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Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs Pure Storage FlashArray comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
15th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (6th)
Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
26th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Pure Storage FlashArray
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
3rd
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
199
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 0.8%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is 2.5%, down from 2.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pure Storage FlashArray is 6.4%, down from 8.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Eugene Hemphill - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps to save money and resources with the data compression feature
One point I'd like to improve is that the tool should start selling small boxes again. It discontinued some products and is focusing on bigger, more capable boxes, neglecting the SMB market. Even though it's not a big market, it shouldn't have removed them. One way to improve the product is to add an operational assistant that doesn't depend on VMware. It could also establish more alliances with other operational systems.
Gastone Canali - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides good stability and is reliable in terms of performance
The solution is reliable in terms of performance They should include a snapshot feature for the solution. We have been using the solution for two to three years. The solution is stable. We have 60 solution users in our organization. The solution's initial setup process is easy. It takes three…
Nabeel Sayegh - PeerSpot reviewer
Supercharges enterprise storage by way of highly optimized hardware, comprehensive data management and a feature rich interface.
During their early years, I was a member of Pure's Customer Advisory Board. In addition, when we first adopted Pure, they did not have replication GA yet. We got into their beta testing program and help them work out certain issues with that technology. One weakness I can say the array has, still to this day, is limited control on scheduling snapshots. Depending on the type of replication schedule you are building, you may or may not have control on specifying the start time of a given replication schedule. This is not a very big problem in the grand scheme of things, but something nonetheless that has bothered me about the scheduler in general. Another area for improvement would be automatic host alias creation. Other platforms such as EMC Unity/PowerStore will automatically detect the host name, create a alias for it and associate the logged in HBA's to it. Pure does not do this for you and as a result, requires manual configuration. This can be very time consuming especially when you are deploying a large number of new servers.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use."
"Pure Storage has signature security technology, which cannot be deleted, even if you are an administrator."
"Everything, especially the VMs inside, is pretty fast."
"It is very easy to install and configure. It has got excellent diagnostics. If you really need to see how the box is performing, the console gives you a lot of information. You can set thresholds as well as alerts based on the thresholds, which is a very powerful functionality. They are very proactive. They know how to monitor and manage the systems. They see a problem, and they are all over it before us. They see the problem before we see it, which is very good."
"I appreciate the performance."
"The duplication algorithm allows us to get a lot more use out of less storage. We're running a five terabyte array right now and we're running probably about 30 terabytes on it. So the duplication rate is pretty phenomenal, without a cost to performance. It still runs pretty smoothly."
"It has good, reliable, fast storage."
"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."
"Fewer features is not necessarily a negative as it leads to simpler operation and lower price."
"We have been working with the solution for around a year and so far it has shown itself to be stable."
"The solution is very easy to troubleshoot. It's one of the most valuable features. It also doesn't take long to deploy and normally it comes with a three-year warranty."
"This solution is good for virtualization and meets the need for CPU and RAM requirements."
"Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is simple to use"
"Its initial setup process is easy."
"The most valuable features of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series are the dual controllers, available installation documentation, and the option of multiple host bus adapter interfaces."
"Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is highly reliable, especially for block-level storage. It is stable, with minimal downtime and no issues beyond user errors."
"They have really good baked in analytics to show you trends for growth history, so it does help with future planning for data growth."
"The amount of throughput that we're getting is really nice."
"Pure Storage FlashArray's overall speed is its most valuable feature."
"The management features are well organized and they have a very good dashboard."
"With Pure Storage, we don't see any latency or IOPS. It has been a very seamless integration."
"It's actually very stable"
"Pure Storage FlashArray provides immediate benefits to our customers with its easy setup process, allowing for instant use and rapid realization of advantages."
"Performance is the most valuable feature."
 

Cons

"We would like to see VNC integration or be able to use Pure Storage with VNC."
"Maybe the price can be reduced since the solution is very expensive."
"We've seen that when we create a POD in synchronous mode, it increases the latency."
"There are some challenges with data encryption and reduction."
"Many options to check performance, like read, writes, random writes, and random reads, are missing in Pure FlashArray X NVMe."
"I would like to see some AI features that would allow arrays to intelligently identify threats or unusual behavior in the data pattern and give an alert."
"Managing data isn't difficult for me. The performance is usually perfect, but we sometimes have capacity problems."
"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."
"The product could support advanced software integrations."
"Its performance could be faster."
"It would be useful to have structured solutions replicated to other sites."
"Improvements can be made to the product's performance."
"In the next release, I would like to see more functionality. But, again, it is an entry-level product."
"In the next release, I would like to see support for Hyper-converged infrastructure."
"There could be a snapshot feature in the solution."
"The features are limited."
"They can also include file services such as NAS shares and CIFS shares. There should be provisioning of the file shares from a unified array."
"I would rate this solution an eight. There's always room for improvement, nobody is perfect to get a ten out of ten. They do what they do well. It's not cheap but we it's for uses that we needed."
"Self-backup is the only feature lacking in this solution."
"We haven't seen ROI."
"I would rate this solution an eight because we have had outages. The commit times went very high in the database. The whole array went down so our customers were down for around eight hours. This was a very big outage which could have been our fault because we didn't do the upgrade in time."
"It's too early to tell if we've seen a reduction in total cost of ownership. The solution is expensive."
"The way Pure Storage does the controller storage warranty or replacement has been an issue for some people who just replace the controllers every couple of years, and that's where some of the confusion with pricing and support has come in. They should be clear on the way the controller replacements happen, as it is important to know whether or not you can get a good return on them, because it can be a little confusing."
"The price of this solution could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its price could be better. It is not too expensive, but it is the high-end cost. It is kind of a Rolls-Royce. You pay a lot, but you get a lot out of it. So, the price pressure on the way down would be great, but at the end of the day, if you need to do the work, you just pay for it."
"With VMware, we pay $300,000 annually."
"The product is expensive."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"The tool's pricing is cheap; I rate it a six to seven out of ten. Most of our sales are not subscription-based. We sell the hardware, and customers keep using it. They only renew the service part annually. The support can be a bit pricey, but the solution is more cost-effective than anything else out there."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."
"They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."
"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."
"The pricing is fair and low compared to other products in this category."
"All of the features are bundled together, and you can renew the bundle with all of the features included."
"The price of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is a one-time purchase. There is a global price list available to find the price of the solution."
"For an all-flash setup, the cost is around $20,000 for a decent configuration."
"The best thing about this solution is its price, which reduces our costs."
"The solution's price could be better."
"It is an expensive solution."
"We have a five-year contract for providing support."
"Our costs are around $100,000."
"The cost has room for improvement."
"It is cheaper than NetApp."
"The price is very reasonable when compared to other solutions."
"In terms of other contemporary arrays, Pure is something you need to have a use case for, as it's not priced for you to buy one off-the-shelf. If you have a use case, heavy lift Oracle Databases, any type of noticeable virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), or need low latency and high throughput, you should consider all-flash at least and probably Pure Storage."
"The best features come included without any additional cost."
"The license for Pure Storage FlashArray includes the support and there are no additional payments that are needed. This is not an inexpensive solution, you need to understand the value of your data before you use a backup solution."
"We are finding the TCO of flash to be lower than SSD implementations."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
University
6%
Educational Organization
21%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.
What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?
The price of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is very good. We chose this type of storage for the performance and the price.
What needs improvement with Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?
The type of connection that is used in Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series should be improved.
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 do you like most about Pure Storage FlashArray?
We consume less physical storage because of the solution’s deduplication and compression.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
I don't have the billing details right now, but the pricing is high.
 

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
ThinkSystem DE Series
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Information Not Available
Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Find out what your peers are saying about Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. Pure Storage FlashArray and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.