Red Hat Ceph Storage vs SwiftStack [EOL] comparison

Red Hat and NVIDIA are both solutions in the File and Object Storage category. Additionally, 81% of Red Hat users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of NVIDIA users who would recommend it.

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Red Hat Ceph Storage and SwiftStack [EOL] based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

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File and Object Storage

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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ANDRE VINICIUS HAMERSKI

IT Private Cloud & Infrastructure Leader at Sicredi

Offers cost-effective scalability through open-source storage integration

Ceph Storage allows us to add value related to cost and offers a unique experience compared to traditional storage. We appreciate the scalability of the open-source solution, allowing us to address our growing data needs without encountering major issues. Having used it as a pilot system in Brazil, we gained significant knowledge and the ability to manage our infrastructure as code.

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Scientif48eb

Scientific Information Officer at a pharma/biotech company with 10,001+ employees

It has helped us with the ability to distribute data to different data centers

* You can bring your own drives, which don't have to be certified. This usually means that they cost significantly more to insert a certified drive with the manufacturer who is selling you your solution. * It is platform independent, so you bring your own hardware. It doesn't matter if you get a Dell EMC, HPE, IBM, etc. Its hardware agnostic capabilities are great. Dell EMC, HPE, and Lenovo are obviously big players, but sometimes they don't have the best prices. You are not tied to any one particular vendor, and it gives you great flexibility as far as pricing is concerned. You can go out, and say, "Give me the most capacity in the smallest number of use spaces." Sometimes that's not the big vendors, it's the small vendors who provide this. * The forward thinking in their cloud solution creates a global namespace across the major public clouds. It allows you to go from on-premise to the cloud seamlessly. They have made it easier to move data between the different cloud vendors and move those flows from on-premise to the cloud, then from the cloud back to on-premise. That freedom that they facilitate is hard to put a price on, because it gives you flexibility. * The metadata search capabilities are something that we look forward to being able to use, though we haven't fully had a chance to get into them. However, in the life sciences area, it could be tremendously beneficial. * Ease of operation: We got it up and running, and it's been solid. We can upgrade the capacity of our drives at any point in time. * The flexibility that the solution provides, both for hardware and on-premise, then to the cloud. That flexibility is great.

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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

"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."

"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 most valuable features of FlashBlade include its replication capabilities, reports, and easy allocation. Everything is user-friendly."

"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."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is performance."

"The performance of FlashBlade is excellent. It does not necessarily leverage the SOS API that some of the newer products leverage, but I found its speed pretty much on par and comparable. It is fast, and it does what it is supposed to do."

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

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"Ceph was chosen to maintain exact performance and capacity characteristics for customer cloud."

"Ceph Storage allows us to add value related to cost and offers a unique experience compared to traditional storage."

"Most valuable features include replication and compression."

"Replicated and erasure coded pools have allowed for multiple copies to be kept, easy scale-out of additional nodes, and easy replacement of failed hard drives. The solution continues working even when there are errors."

"What I found most valuable from Red Hat Ceph Storage is integration because if you are talking about a solution that consists purely of Red Hat products, this is where integration benefits come in. In particular, Red Hat Ceph Storage becomes a single solution for managing the entire environment in terms of the container or the infrastructure, or the worker nodes because it all comes from a single plug."

"Without any extra costs, I was able to provide a redundant environment."

"Red Hat Ceph Storage is a reliable solution, it works well."

"We are using Ceph internal inexpensive disk and data redundancy without spending extra money on external storage."

More Red Hat Ceph Storage pros

"It has helped us with the ability to distribute data to different data centers. As part of our DR strategy, we have nodes automatically replicating data from one data center to the other. This makes it easier for us to not have to shift tapes around."

"The most valuable feature is its versatility. We use 1space and we can use it for almost anything: for our cloud service, for backups of VMs."

"The scalability is phenomenal. It seems infinite, as long as you put enough storage in place, add enough nodes."

"The SwiftStack Controller, which is the web UI, provides out of band management. This has been one of the best features of it. It allows us to be able to do upgrades and look at performance metrics. It is a top feature and reason to choose the product."

"The graphs are most valuable. They have a lot of graphs and reports that you can run to see what's happening in the background to configure OpenStack Swift."

"The general consensus on what we've done is that the restores coming back from it have been faster than they were from our prior vendor. Ingest speeds are fine. The restore speeds have improved."

"SwiftStack is also quite flexible when it comes to hardware. It depends, of course, on the use case and the kind of hardware you want to buy. But you have quite a bit of choice in hardware. The SwiftStack software itself does not impose anything on you."

"In terms of the hardware flexibility, with SwiftStack not being a hardware company, I literally buy any hardware that's the least expensive, from any vendor... from a flexibility standpoint, I think it's fantastic. I can go to anybody, anywhere - any vendor - and get my hardware."

More SwiftStack [EOL] pros

Cons

"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."

"Its configuration should be easier."

"We initially encountered challenges with the assembly process due to issues with the documentation required during setup, an area where Pure Storage needs improvement."

"On our dedupe during our initial buy, we were expecting a number a little higher like 4x. However, we are getting about 3.6. While it is close enough, it doesn't quite hit the numbers. So, this has been a challenge."

"Compared to, for example, Hitachi NAS, the solution is not mature at all. It's just in its infancy as far as technology goes."

"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."

"There could be improvements in public cloud 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."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"Please create a failback solution for OpenStack replication and maybe QoS to allow guaranteed IOPS."

"The product lacks RDMA support for inter-OSD communication."

"What could be improved in Red Hat Ceph Storage is its user interface or GUI."

"In the deployment step, we need to create some config files to add Ceph functions in OpenStack modules (Nova, Cinder, Glance). It would be useful to have a tool that validates the format of the data in those files, before generating a deploy with failures."

"The licensing cost is excessively high. This is a significant issue from my perspective."

"It takes some time to re-balance the storage in case of server failure."

"An area for improvement would be that it's pretty difficult to manage synchronous replication over multiple regions."

"Geo-replication needs improvement. It is a new feature, and not well supported yet."

More Red Hat Ceph Storage cons

"They should provide a more concise hardware calculator when you're putting your capacity together."

"At the moment we are using Erasure coding in an 8+4 setting. What would be nice is if, for some standard configurations like 15+4 and 8+4, there were more versatility so we could, for example, select 8+6, or the like."

"I would like to see better client integrations, support for a broader client library. SwiftStack could be a little bit more involved in the client side: Python, Java, C, etc."

"On the controller features, there needs to be a bit more clean up of the user interface. There are a lot of options available on the GUI which might be better organized or compartmentalized. There are times when you are going through the user interface and you have to look around for where the setting may be. A little bit more attention to the organization of the user interface would be helpful."

"The biggest room for improvement is the maturity of the proxyFS solution. That piece of code is relatively new, so most of our issues have been around the proxyFS."

"It's very well done for what it's supposed to do, and I don't have anything to add, but I would like them to keep it available to the public. SwiftStack is going out of the market. NVIDIA purchased SwiftStack a couple of years ago, and they won't be making it available to the public anymore. Our license is up to March 31st."

"The file access needs improvement. The NFS was rolled out as a single service. It needs to be fully integrated into the proxy in a highly available fashion, like the regular proxy access is. I know it's on the roadmap."

"[One] thing that I've been looking for, for years as an end user and customer, for any object store, including SwiftStack, is some type of automated method for data archiving. Something where you would have a metadata tagging policy engine and a data mover all built into a single system that would automatically be able to take your data off your primary and put it into an object store in a non-proprietary way - which is key."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."

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

"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."

"We used a reseller for the purchase."

"The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate."

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"Licensing fees are paid yearly."

"Our licensing is renewed annually."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"There is no cost for software."

"The price of Red Hat Ceph Storage is reasonable."

"The price of this product isn't high."

"Most of time, you can get Ceph with the OpenStack solution in a subscription as a bundle."

"If you can afford a product like Red Hat Ceph Storage then go for it. If you cannot, then you need to test Ceph and get your hands dirty."

"We never used the paid support."

"I rate the product’s pricing an eight out of ten."

"The other big advantage is that Ceph is free software. Compared to traditional SAN based storage, it is very economical."

More Red Hat Ceph Storage pricing and cost advice

"The pricing model is great and makes sense. We have talked about how to get into more of a frequent billing cycle than once a year. That would be an interesting concept to add into the product, having the ability to have monthly billing instead of having to do a one-year licensing renewal. However, the way the license works by charging for storage consumed is definitely what makes them the most competitive."

"All in, with hardware and everything else - and I hate to say a dollar amount because it's been awhile since I computed it - I know I'm under the $300 to $500 per terabyte mark. I call that my "all in" price, which has replications built in and protections built in."

"It's pricey for us because we're a nonprofit. I'm not privy to any amount or cost, but I have been told that it is pricey. There are no costs in addition to the licensing fees, and it seems to come with the support."

"We find the pricing rather steep. Of course, you get quality for your money, that's absolutely true... [But] when you look at the prices of the licensing and the prices of your hardware, it's quite substantial."

"Dollar per gigabyte, it costs us more because we are storing more. However, if you look at it from a cost per gigabyte perspective, we have dropped our costs significantly."

"COST_SAVING; We have had a 40 to 50 percent reduction in CAPEX on the acquisition of new hardware, which is probably conservative."

"We have had a 40 to 50 percent reduction in CAPEX on the acquisition of new hardware, which is probably conservative."

"We are able to dynamically grow storage at a lower cost. We can repurpose hardware and buy commodity hardware. There is a huge cost savings, on average $100,000 a year compared to traditional storage for what we have at our size."

More SwiftStack [EOL] pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

29%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

18%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Government

Computer Software Company

19%

Manufacturing Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Educational Organization

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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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 ...

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What do you like most about Red Hat Ceph Storage?

The high availability of the solution is important to us.

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What needs improvement with Red Hat Ceph Storage?

I have not identified any drawbacks, however, the response to public platform inquiries could be faster.

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Comparisons

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Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

Dell ECS vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 6% of the time

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Compared 40% of the time

VMware vSAN vs Red Hat Ceph Storage

Compared 6% of the time

NetApp StorageGRID vs Red Hat Ceph Storage

Compared 6% of the time

Dell PowerFlex vs Red Hat Ceph Storage

Compared 4% of the time

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Red Hat Ceph Storage

Compared 3% of the time

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MinIO vs SwiftStack [EOL]

Compared 55% of the time

Dell ECS vs SwiftStack [EOL]

Compared 23% of the time

Peaxy vs SwiftStack [EOL]

Compared 10% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

April 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

Software Defined Storage (SDS)

April 2025

Download Red Hat Ceph Storage product report

Buyer's Guide

SwiftStack [EOL]

April 2025

Download SwiftStack [EOL] product report

Also Known As

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Ceph

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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

Red Hat Ceph Storage is an enterprise open source platform that provides unified software-defined storage on standard, economical servers and disks. With block, object, and file storage combined into one platform, Red Hat Ceph Storage efficiently and automatically manages all your data.

Red Hat

SwiftStack focuses on handling large-scale unstructured data, providing software-defined storage, and boosting data scalability and durability.

SwiftStack is known for its proficiency in object storage, seamless workflow integration, and robust support for multi-cloud environments. Its architecture ensures high-performance data access, making it ideal for big data analytics, media asset management, and backup tasks. Users value its flexibility, ease of integration, and strong performance. The solution's high availability and efficient storage capabilities contribute to its strengths. However, areas needing improvement include customer support response time, initial setup guidance, and enhanced scalability during high-demand periods.

What are SwiftStack's Most Important Features?

Robust Scalability: Easily manages growing data volumes
Multi-cloud Support: Seamless integration across cloud environments
Seamless Data Management: Efficiently handles large datasets
High Availability: Ensures data is accessible whenever needed
Open-Source: Customizable and flexible with extensive API support

What Benefits Should Users Look For?

Enhanced Performance: Handles demanding workloads efficiently
Easy Integration: Adapts well with existing systems and workflows
High Durability: Ensures long-term data storage and protection
Cost-Effectiveness: Reduces overall storage costs
Scalability: Grows with organizational needs

In industries like media management and big data analytics, SwiftStack’s capabilities in high-performance data access and multi-cloud support facilitate efficient data handling. Backup and archival solutions also benefit from its robust storage and high availability features.

NVIDIA

Sample Customers

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

Dell, DreamHost

Pac-12 Networks, Georgia Institute of Technology, Budd Van Lines

Buyer's Guide

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April 2025

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