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Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct vs Portworx Enterprise 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

Everpure FlashArray
Sponsored
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
231
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (3rd)
Microsoft Storage Spaces Di...
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (8th)
Portworx Enterprise
Average Rating
9.2
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Software Defined Storage (3rd), Data Storage for Kubernetes (1st)
 

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.
Tomas Basus - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Professional at NIPOS
Optimized storage has supported high availability but performance and node limits still need work
The performance of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct is challenging when trying to support both NVMe and SATA SSDs, and there are problems regarding performance that need to be addressed. I have found that performance is not as good as expected with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct. It is risky because of quorum; it is better in three nodes, but my budget only allows for two nodes, so I need to use a witness, which is not an optimal configuration. I am not using the automatic rebalancing feature that much in Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct. I have not utilized nested resiliency in my operations. I am using the most standard features available in Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct.
David Ivorra - PeerSpot reviewer
CEO at Lynx View
Modern data platform has simplified Kubernetes backups and disaster recovery across environments
Portworx Enterprise is a leader in the market according to consultancies and consultant agencies, but one area for improvement could be the visibility about how applications are working on a low level, especially regarding how they are messaging between all those microservices. Cybersecurity in those kinds of environments needs to be rock solid and really secured. With all those AIs working now to infect and attack environments, this is something that Portworx Enterprise should put more focus on even more than they do now. There are security solutions already implemented in Portworx Enterprise, including anti-ransomware, but as the environment grows, the possibilities of having cybersecurity issues increase, so they should focus even more on that part.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The availability and ease of use are the big features."
"The most valuable feature is that maintenance is free."
"Everpure FlashArray is probably not cheap storage, but it provides great performance, scalability, and everything a customer needs."
"Now, with Pure Storage, we have totally eliminated that problem."
"The most valuable feature of Pure Storage FlashArray is the complete set of functions it provides."
"The solution helps to simplify storage."
"The most valuable feature is its upgradeability."
"When you put all of the features in a box, leverage them and migrate your application to one of these arrays, it will give you a lot of benefits."
"Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct definitely has its advantages, especially with robustness and scalability."
"The main positive impact that Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct has had on my company over the years is increasing performance; our checks show it is three times faster than VMware, making us extremely happy and motivated to keep using it."
"Its technical support is excellent."
"The flash ability, in terms of tiering and caching, is amazing."
"We chose Microsoft due to its simplicity, affordability, reliability and performance."
"The performance, reliability, and affordability has been most valuable."
"The most valuable feature are the caching capabilities using the storage class memory."
"One of the best things about Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct is that it allows for optimized storage solutions and high availability, which is beneficial for managing workloads efficiently."
"The solution is user-friendly."
"Portworx is a great solution for managing container environments."
"If I containerize a database server, I know that not only is Portworx providing a persistent and resilient storage backend, but it also meets the database's IOPS requirements, in a containerized environment."
"I like that you have a small dedicated file system that is fast and resilient for containerized workloads."
"The best thing about Portworx is the Stork, they have called the VPS (Volume Replacement Strategy) and they also have topology awareness, and these are the three features I like."
"We are offering two kinds of environments: one for customers working with modern data and modern application development, and they are finding that it is easier for them to migrate workloads from on-premises to cloud or the other way around."
"Portworx virtualizes the aspects of the underlying block storage. That is good because they can also use block storage for their future deployment instead of just NFS."
"Portworx is a simple solution. It's similar to Pure Storage products. They're all easy to use and install. You need to have a little expertise with containers to use Portworx, but it will be no problem for you if you understand containers."
 

Cons

"Beyond a certain amount of petabytes, you have to have a separate system. Basically, it's not infinitely scalable."
"Reports of performance and LUN utilization could be improved."
"The price of this solution is high and should be lowered."
"In the configuration, which we brought in or tested it in, it has a very limited config as far as the array goes. That said, it still did more than our anticipation."
"On a couple of occasions, the waiting time for an upgrade has been pretty substantial."
"FlashArray's capacity for forecasting should be improved because it needs to be a bit more current."
"I would like to see additional features like performance monitoring, configuring alerts, and the customization of alert thresholds."
"There is not a great need for improvement, but better pricing could be beneficial."
"I think the online documentation needs a lot of work and so do the sizing tools."
"Documentation management could be improved"
"The main reason that we have not implemented this solution or put it into production is because of the pricing."
"On a scale of one to ten, I would rate the customer service and technical support of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct a three, as there were issues that the Microsoft team could not pinpoint, leading to delays in finding solutions."
"The management tool within this solution could be improved. We would also like to be able to access services like Azure when using this solution."
"The reason why this product is not being widely accepted by the public is that it doesn't include intuitive streamline, which makes it far from complete."
"It is scalable, but only beyond two nodes. If I go for two nodes it's not scalable. I need to build a complete cluster from the beginning if I'm going for two nodes."
"Microsoft's frontline support is not adequate if you rely on this for your business."
"Regarding pricing, I found that a couple of customers did not purchase the project because, at least in Spain, there are customers finding the pricing a little too high for the service they receive."
"I think the vendor could provide more training for new users who may not be familiar with containers."
"The documentation could be better."
"I would like to see a more native mapping to mainframe-type systems."
"It would be highly advantageous to include an integrated backup solution within the same license, rather than purchasing backup separately."
"The integration has room for improvement."
"They have not integrated Portworx with Ondat since they are too focused now on Pure Storage APIs and not on users like us."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have 16 or 18 arrays. We like to do the three-year support model so that we get Evergreen and therefore, we get free upgrades. We pay around more than 1.5 million dollars."
"We lost a lot of customers because we couldn't compete on price with other vendors."
"There are no licensing fees or other costs."
"Pricing is moderate. It is neither cheap nor expensive."
"There are no fees for licensing. The hardware is paid for only once."
"There is always room for negotiation."
"Pure Storage FlashArray is expensive."
"It's priced higher than the market."
"The solution is expensive."
"Cost-wise the product is one of the more affordable within the category of products."
"With the data center licensing and everything that is connected to that, this solution is relatively costly."
"I'm not sure how the licensing was broken out, but I don't think our offering of the Portworx was more than USD $20,000."
"It has two offerings. One is free, which is limited to only five nodes. The other is enterprise, which is a bit pricier."
"The price is competitive, but it is too expensive when paired with Red Hat IBM."
"The price of Portworx Enterprise is high."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Construction Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
24%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Government
8%
Insurance Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business71
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise159
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Large Enterprise4
 

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 have knowledge about the licensing part, which we obtained for around 10 years from the time of deployment, but I d...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
When it comes to Everpure FlashArray ports shown in the GUI, it would be better if, when one of the Pure array ports ...
How does VMware vSAN compare with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?
We found VMware’s vSAN was easy to set up, configure, and manage compared to other solutions we considered. It is bes...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?
Overall, I find the cost of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct to be affordable for the on-prem Windows pure solution, b...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?
The performance of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct is challenging when trying to support both NVMe and SATA SSDs, and...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Portworx Enterprise?
Regarding pricing, I found that a couple of customers did not purchase the project because, at least in Spain, there ...
What needs improvement with Portworx Enterprise?
I see some limitations such as operational complexity. Configuring Portworx initially requires an understanding of ke...
What advice do you have for others considering Portworx Enterprise?
My advice for others considering Portworx Enterprise is that if you operate in a cloud-native environment such as Kub...
 

Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
MS Storage Spaces Direct
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Acuutech, Quest Technology Management, Bradley, Mead & Hunt
NIO, GE Digital, DreamWorks Animation, Lufthansa, beco, NEW CONTEXT
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