward as I would like it to be."

"The main issue that we have now is with the encryption. They want to use more metrics in encryption, which is not working very well."

More IBM Spectrum Scale cons

"The only issue we have seen is with the StarWind Server Manager. We have had to continually reboot the server in order to use it."

"The monitoring and report software is a bit hit and miss."

"Most meetings are done via Zoom, and I'm sure you could switch to a text based conversation if needed as they seem like a very accommodating team. It's not something I would worry about if you are a potential client."

"We ran into some issues with going from Hyper-V 2012 R2 to Hyper-V 2019."

"The management console could use a facelift."

"Maybe they could have a support portal that you can have direct access to a current support representative."

"Not much can be improved, to be honest."

"I think some performance metrics would be nice to see, especially on the storage side."

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

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

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."

"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."

"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."

"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 price could be cheaper."

"The price of this solution could be made more affordable."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"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."

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

"I honestly feel that there's no one else in the market doing what they're doing for the price point that they're doing it at. That's why I asked them about investing in their company. I think that the options they're providing and the software that they have is sort of revolutionary for the price point... The total cost was $24,400."

"The other solutions we were looking at were priced much higher than this and they didn't necessarily have full redundancy... Nutanix and VxRail were in the final running... but it came down to our price point."

"When I researched they came the most cost-effective."

"In terms of cost, a storage array is more expensive... For half the cost of Compellent, I got two hosts, more storage, and redundancy."

"We didn't have any issue with pricing or any of the sales process."

"I was able to bring the price per year down by going out to a five-year plan."

"This was all completed at an affordable price point for an SMB, which was also a key element for an NPO."

"Our entire package was around $35,000 for everything, including three years of support."

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Software Defined Storage (SDS) solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Financial Services Firm

18%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Educational Organization

16%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Hospitality Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	20

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Large Enterprise	7

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	50
Midsize Enterprise	22
Large Enterprise	8

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...

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

The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the pas...

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

I believe there is not much improvement needed because they have everything we need, but the interface is a little bi...

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...

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...

What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Scale?

My personal use of this product is for parallel writing or reading files.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

It's not the cheapest, however, the solution works incredibly well and is so simple to licence and maintain.

What needs improvement with StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

There was a long delay with shipping, which we weren't expecting, but we were kept updated throughout. It wasn't made...

What is your primary use case for StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

We desperately needed to update yet downsize our data centre. We had six hosts for only approximately 14 or so Virtua...

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Comparisons

Compared 19% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 9% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 7% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 19% of the time

Portworx Enterprise vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 12% of the time

DDN IME vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Gluster Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 9% of the time

VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 8% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Scale Competitors

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 18% of the time

DataCore SANsymphony vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 16% of the time

StorMagic SvSAN vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 15% of the time

Azure Stack HCI vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 15% of the time

VxRail vs StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Compared 13% of the time

More StarWind HyperConverged Appliance Competitors

Product Reports

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

IBM Spectrum Scale

Download IBM Spectrum Scale product report

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

Download StarWind HyperConverged Appliance product report

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance 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

For SMB, ROBO and Enterprises, who look to bring in quick deployment and operation simplicity to virtualization workloads and reduce related expenses, our solution is StarWind HyperConverged Appliance (HCA). It unifies commodity servers, disks and flash, hypervisor of choice, StarWind Virtual SAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct or VMware Virtual SAN and associated software into a single manageable layer. The HCA supports scale-up by adding disks and flash, and scale-out by adding extra nodes.

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance consists of StarWind Virtual SAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct or VMware Virtual SAN “Ready Nodes”, targeting those, who are building their virtualization infrastructure from scratch. In case there is an existing set of servers, we offer a “software only version”, which is essentially our years proven StarWind Virtual SAN. Basically, it’s the fuel powering StarWind HCA.

StarWind

Sample Customers

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

Information Not Available

Sears Home and Franchise Business

IBM Spectrum Scale vs. StarWind HyperConverged Appliance