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Red Hat Ceph Storage vs StarWind Storage Appliance 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
7.8
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (15th), Software Defined Storage (SDS) (8th), File and Object Storage (8th)
Red Hat Ceph Storage
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (2nd), File and Object Storage (1st)
StarWind Storage Appliance
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
NAS (16th), All-Flash Storage (30th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Software Defined Storage (SDS)
NAS
 

Featured Reviews

Eric Black - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Rifat Rahman - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers reliable performance and availability for large deployments
I would like to see improvements in Red Hat Ceph Storage not because I necessarily think it needs improvement, but because I generally prefer to do things manually rather than following the containerization part. Current deployments are based on containers, but I deploy manually with my scripts and controls. If there are no Kubernetes-like requirements, I often prefer to deploy a whole manual process. I don't ask for improvements in the deployment model because Red Hat has its own philosophy about making things, but it's my personal choice that I prefer things manually. Some features are available only in the containerization part, so if those are also available in manual deployment, that will help.
Kishore CA - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers stable performance even with a single node failure and manages everything with just two nodes.
The only drawback is that it takes a bit of time during initial synchronization, especially after restarting the environment. This is a potential area of improvement. There's a synchronization time, but it takes time. Initially, when we start the first environment deployment, it starts synchronizing between the storage. So, it is taking time. One thing is that even when you restart. Let's assume that the synchronization is completed and the storage is synchronized. Both storages are fully synchronized, and it is in sync mode. Now, if we want to restart both nodes, there is a case for maintenance purposes. You took both nodes for maintenance, and we rebooted it. Then, it should not synchronize again. It should be a checksum. And if there is a checksum match, there should be no synchronization again. So, one thing that should be taken care of. Another thing is that I used freeware- the community version, free license, which we deployed using PowerShare. In that case, it was very difficult to bring back another node when one node was faulty. Let's assume that both the nodes are working fine. And we found one node faulty. And we destroyed all the volumes in that and tried to bring it back. So that was a difficult factor. The final solution is that we were not able to bring back the failed node. So, we reconstructed a new data source for that. That is another drawback. In future releases, I would like to see the integration with VMware or some other things as a plugin model for VMware.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's very easy-to-use."
"I would rate Pure Storage FlashBlade a ten out of ten."
"The solution provides many controllers."
"The most valuable features include the ease of implementation, ease of use and the speed that you can do backup and recovery on."
"Approximately 40% to 50% of my time is saved using Pure Storage FlashBlade compared to different products."
"The most valuable features are the Metro clustering, and disaster recovery."
"The product is scalable and easy to expand."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the rewrite speed and the nonstop services."
"We are using Ceph internal inexpensive disk and data redundancy without spending extra money on external storage."
"High reliability with commodity hardware."
"Stratus allows more reliability than all the other types of computers available."
"I like the distributed and self-healing nature of the product."
"The ability to provide block storage and object storage from the same storage cluster is very valuable for us."
"Data redundancy is a key feature, since it can survive failures (disks/servers). We didn’t lose our data or have a service interruption during server/disk failures."
"I would definitely recommend Red Hat Ceph Storage. It is a complete solution for cloud-native storage needs."
"We have some legacy servers that can be associated with this structure. With Ceph, we can rearrange these machines and reuse our investment."
"The integration is excellent."
"We are able to easily back up our data and send it to an offsite location."
"Its user-friendly interface makes it an attractive option, especially for customers who may not be highly tech-savvy."
"The management interface is the most valuable feature for us."
"Another good feature is that you can pause the appliance if you want to move it from one location to another and then once it's moved you can resume it, this way you can physically move the whole cluster or storage without any downtime. Its really easy to use, if you have a good foundation in storage and clustering then you will need less then one hour to figure out how to operate it."
"I would say data protection and easy management are the most valuable features of the product...I rate the technical support a nine out of ten."
"Having instant failover redundancy helps me sleep easier at night."
"They call us when monitoring shows a possible issue and are very flexible in working with our schedule to troubleshoot when it is convenient for us."
 

Cons

"The technical support needs to improve. When we open a case, it is auto assigned to a support tech person. Nine out of ten times, we get an email right back saying that person is off until tomorrow. I cannot handle that. They just did this over the weekend to us, too. I had to call our rep and have them do something about it."
"The speed could be improved."
"It would be nice if you could store file-based in the same box with the same technology."
"Its configuration should be easier."
"I would like to see more VM-Aware features in the next release of this solution."
"In terms of technical support, the experience has been mixed. The support is done through email and is not that great, making it a very problematic area I've been dealing with for over four years."
"I would like to see better integration."
"Its configuration should be easier."
"We have encountered slight integration issues."
"Areas of Red Hat Ceph Storage that have room for improvement include more promotion. Many people do not know about the Stratus case, which is one of the most reliable systems available in the world, but they are not aware that a system can keep working even if there is a hardware failure."
"It needs a better UI for easier installation and management."
"If troubleshooting is needed, the response should be faster."
"While the documentation for Ceph Storage is helpful, it could be improved."
"It takes some time to re-balance the storage in case of server failure."
"The licensing cost is excessively high. This is a significant issue from my perspective."
"The management features are pretty good, but they still have room for improvement."
"With StarWind Storage Appliance, it would be better to have an overall easier setup with a little bit of configuration changes since, currently, even a small mistake may cause the setup process to go wrong."
"StarWind should improve the synchronization time of its product. There should be a standard operating procedure (SOP) for synchronization to reduce the time it takes."
"An improvement would be if they reached out to education customers with other available products."
"Other solutions, such as StorMagic, offer more flexibility in terms of handling caching and moving data between additional nodes."
"StarWind Storage Appliance's demo version should be similar to the paid one."
"It needs more integration with backup vendors so there is native integration with it that will allow storage level backup/snapshots. I would love to see integration with Veeam and Commvault so it can be recognized by them directly and added as network storage."
"StarWind no longer sells HDDs for primary storage."
"They offered onsite installation, but we chose to do it ourselves. That took longer and was more work for us but saved us a ton of money in the end."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."
"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."
"The price is a little high."
"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."
"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."
"The product is very expensive."
"Our licensing is renewed annually."
"We used a reseller for the purchase."
"There is no cost for software."
"I rate the product’s pricing an eight out of ten."
"The operational overhead is higher compared to Azure because we own the hardware."
"The other big advantage is that Ceph is free software. Compared to traditional SAN based storage, it is very economical."
"The price of this product isn't high."
"We never used the paid support."
"The price of Red Hat Ceph Storage is reasonable."
"Most of time, you can get Ceph with the OpenStack solution in a subscription​​ as a bundle.​"
"We found that the price of StarWind was very good compared to VMware or Nutanix."
"On the homepage, you can not see the pricing."
"I rate StarWind Storage Appliance's pricing an eight out of ten."
"With StarWind Storage Appliance, the payments made towards the licensing part of the product are on a per-node basis, making it cost-effective for us to use the solution in our company."
"It costs about 50,000 euros."
"StarWind by far provides the best bang for the buck."
"The cost is determined by various factors, including the amount of terabyte storage you require, the number of nodes you want to purchase, and the duration of your maintenance agreement"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
18%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
No data available
 

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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?
The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the pas...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?
I believe there is not much improvement needed because they have everything we need, but the interface is a little bi...
How does Red Hat Ceph Storage compare with MiniO?
Red Hat Ceph does well in simplifying storage integration by replacing the need for numerous storage solutions. This ...
What do you like most about Red Hat Ceph Storage?
The high availability of the solution is important to us.
What needs improvement with Red Hat Ceph Storage?
Areas of Red Hat Ceph Storage that have room for improvement include more promotion. Many people do not know about th...
What do you like most about StarWind Storage Appliance?
I would say data protection and easy management are the most valuable features of the product...I rate the technical ...
What needs improvement with StarWind Storage Appliance?
StarWind Storage Appliance's demo version should be similar to the paid one.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Ceph
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL
Dell, DreamHost
Bosch, EC2 IT, Solid Earth Inc., Canon
Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat Ceph Storage vs. StarWind Storage Appliance and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.