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Portworx Enterprise vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

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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

Pure Storage FlashBlade
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (12th), Software Defined Storage (SDS) (8th), File and Object Storage (8th)
Portworx Enterprise
Average Rating
9.2
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Software Defined Storage (3rd), Data Storage for Kubernetes (1st)
StarWind Virtual SAN
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
204
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st), HCI (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

MikaelHellström - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager at Regin Dalarna
Has handled backup storage needs reliably and supports seamless upgrades
In environments requiring high throughput and low latency, Pure Storage FlashBlade provides high throughput and normal latency, but we do not have any application that requires low latency right now, so the latency of three to five milliseconds is considered kind of high. Pure Storage FlashBlade's ability to integrate with enterprise applications is not important for us, as we only want to present an S3 bucket for our backup, which we have done, and it works very fast. We use the Purity software's data reduction techniques; we have a backup software that compresses everything before sending it to the S3 bucket, achieving a data reduction of 1.1 to one. I would recommend Pure Storage FlashBlade to other companies because it's a very fast and scalable solution for anyone who needs it. On a scale of 1-10, I rate this solution an 8.
Paulo Jose  Bosco Otto - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant at PBOservicos-Informatica
A solution backed by strong customer support, that is stable and scalable
As a company managed in a Kubernetes environment, being trusted by a Kubernetes vendor, Red Hat creates barriers against using other certified solutions that work. Because IBM is a competitor of Pure Storage, things seem to be getting worse. I don't have plans to use Portworx Enterprise in the future because, at the moment, I am working with Ondat, and I have to follow NetApp's direction on that. When evaluating Portworx, one should make sure their company has already chosen Pure Storage. Still, if they are evaluating the solution on Ondat or Dell or other platforms, they should get a roadmap statement from Pure Storage, that they will continue to develop storage hardware diagnostics. I rate Portworx a nine out of ten.
Jccerong Heron - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Support team has guided us through deploying virtual storage on legacy hardware and reducing operational costs
The reason I chose StarWind Virtual SAN for this particular scenario is really the features, the ease of use, and most importantly, the price. In my opinion, the best features StarWind Virtual SAN offers are easy integration with the system installed in the data center. The integration with my existing systems in the data center works well, especially with VMware, as we already have a big cluster in VMware, and the easy integration with that is helpful to solve some problems with the platform. StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted my organization by reducing OPEX costs. My OPEX costs have gone down as we reutilize some old servers, and this reduces the CAPEX of hardware in the data center.

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."
"It performs well and it is also very fast."
"The solution provides many controllers."
"I would rate this solution an eight plus. It has has good flexibility and stability, it's easy to manage and the response time is good."
"Speed and ease of use are the two most valuable features."
"It has also helped to simplify storage for us in the way that it's easy to manage. Their automatic monitoring really helps when things break or are about to break. They see a problem coming and alert us even before our own system does."
"The ease of deployment and management has helped us simplify our storage. We also do not have to worry about capacity management as much. A lot of these things are native to Pure Storage."
"The initial setup is pretty quick."
"A custom IBM script is designed to tackle the storage management challenges within containerized environments, providing crucial data services and features required for enterprise applications."
"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."
"I like that you have a small dedicated file system that is fast and resilient for containerized workloads."
"The solution is user-friendly."
"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."
"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."
"It eliminates the use of expensive physical shared storage."
"It has allowed me to effectively and confidently manage the maintenance of hosts where I can power off a host and have its VMs migrate to another one."
"The fact that the solution is vendor-agnostic allows it to be used with any virtualization vendor while remaining a powerful abstraction over storage."
"You can turn your local disk storage into high-availability iSCSI storage."
"They offer top-tier support."
"The install itself is easy as pie."
"StarWind Virtual SAN is a highly flexible solution, as it can be deployed on physical servers or on top of virtual machines running on hypervisors such as VMware vSphere and Microsoft Hyper-V."
"I've been really impressed with it so far. I think it's pretty great, actually. It does exactly what we need it to do, and it does it well, so I would recommend it. Plus, the support has been very good."
 

Cons

"Commvault has mainly driven the Analytics, providing data and reports. However, the product has room for improvement, especially regarding storage analytics. Upgrading firmware has caused issues, requiring feature disabling to revert to traditional backups. The firmware upgrades sometimes affect Commvault backups."
"I would like to see better integration."
"File storage needs a lot of improvement. Mainframe connectivity also needs improvement because it requires additional components to be integrated with Pure Storage FlashBlade. If you want to keep your backup data, then this becomes an even more expensive solution because Pure Storage FlashBlade will not be able to meet your backup needs."
"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."
"I would also like to see better support for CIFS workloads."
"It would be nice if you could store file-based in the same box with the same technology."
"Its configuration should be easier."
"Its configuration should be easier."
"The documentation could be better."
"The integration has room for improvement."
"I think the vendor could provide more training for new users who may not be familiar with containers."
"They have not integrated Portworx with Ondat since they are too focused now on Pure Storage APIs and not on users like us."
"It would be highly advantageous to include an integrated backup solution within the same license, rather than purchasing backup separately."
"I would like to see a more native mapping to mainframe-type systems."
"I would definitely like to see quite a bit more on the monitoring side of things."
"It would be helpful to have a little more insight into what kind of performance the VSAN cluster is utilizing; something that would be more proactive on our side, versus their ProActive Support."
"The platform needs to improve user management and the web console."
"I would like an automated installation/configuration despite the fact that their service is very collaborative, a customer should be able to deploy the solution by themselves."
"Management of VSAN itself could be improved. A Web UI for management would be great rather than an application installation. StarWind is testing a command center virtual appliance that I have installed in my environment."
"I want to suggest that the complexity of the startup and shutdown procedure needs to be reduced."
"We just need more integration with Veeam."
"I would like to see more advanced free versions."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."
"We used a reseller for the purchase."
"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."
"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."
"The price of this solution could be made more affordable."
"Support is a separate line item. Support is a different cost, but whatever your support is now, that's what you're going to pay forever. If your support's $100 today, six years from now it's $100. It doesn't fluctuate unless you upgrade it, or change it, etc."
"In my opinion, we have paid the right price for the product. I don't think that it is too much or too little."
"I understand that it is competitively priced compared to other brands."
"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 of Portworx Enterprise is high."
"The price is competitive, but it is too expensive when paired with Red Hat IBM."
"This solution has competitive prices and the implementation is very easy."
"This solution has a great price for the functionality."
"StarWind is a low-cost, full-featured alternative to the traditional SAN environment, and their support will guide you every step of the setup."
"The StarWind VSAN business model is very cost-effective."
"I think the cost of this solution is quite fair."
"The pricing is more than reasonable."
"This solution is very accessible and the pro-level for support is well worth the cost."
"I think the bang for the buck is much better with StarWind Virtual SAN."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise21
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business165
Midsize Enterprise54
Large Enterprise34
 

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?
Regarding pricing, it is okay; we needed exactly this in size, and the price was a lot lower than competitors, making...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?
In my opinion, one way Pure Storage FlashBlade can be improved is by having more compatibility between the FlashArray...
Ask a question
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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) combin...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was very good. We were able to get the software at a good cost....
What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
The only thing that I would say about documentation is there are some aspects of the documentation that are a little ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
No data available
StarWind SAN & NAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL
NIO, GE Digital, DreamWorks Animation, Lufthansa, beco, NEW CONTEXT
Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
Find out what your peers are saying about Portworx Enterprise vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,853 professionals have used our research since 2012.