Quest QoreStor vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

Quest Software and StarWind are both solutions in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category. Quest Software is ranked #37, while StarWind is ranked #1 with an average rating of 9.5. Additionally, 100% of Quest Software users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of StarWind users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

StarWind Virtual SAN and Quest QoreStor compete in the software-defined storage category. StarWind appears to have the upper hand due to its high performance, cost-effectiveness, and superior customer service.

Features: StarWind Virtual SAN is noted for its excellent scalability and ability to leverage existing hardware, providing redundancy and high availability. It is highly adaptable to common server hardware, which users value for fault tolerance and synchronous replication. Quest QoreStor's strengths are in data deduplication and replication, which efficiently reduce storage space and optimize data management. Its software flexibility and cloud archiving capabilities are highlighted, focusing on backup processes.

Room for Improvement: StarWind Virtual SAN could improve filesystem support and documentation clarity, and enhance multi-tier storage management. Users find the upgrade process complex, leading to downtime. For Quest QoreStor, improvements are needed in the user interface to better balance user-friendliness with data protection features. Users seek expanded cloud integration and enhanced ransomware protection.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: StarWind Virtual SAN is praised for its straightforward deployment and excellent customer service, with responsive technical support guiding effective installations. Quest QoreStor receives positive feedback for its attentive support during storage configuration and clarifying licensing and deployment processes. Both have strong customer service, though StarWind is commended for rapid issue resolution.

Pricing and ROI: StarWind Virtual SAN is favored for its cost-effectiveness, with competitive pricing and a simple licensing model allowing for efficient expansion. Users report significant ROI due to reduced downtime and independence from hardware. Quest QoreStor's pricing is based on capacity, seen as comprehensive yet sometimes higher than competitors. However, it offers cost efficiencies through data deduplication, reducing storage expenses over time and achieving solid ROI by optimizing storage capacities.

To learn more, read our detailed Quest QoreStor vs. StarWind Virtual SAN Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Quest QoreStor vs. StarWind Virtual SAN

April 2025

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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

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

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. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

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Jeff Manuszak

CTO at EDSI

Cost-efficient, highly scalable, and installable on different types of hardware

They could improve on support a little bit. We have not had to engage their support much, but when we do have issues, it can take longer to get things resolved. We are pretty lenient as we do a lot of IT support ourselves. We are not very hard on support organizations, but when a customer has a support issue, it would be easier if the support processes were a little bit more automated. It would be beneficial to have an easier way to upload diagnostic dump files. They can make it easy for the customer to collect the diagnostic data. There can be some kind of monitoring solutions to alert users to issues with the appliance or software, making it easy for customers to monitor their systems in the field. This is especially critical because it stores customers' backups, and a failure can have significant business impacts. If a customer does not have the backups and has a disaster, they can be out of business, so monitoring is key.

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WJHG

Soporte IT at Sildan Security

Seamless integrations, high availability, and offers a free version

Although I am generally satisfied with VSAN and its performance, there are some areas that could be improved to enhance its effectiveness even further. One area that could benefit from improvement is scalability. While the tool works well in its current configuration, allowing for greater ease and flexibility in adding new nodes to the cluster without complications would be very beneficial, especially in growing environments. Additionally, I would like to see additional features in the next version, such as better support for automated resource management. This could include proactive suggestions for optimizing storage and memory usage, as well as preventive alerts about the health status of the servers. A more intuitive interface or an improved dashboard for monitoring the cluster would also be helpful, as it would facilitate performance tracking and help identify potential issues before they affect services.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

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

"The initial setup is pretty quick."

"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 snapshots, replication, and the ability to have immutable blades are the most valuable features. You're putting data snapshots out in those blades, and they cannot be touched. Its performance is great."

"We have seen a reduction in the total cost of ownership by around 20%."

"What I like best about Pure Storage FlashBlade is its object storage functionality, plus it has fast underlying hardware. Pure Storage FlashBlade is also very stable. I find its stability one of its valuable features."

"The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power outages when we need to quickly move data between different data centers. It ensures efficient replication and helps maintain our data centers' uptime."

"The solution provides many controllers."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"The extreme compression of data is a big thing for us. We were looking for an online backup solution, and QoreStor is very good in terms of data compression. It helps us minimize the required storage in the Blob Storage environment."

"The dedupe and compression are pretty extreme. On disk, we're getting dedupe rates of up to 65 percent of data and compression of 34 percent. When you go to the cloud, it's more like 76 percent for dedupe and almost 50 percent for compression."

"I would rate QoreStor a ten out of ten for what it offers for the price."

"Quest QoreStor definitely saved us money."

"The features we use for the data deduplication are nice because we're able to back up a much larger amount of data, yet it doesn't necessarily take up that much data on the devices."

"Quest QoreStor is very stable compared to our previous solution."

"We need revisions and safe backup so that it could be held up in court, but deduplication and compression are the main features why we have Quest QoreStor. That's where it really shines. I use ZFS and XFS at home, and Quest QoreStor is even better."

"This software solution can be installed on many different types of hardware, which makes it very flexible. We can run it on virtual machines or virtual servers, providing convenience for solutions of varying sizes, from small to large."

More Quest QoreStor pros

"StarWind vSAN was very easy to integrate into our system and ran flawlessly during our entire use time."

"StarWind Virtual SAN (vSAN) offers a significant breadth of features."

"Support keeps track of alerts of the system and verifies with us if we need help to fix any issues. They have great and quick technical support."

"This was a great implementation for a small to mid-size business."

"The product's core feature of virtualizing our storage is by far the most valuable."

"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."

"The top-notch support before, during, and after deployments are better than any other vendor I have come across."

"It has allowed us to save a lot of time and money by letting us create a vSAN within a Windows VM on the environment it controls."

More StarWind Virtual SAN pros

Cons

"The feature that we're waiting on is better integration with the cell services."

"To improve FlashBlade, some analysts suggest enhancing its handling of relational database management systems and SQL queries."

"I would like to see more VM-Aware features in the next release of this solution."

"They need better integration with public clouds along with a better hybrid solution."

"The speed could be improved."

"Its configuration should be easier."

"It usually comes down to just what you hit and the value you're getting when you spend the money and license the products. I would always go, "If you want to make things better, lower your price and make your licensing simpler." There's always an opportunity around that."

"In terms of scalability, it doesn't expand out quite as robustly as some of the others, but it covers 90% of the market in what it does."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"In terms of improvement, we would like to have an Air Gap feature to prevent a virus from attaching to something. So that when we don't do a backup, we want the QoreStor to stay offline. It would be a nice feature to have."

"Support is one point of improvement for Quest QoreStor. Support is sometimes not adequate."

"Overall, I am happy with this solution, but a way to export configuration settings would be beneficial."

"The setup of the software is definitely not the easiest thing. I worked a lot with Quest engineers, especially in the early days when we were first testing it and trying it out. I actually had some of the developers working with us at one point because they were going through these point releases, and I was having trouble getting it to work in this S3-compatible situation. We got it all working eventually, but setup is definitely not the easiest thing in the world."

"They need to increase their maximum capacity. Other than that, they're doing a pretty good job."

"The management interface is in need of improvement. The graphical user interface (GUI) for the web management tools appears clunky, and not super intuitive."

"The installation could use improvement. The initial installation was a little touchy and it's not really user-installable. You have to have a connection to support to install."

"There can be some kind of monitoring solutions to alert users to issues with the appliance or software, making it easy for customers to monitor their systems in the field."

More Quest QoreStor cons

"The system performs as expected, but we're always looking for performance improvements regarding the best utilization of NVMe disks."

"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."

"It runs until it does not - and disaster recovery documentation is sparse and mostly unclear."

"I wish the sync after a failure, such as hardware failure or power-related issues, for example, was faster."

"The platform needs to improve user management and the web console."

"I would like to see some additional, and possibly clearer, implementation videos with some slower and possibly more detailed descriptions of what the various steps of implementation are for someone who is unfamiliar with high availability and failover clustering in Windows."

"This product would benefit from having automated alerting functionality."

"The documentation could be better."

More StarWind Virtual SAN cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"I feel that the price could always be lowered."

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

"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."

"We used a reseller for the purchase."

"I understand that it is competitively priced compared to other brands."

"The price could be cheaper."

"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."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"Its pricing model is very attractive. You have one price, and you get everything from QoreStor."

"Quest QoreStor's pricing is affordable. We evaluated Veeam, a well-known company for backup solutions, but found their pricing to be quite high. Veeam's price was almost double. For us, Quest QoreStor is very affordable."

"The cost is per terabyte, and overall, the cost was reasonable when compared to some competitors."

"The pricing is good. It is competitive for a managed services provider. I like the ability to pay by the terabyte, allowing for an incremental cost that we and our customers can afford, so the solution grows with the customer."

"The cost, including OPEX, is lower compared to other solutions."

"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 support contract is well worth it. The price for it was very reasonable and their team has been very engaged whenever we reach out."

"The Price/Performance ratio for this solution is outstanding!"

"This solution is very accessible and the pro-level for support is well worth the cost."

"Licensing is based on nodes rather than TBs, which means that the users are free to increase storage capacity without putting thought into licensing."

"I think the cost of this solution is quite fair."

"I would suggest that you download the free version, deploy in your lab, and play with it."

More StarWind Virtual SAN pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

28%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Performing Arts

12%

Computer Software Company

11%

Real Estate/Law Firm

Computer Software Company

17%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

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...

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

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

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What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

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What else besides data replication does QoreStor offer?

Quest QoreStor can be used for multiple things besides data replication. For example, it can be trusted to make a bac...

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How does Quest QoreStore protect your data?

One of our favorite features of Quest QoreStore for data protection isn't the backup, actually, though we're using it...

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How does Quest QoreStore solve repetitive data replicas?

When I first found out about data replication and the many benefits it had, I couldn't help but wonder - what about t...

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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...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?

I can't give a sincere opinion on the installation and licensing costs because, as I have mentioned repeatedly, I am ...

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What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?

More comprehensive reporting and educational resources for error resolution would enhance the user experience. There ...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 21% of the time

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MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

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Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

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Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs Quest QoreStor

Compared 100% of the time

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VMware vSAN vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 25% of the time

Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 17% of the time

StorMagic SvSAN vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 16% of the time

DataCore SANsymphony vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs StarWind Virtual SAN

Compared 10% of the time

More StarWind Virtual SAN Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

April 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

Quest QoreStor

April 2025

Download Quest QoreStor product report

Buyer's Guide

StarWind Virtual SAN

April 2025

Download StarWind Virtual SAN product report

Also Known As

No data available

QoreStor

StarWind SAN & NAS

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

Quest QoreStor is commonly used for deduplication, compression, backup, and restore, integrated with NetVault for robust data redundancy and cloud storage replication.

Quest QoreStor optimizes data management with its sophisticated deduplication and compression capabilities, allowing companies to efficiently handle data redundancy. By integrating seamlessly with platforms like NetVault, Veeam, and resellers utilizing SPHiNX and BackBox, Quest QoreStor serves as both local and offsite repositories. This solution manages replication between production and corporate locations, strengthening recovery and improving backup operations. QoreStor's software-based nature ensures flexibility and easy integration, although improvements in replication and installation are sought by users.

What Are Key Features of Quest QoreStor?

Deduplication: Significantly reduces storage usage, achieving deduplication rates up to 76%.
Compression: Lowers data size on disk and cloud storage by up to 50%.
Integration: Compatible with multiple backup software to enhance efficiency.
Cloud Tiering: Facilitates seamless cloud storage expansion.
Encryption & Replication: Ensures secure and reliable data transportation and protection.

What ROI and Benefits Should Be Considered?

Storage Efficiency: Reduces required storage capacity savings on costs.
Backup Optimization: Increases speed and efficiency of backup processes.
Flexibility: Software-based, allowing adaptability to existing infrastructure.
Data Security: Offers strong encryption and replication features.

In sectors such as finance, healthcare, and technology, Quest QoreStor aids in maintaining vital data management with its robust features, enhancing data recovery strategies. Its use with secondary backup targets and replication capabilities supports a wide range of industry requirements. However, challenges such as initial setup complexity and system interface improvements are areas for growth, particularly in expanding capacities and addressing specific cybersecurity concerns like ransomware protection on Linux.

Quest Software

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

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

American Airlines, at&t, Bank of America. Barclays, ebay, Ford

Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School

Buyer's Guide

Quest QoreStor vs. StarWind Virtual SAN

April 2025

Free Report: Quest QoreStor vs. StarWind Virtual SAN

Find out what your peers are saying about Quest QoreStor vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

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