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NetApp HCI [EOL] vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

NetApp and StarWind are both solutions in the HCI category. Additionally, 88% of NetApp users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of StarWind users who would recommend it.
NetApp HCI [EOL]
Read 32 NetApp HCI [EOL] reviews
    88% willing to recommend
    StarWind Virtual SAN
    Read 200 StarWind Virtual SAN reviews
    • 4,856 Views
    • 3,059 Comparison Views
    100% willing to recommend
     

    Comparison Buyer's Guide

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    Executive Summary
    We performed a comparison between NetApp HCI [EOL] and StarWind Virtual SAN based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

    Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, Broadcom, StarWind and others in HCI.

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    To learn more, read our detailed HCI Report (Updated: October 2025).
    Buyer's Guide
    HCI
    October 2025
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    Helped 873,085 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

    NetApp HCI [EOL]
    Average Rating
    8.0
    Reviews Sentiment
    5.6
    Number of Reviews
    32
    Ranking in other categories
    No ranking in other categories
    StarWind Virtual SAN
    Average Rating
    9.6
    Reviews Sentiment
    7.6
    Number of Reviews
    200
    Ranking in other categories
    Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st), HCI (4th)
     

    Featured Reviews

    MB
    Crashed continuously, complex to deploy, and bad after-sales support - NETAPP FIXED the problems in 2022
    Their after-sales support, SLA, and third-parties availability should be improved. NetApp's support is very difficult to engage. We have an SLA of onsite support within 24 hours. but they don't respect the SLA. Its stability was very bad. It has been crashing continuously. In one year, we got three crashes, which is unbelievable for an appliance that is guaranteed for 10 years without any crashes. In 2022, NetApp Italy, driven by the country manager Davide Marini, fixed all our issues and added additional computation power for free. This is a great example of customer care. They could have done it right the first time of course, but admitting the errors and putting in place such a remediation plan has been a very professional behavior.
    Read full review
    Vladimir Simion - PeerSpot reviewer
    Achieving seamless cost-saving implementation with exceptional support
    The best features that StarWind Virtual SAN offers include the price because comparing to other virtual SAN solutions, this one is the best, and it also has a great support team behind it. My experience with their support has been positive, as their guides regarding the integration are very useful. They have some awesome guides online that show you exactly how to configure the product, how to do the initial setup, and you can speak with them directly. They will be able to connect and verify your setup, run its parameters and see exactly what's working and what is not, and they really help you with that. StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted my organization and my customer through initial cost saving. They use this product in a dark site, so I'm not able to provide any additional details about this, but they were really glad about it, they're still using it, and they asked for extending the capacity for it and the support. They really want to use it and are enjoying using it.
    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 NetApp Deployment Engine that comes with it makes the actual deployment and usage very easy. That's our primary focus and it's hyper-converged. That's something that we want to use as well."
    "We like SnapMirror and we've been using it for many years. We also like the object storage tools, as well as cloud sync for customers wanting to integrate between the cloud and local."
    "NetApp HCI is a stable solution."
    "It is scalable, and NetApp Deployment Engine (NDE) makes its deployment easier."
    "The ease of deployment is a positive feature that allows us to scale easily."
    "The ability to size the available space in a way that matches our company's needs is most valuable. For instance, you can decide if you want 80/20, 70/30, or 60/40 space. Redundancy depends on your needs without changing the appliance. You just add space and decide the percentage of space that you need free and the percentage of space that you need for backup. It is all automatic, and you don't have to do anything. You just add space, and the system automatically configures itself with the chosen option."
    "Scalability was another thing I was looking at. The solution, by its very nature, is designed to be expandable and flexible, so you don't have to buy performance you don't need today, but you're also not stuck with something you can't expand."
    "Stability is one of the things we absolutely have to have, because if the HCI is down, our assembly lines are down, and that could potentially lead to our customer being down. If our customer is down, that's $10,000 a minute; and any time the assembly line is down, that could potentially lead to overtime. We don't get to charge one and a half times for something we billed just because you happened to build it on overtime. Any technology we bring in, has to be built for what I call "three in the morning." It can't be built for whenever everybody's in the plant, everybody can watch it, and everybody can babysit. It has to be built for three a.m. when you've got a skeletal staff there, and you just have to know that it's just running. As I stand here, right now, I don't have to check my phone, I don't have to check my email. I know it's running. Period"
    More NetApp HCI [EOL] pros
    "The install itself is easy as pie."
    "This solution made it possible to deploy a new infrastructure in the shortest amount of time, at a low cost without purchasing expensive hardware storage, and use unused servers."
    "StarWind vSAN has allowed us to grow rapidly while still providing flexibility and reliability."
    "Starwind made it easy to deploy fully redundant, highly available storage at a low cost."
    "StarWind is very easy to use, even if you have had no experience using a SAN before."
    "The fact that I can now count on a true failover solution is what is most appealing."
    "Ten gigabit Ethernet compatibility, support, ease of use, and management are some positive features."
    "VSAN works great; it's very easy to install, configure, and manage."
    More StarWind Virtual SAN pros
     

    Cons

    "It would be great if they took something like kernel storage and integrated straight into the NetApp as well."
    "At the moment, I am not looking for new features. Quality of Service (QoS) and capacity efficiency are the two things that I want to resolve in my customer's environment. QoS improves the performance of each tenancy, and with capacity efficiency, the customer can achieve more capacity as compared to the normal capacity."
    "It would be nice to have better access to tutorials and a test environment for simulations."
    "I would like for them to fall a little closer to like the VMware release model. The new features and new solutions tend to come from the VMware side. I would like for NetApp to follow along closely with VMware's release schedule."
    "It is difficult to get acclimated to all the new features quickly. The onboard process could be improved to bring clients up to speed faster."
    "The administration side of it needs to be improved. We expect an easier interface and a single upgrade for updating the infrastructure."
    "In the next version I would like to see bigger GPU types and insurance for including transparency."
    "I'm not a fan of how they don't log you out properly from some of their web tools for management."
    More NetApp HCI [EOL] cons
    "The Command Center, a free guest VM for management and monitoring, leaves something to be desired. It could have more accurate real-time information and better reporting visuals, which seem to be an afterthought."
    "If there was a way to automatically put disks in maintenance mode when shutting the host down and exit maintenance mode automatically, that would simplify things."
    "The initial setup got a little confusing at a few points with differences between the VMware version in documentation vs the latest, etc."
    "The interface of the management console of the StarWind Virtual SAN is complex, and it's difficult for the novice user to interact with the management having less knowledge or training in the product."
    "High availability for direct attached hardware drives could be useful for increasing the performance of a storage appliance."
    "We have, in rare cases, received conflicting guidance between different support folks within StarWind."
    "StarWind Command Center's single-pane management solution only works with Hyper-V."
    "I'd love to see more clarification for us folks who are smart enough to do some damage yet not smart enough to use CLI."
    More StarWind Virtual SAN cons
     

    Pricing and Cost Advice

    "Its pricing is lower than our previous solution."
    "This solution reduced our maintenance costs. We were going to have to pay one to two million dollars to put in compute nodes. We are avoiding those costs."
    "There are the overall infrastructure costs. Even though the initial costing was higher, we calculated for year-to-year for five years. That brought us into a position where we decided, we have to go for HCI rather than having distributor systems."
    "Licenses run on a yearly basis, and there aren't any additional fees other than the standard licensing fee."
    "Where we lost nearly 75 percent of our infrastructure due to a malicious attack and were able to recover two and a half hours into it due to the integration, it saved us and all of our customers. Because we were able to recover so fast from the attack, the solution paid for itself right there."
    "This solution saved our organization time (35 percent) and money. We have a hefty group of developers, and if you multiply that by 30 to 35 percent, that is quite a bit of money."
    "Its price is comparable to the competitors in the market."
    "Its price is aligned with the market. In addition to the standard licensing fees, there is an integrator cost."
    More NetApp HCI [EOL] pricing and cost advice
    "If you are looking at a traditional SAN for a small cluster, give StarWind vSAN because you will save thousands without any compromise."
    "I think the bang for the buck is much better with StarWind Virtual SAN."
    "I would suggest that you download the free version, deploy in your lab, and play with it."
    "The scalability limitation for us is its licensing. At some point in the fairly near future, we will probably have to upgrade our license so we can store eight terabytes instead of four. We are currently at four terabytes, but we're starting to knock on the door of that capacity."
    "Licensing is based on nodes rather than TBs, which means that the users are free to increase storage capacity without putting thought into licensing."
    "The pricing is fine for the work that it does."
    "This is the best priced solution for an SMB."
    "StarWind is a low-cost, full-featured alternative to the traditional SAN environment, and their support will guide you every step of the setup."
    More StarWind Virtual SAN pricing and cost advice
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    Top Industries

    By visitors reading reviews
    No data available
    Computer Software Company
    17%
    Manufacturing Company
    10%
    Financial Services Firm
    8%
    Government
    7%
     

    Company Size

    By reviewers
    Large Enterprise
    Midsize Enterprise
    Small Business
    By reviewers
    Company SizeCount
    Small Business8
    Midsize Enterprise9
    Large Enterprise19
    By reviewers
    Company SizeCount
    Small Business162
    Midsize Enterprise54
    Large Enterprise33
     

    Questions from the Community

    Ask a question
    Earn 20 points
    What do you like most about StarWind Virtual SAN?
    It is easy to use and can monitor system synchronization and check Storage status. StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN) combines flash and disks of the cluster and forms a virtual shared storage “pool” acce...
    See all answers
    What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?
    My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for StarWind Virtual SAN was okay.
    See all answers
    What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
    An improvement for StarWind Virtual SAN would be to have an updated admin console.
    See all answers
     

    Comparisons

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    Compared 15% of the time
    Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct vs StarWind Virtual SAN Logo
    Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct vs StarWind Virtual SAN
    Compared 12% of the time
    StorMagic SvSAN vs StarWind Virtual SAN Logo
    StorMagic SvSAN vs StarWind Virtual SAN
    Compared 11% of the time
    Red Hat Ceph Storage vs StarWind Virtual SAN Logo
    Red Hat Ceph Storage vs StarWind Virtual SAN
    Compared 10% of the time
    More StarWind Virtual SAN Competitors
     

    Product Reports

    Buyer's Guide
    NetApp HCI [EOL]
    October 2025
    NetApp HCI [EOL] reportDownload NetApp HCI [EOL] product report
    Buyer's Guide
    StarWind Virtual SAN
    October 2025
    StarWind Virtual SAN reportDownload StarWind Virtual SAN product report
     

    Also Known As

    No data available
    StarWind SAN & NAS
     

    Overview

    NetApp HCI is the only true enterprise-scale hyper converged cloud infrastructure. NetApp HCI comes in a 2 RU chassis with 4 node expansion slots.

    NetApp

    StarWind Virtual SAN provides high availability and fault tolerance for virtualized environments without the need for dedicated SAN hardware. It allows for real-time replication between servers, shared storage for Hyper-V clusters, and enables vMotion and High Availability features for VMware vSphere. The solution reduces costs and leverages existing hardware while providing a scalable and reliable infrastructure. Valuable features include ease of use, scalability, top-tier support, hardware agnosticism, and the ability to use off-the-shelf standard servers to increase storage space. StarWind VSAN has helped organizations improve performance, data availability, and data security while reducing downtime and providing cost-saving storage options.

    StarWind
     

    Sample Customers

    American Showa, Children's Mercy, Coca-Cola, Consultel Cloud, Evangelische Landeskirche in Wurttemberg, Imperva, Surface Mount Technology
    Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
    Buyer's Guide
    HCI
    October 2025
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    Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, Broadcom, StarWind and others in HCI. Updated: October 2025.
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