Dell PowerEdge R-Series Reviews

Dell PowerEdge R-Series is used for edge services in our company. We are testing whether Dell PowerEdge is on par with HPE, because we have been using HPE for more than 20 years, and it has been serving us very well. However, we still have doubts about some Dell aspects, particularly support. We are using a few Dell PowerEdges in the field to test if it is working and if it is mature. If it is not mature, then we will need to switch back to HPE. We are running two servers in a Citrix platform together with eight HPE servers to see if the performance is on par, if it is working as expected, and what the administrative overhead for the system engineers is. It is another platform that works in another way, so there is a learning curve, but I wonder if the end user notices anything. From my standpoint, I also consider the financial aspect of it.

Not really have I appreciated any feature about Dell PowerEdge R-Series so far because we are running a hypervisor on it, making it just a server in a rack. However, iDRAC is nice, although HPE iLO is better.

In terms of the interface, HPE is cleaner. Dell is more like a website, requiring us to search everywhere to find a feature to turn on or off, and sometimes it is hard to know where it is set. Of course, that is based on experience, as we are experienced with HPE, but HPE's management interface and their website are cleaner than Dell's. Dell has too much bloatware, too many settings, and it varies with updates, but overall, it is okay, just another way of working.

I have realized benefits so far from running Dell PowerEdges just from a financial standpoint.

The Intel processor handles my workloads well. It is just Intel, and it just works.

Dell PowerEdge could be better by having a cleaner interface, especially for iDRAC, as well as improving the support website of Dell in general, making it easier to find firmware and drivers. This is feedback I am getting from my engineers, as they find it difficult to locate settings or download items. It needs to be easier and cleaner.

We have been using Dell PowerEdges for almost two or three years now.

So far, the stability and reliability of Dell PowerEdges is good, but we are only running it for almost three years now, so I cannot tell over the long term.

The scalability question depends on the outcomes of our experiment, making it not applicable at this time.

We have utilized Dell support to help us, but of course, it takes time for them to start analyzing and determining the cause of the issue. Support is fine. We used to believe it was better, but that is what we are experimenting with. We are not only looking at cost but also support.

I cannot tell you the exact rating for their support; I would have to ask my engineers, but it would be around a six or seven.

What is lacking for me to make it a ten in terms of support is having a clear support system. Reachability should be better, with native-speaking Dutch engineers available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week instead of being transferred to India, for example.

Of course, I considered HP ProLiant before deciding on Dell PowerEdge.

We are only running HPE, specifically HPE Incorporated and HPE Enterprise, not Lenovo.

It is difficult because it is new and looks different from what we are used to. That is the problem. When something is not working as expected, finding documentation becomes an issue. Where it would take an hour to set up an HPE server, for example, it took almost two working days for the first Dell PowerEdge to get it running.

I have not deployed Dell PowerEdges myself, but for my engineers, it is difficult.

The ROI from purchasing Dell PowerEdges versus HP or any other vendors is close, although it really depends on what the account manager is doing and whether they want an extra customer or not.

The pricing was nice, otherwise it would not be Dell, so I am only looking at pricing.

It is a little bit cheaper than HP, although that depends on the sales process. Sometimes HPE wants to do more than Dell, which makes it interesting from a financial perspective. From an operational perspective, it is just equipment.

Not specifically do I think Dell PowerEdge has features that cater to the needs of my company. It is just another hardware vendor. I see it with more transparency because you can have IBM, Lenovo, or HPE, but they all include an Intel chip, and they all include chips from NVIDIA. For me, it is just equipment, and whether it is Lenovo, Dell, or HPE does not matter much. The support behind the equipment is more important, and financially it is just comparing HPE versus Dell versus Lenovo.

I do not know at this time what model or functionality of servers or rack servers are being used.

I think it is the R model, specifically R660 or something similar, and I think they were invested last year.

I do not have any other differentiators to mention about the benefits of HP versus Dell solutions, as we are only running Dell PowerEdge and ProLiant.

My overall review rating for Dell PowerEdge R-Series is eight out of ten.

On-premises

My primary use cases for Dell PowerEdge R-Series in my company mostly focus on production use, for all the servers and systems inside the company environment. I prefer not to go into details, but we have Active Directory concepts, databases, SQL, and similar systems running on them.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series does not yet play a role in my company's AI initiatives.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series supports the growth and operational success of my company in an amazing way. We had several meetings with Dell PowerEdge R-Series representatives who came to our office, understood our forecast, and managed to help us build infrastructure that would support our goal.

Since then, we have definitely scaled up as we purchased several more servers.

I need to think about in what areas Dell PowerEdge R-Series could be better and what additional features I would want to see included in the next releases.

I have no suggestions about room for improvement regarding Dell PowerEdge R-Series. Everything is fine with Dell PowerEdge R-Series; we enjoy it. It's a server, and I don't have any current pain points or features that I would want to see. We simply enjoy it.

I have almost 20 years of experience working in my current field. I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for almost all my professional years.

I can say that Dell PowerEdge R-Series is a reliable and stable solution for me, and if any issues arise, they know how to solve them.

We have definitely scaled up as we purchased several more servers since our initial deployment.

On a scale of one to 10, I would give their support a rating of 10. I don't remember a situation where I was furious as I've been with other vendors, so they are better than others.

Positive

I have evaluated other vendors before choosing Dell PowerEdge R-Series, but I started as a junior with Dell PowerEdge R-Series, and as a senior, I continue doing good. Dell PowerEdge R-Series has proven itself as a reliable solution, and the service is great; you don't want to take a risk with something else.

The setup cost for Dell PowerEdge R-Series was fair enough.

I have definitely realized a return on my investment in Dell PowerEdge R-Series, as even old machines are still working as robust systems. We can use them in the DR or at least in the laboratory environment as a second generation.

I am the IT Manager managing Dell PowerEdge R-Series. With VMware and Veeam, they worked perfectly and smoothly for backups. When we had accidents and situations that required restoration, it worked perfectly and the service was fine.

As I'm in a security company and most of the systems are on-prem, we're trying to migrate most of the systems to something that will collaborate between systems, and the next step we will start to implement AI. I want AI to help with basic tasks, including helping developers, procurement, inventory, and regular day-to-day operations.

The performance metrics I use to measure success with Dell PowerEdge R-Series include the service as one of the first things, the salesperson, and all the surrounding aspects. The server itself is similar to HP and other vendors, but when you have a problem and the service is better than fine, this is a win-win situation.

My advice to someone evaluating Dell PowerEdge R-Series is that cost is not always the most important factor; sometimes you need to consider other benefits when buying a product. We can speak with potential customers if Dell PowerEdge R-Series wants our recommendation. Dell can be in touch with me if they have any questions.

On a scale of one to 10, I would rate Dell PowerEdge R-Series solutions between 9 and 10.

On-premises

Other

Our use case mainly involves running our exchange server 2019 on the SimpliVity, along with other healthcare-related servers that are also on HP, including the domain controller. We are moving away from HP because of their support issues and solutions.

The most valuable function we found in Hyper-Converged is the application version we are currently using, which is HP SimpliVity version 4.1.0.266, although we are not fully satisfied with it. We have been using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers without issues. We occasionally replace one or two servers, but the majority are still functioning well. We've relied on Dell's EqualLogic storage for over ten years, receiving many alerts but overall having a perfectly functioning setup in the back end.

Dell's support is an area that needs improvement as their product reliability is good, but the support is not as strong as HP's. I suggest that Dell should include a built-in backup solution in VxRail, similar to what we find in Sangfor, where the backup feature is integrated.

We have been working with HP Hyper-Converged for around five years.

We have never faced unplanned downtime with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers.

After HP SimpliVity, the hyper-converged solution, we are not using any more HP servers. We are working with Nutanix and Sangfor, and previously we also worked with Dell. Initially, these servers were with Dell, but we moved them to HP SimpliVity after the hardware expired. Our reason for this shift was based on a technical and financial comparison, as we got a better price from HP.

Dell's pricing has been high for us, which led us to move to SimpliVity.

We are still working with Nutanix products, and we also moved to another vendor called Sangfor. We are using HP SimpliVity as our hyper-converged solution, but we are not satisfied with their services and support. We have 24 nodes of HP SimpliVity, and this year we decide not to renew the contract as we plan for one more solution which could be Nutanix to replace the SimpliVity.

We use Dell's EqualLogic storage technology and Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers R740, R730, R740, and R750 servers. We are also using some applications and one or two servers from HP for Cisco operations. We have been working with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for maybe ten years. We use Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for our healthcare applications and for running an old version of the exchange server.

The main benefits we receive from Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are stability and reliability. While we occasionally receive complaints about hard disk failures, overall, we find the solution satisfactory. We could not continue with Dell due to high pricing, but we have transitioned to HP and are now moving to Sangfor and Nutanix.

Flexibility-wise, both Dell and HP solutions are okay for us, as we run VMware on Dell hardware, managing around 120 to 130 virtual machines. In the past, we primarily used Dell while paying to Dell and VMware, but given the changes in VMware's pricing after Broadcom's acquisition, we are now transitioning to HCI solutions that provide similar features.

We cannot give a proper estimation of power consumption due to high cooling and availability in our data center, but our HCI solutions consume less electricity now compared to older Dell servers, which had high energy consumption. We are not familiar with AI workloads, as no one has presented this feature to us. We purchased the product from a third-party business partner.

When comparing Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers with HP SimpliVity, we see that they serve different purposes; Dell operates standalone on VMware, whereas HP is a hyper-converged solution. Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers stands out as a better option in this context. Overall, we give Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers a final rating of six out of ten.

Hybrid Cloud

Other

We choose Dell PowerEdge R-Series to perform backup and to store multiple data for our team in our businesses. We do not do much with it. We mainly use external management for our business applications rather than internal management. For Dell PowerEdge R-Series, we primarily use it for backup and for network shares for the different people and staff.

The most valuable feature of having Dell PowerEdge R-Series is the iDRAC, and the ease of administration is nice too; they are quite easily manageable.

The biggest benefit my company gets from having Dell PowerEdge R-Series is that they work as we expect and deliver the performance that we expect. We mainly look at what is in the hardware when we buy servers; that is what interests us. If we buy servers from Dell, it is because they meet our expectations.

There is a little margin for improvement. I would appreciate more facility to open the server and remove the pieces, such as the CPU, hard drive, and RAM but overall, the product is good to me.

I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for three years, my company has been using it for around 10 years.

My impressions of the stability and reliability of Dell PowerEdge R-Series are good, as we still have some servers from Dell that we use for secondary purposes that are more than 20 years old.

Even though there is some downtime, they are durable. We had to tinker with them a little, change some parts, and repair them.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series does expand with my company's needs in a way, but we are not too dependent on it. Everything that is important for our company is hosted externally; we just have everything for network sharing of documents locally that staff need on the spot. We do not have large needs on the local server that we store at our place.

I have not used Dell's customer support service; I do everything myself.

Neutral

I have previously used other solutions, including HP and other brands of servers, but not many.

The best part about using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for a small company like mine is the simplicity of setup; it is simple to set up and fast, with no particular problems during setup, unlike certain other types of servers from other brands.

Comparing Dell PowerEdge R-Series to HP, HP is already much more complicated, notably on the part of their equivalent of iDRAC, which is much more obscure and less intuitive to understand.

While we have not yet deployed AI initiatives on our Dell PowerEdge R-Series infrastructure, these projects are firmly on our future roadmap. We are currently in the early discussion and planning stages, and we expect to evaluate our hardware requirements more concretely as these projects progress.

I have no specific criticisms regarding the product. When compared to competitors, I highly recommend the PowerEdge R-Series for its streamlined setup and deployment. While I don't claim it is the only solution on the market, its simplicity and reliability are perfectly suited to our current environment. I rate the solution an 8 out of 10; it is a consistently strong performer, though there is always room for minor iterative improvements.

On-premises

My main use case for Dell PowerEdge R-Series is that I use them as VMware hosts to run my virtual environment.

I use Dell PowerEdge R-Series as VMware hosts in my virtual environment for all workloads. I stand them up with the hypervisor software installed on them, and then run 15 to 20 guest machines on them in the data center. I have 17 Dell servers in total.

My main use case is straightforward regarding how I run those workloads on Dell PowerEdge R-Series.

The workloads I am currently running on Dell PowerEdge servers involve VMware as the hypervisor, and then a multitude of applications running on those guest machines.

I have run AI workloads on my PowerEdge servers.

The best features Dell PowerEdge R-Series offers are that they are reliable, they perform well, and the cost is reasonable.

When I mention reliability and performance, I mean that my demands are not high, so I do not have an unexpected expectation for performance, but it performs well and it is reliable. Once I stand them up, I really do not have to worry about a hardware-related issue.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series has positively impacted my organization by being a trusted hardware source, which is always important to have a reliable environment.

This reliability has led to peace of mind and by being reliable, I reduce my downtime, which is always appreciated.

I do not think Dell PowerEdge R-Series can be improved; I think it is in a pretty good position right now, and it is reasonably priced.

I do not have anything else to add about needed improvements.

There is nothing I think could be improved with Dell PowerEdge R-Series, even a small detail.

I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for 10 plus years between this firm and my last.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series is stable.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series' scalability is adequate. I do not really scale them; I just add additional hosts as I need to.

Customer support for Dell PowerEdge R-Series is good.

I previously used HP servers before; they were legacy from when I started, so since I had history with Dell, I wanted to stick with Dell moving forward.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series is deployed in my organization on-premises.

I did not use Dell deployment services or an integrator.

I do not track direct return on investment; I just have an expectation that the hardware is going to run well beyond the expected life cycle, which I have had success with.

My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that there was no licensing; I used my VMware licensing for that. Setup cost was handled by me. Pricing was straightforward.

I did not evaluate other options before choosing Dell PowerEdge R-Series.

Using PowerEdge rack servers has not affected the overall flexibility of my operations or business.

I do not really look at sustainability regarding PowerEdge server's impact on my organization's sustainability goals.

I recommend Dell PowerEdge R-Series as it is a good product. I would rate this review as a nine out of ten.

We have a variety of servers, including Dell PowerEdge R-Series, as we have a full environment, functioning environment with Kubernetes, virtual servers, and virtual machines that carry on applications, gaming applications.

The most valuable feature of Dell PowerEdge R-Series server is the processing speed. The processing speed is the most important thing that we are looking for in a server, and we want it to function fast as the latency is the most important between the end user and our servers to get the application and to get the feedback from the application. 

We have monitoring systems that allow us to see the improvement without benchmarking, including latency and the time taken by Dell PowerEdge R-Series servers to access data from storage and return it.

Dell can improve or speed up the deployment process with more intuitive dashboards, a more intuitive installing process, and maybe more detailed guides that can help the end user to install and implement their servers and racks.

It would be better if it could be, let's say, a bit less complicated to install everything, to make everything work together. I'm usually on the network side mostly, however, for me, configuring the Dell was a bit more complicated than just using the HP since the HP was really straightforward about everything. The Dell was a bit more complicated. I needed to check a lot of stuff. I needed to contact Dell support a few times to understand exactly how to connect the storage portal. 

I have been with the company for about a year, so I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for about a year now.

This solution is able to scale with our organization.

We used Dell's customer service or technical support for connecting the storage to the servers, which was complicated, and we had many issues because the virtual machines didn't really sync. 

We used them several times, and they were very nice about it, however, it still felt like a long process with two or three sessions until we got the full solution that we wanted. For kindness, 

I would rate Dell's customer support a ten out of ten; for technical knowledge, I would rate them a seven or eight.

Positive

I'm also familiar with HP. I didn't see much improvement between the HP servers and Dell PowerEdge R-Series, however, it got a bit faster; the latency went down, and we can see that the processing speed of the applications or the functioning is faster than what we had with HP.

The initial deployment of Dell PowerEdge R-Series, the actual connection, was two or three days' worth of work; deploying the whole environment until everything functioned as we wanted was a process of two or three weeks overall.

Regarding the benefits and how they complete the mission, I would give Dell PowerEdge R-Series a perfect score as they are doing exactly what they need to. 

It took some time, however, they got to where they need to, and it's working as we expected. If someone asks me about Dell PowerEdge R-Series in general, I would say to go check them. 

I have rated this solution ten out of ten.

We deployed Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers to support a VMware environment, and we're looking for something else, but primarily it's to support our software that we're delivering to our customers, allowing them to bring their own hardware if they wish; however, if they want us to provide it, we only bring Dell.

I find great value in Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, particularly in their excellent serviceability. At cost per feature, the pricing is great; I super love iDRAC and the serviceability, as they're easy to access when needed and work every time, showcasing consistency in quality.

The main benefit my customers see from installing or deploying Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is that they don't have to pay much attention to it because it runs smoothly, meaning they don't babysit it as they should, which while not ideal, indicates how stable the product is.

In my opinion, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers could improve in clarity when specifying options; for instance, the difference between power supplies can sometimes be a little challenging to understand if you don't already know, but the product itself is great, and I believe it will continue to get better, so I don't have specific requests.

I have been using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for 15 years.

The main benefit my customers see from installing or deploying Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is that they don't have to pay much attention to it because it runs smoothly, meaning they don't babysit it as they should, which while not ideal, indicates how stable the product is.

We've added nodes with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, and when customers expand their usage, they buy new suites on top of what we previously sold them, allowing new nodes to fit in smoothly without causing issues during additions to the stacks.

I haven't needed to use Dell support recently, but I have in the past, and I feel that one of Dell's strong points is their support; they believe you and usually resolve issues without passing you on to someone else, and I appreciate having one person own my case and build a relationship by following up to check if everything is still working.

Positive

I haven't bought anything but Dell in a long time and found myself using other products at customer sites to assist in troubleshooting, and I've always felt that the interfaces on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are pretty intuitive, which isn't always the case with other products.

My role in using and managing Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers involves specing it, picking it, buying it, ordering it, and installing it, so I manage it end to end until I turn it over to the customers, providing a turnkey service to go with our software that we sell.

We work with a channel partner, distributing under OEM, and while we have a Platinum Dell partner to assist us in quoting and ordering, we maintain relationships with account managers at Dell, who are awesome.

I believe my customers really appreciate the predictability of costs, especially since Dell offers extended warranties that allow them to plan for running their systems for 5 or 6 years while being aware they'll need to purchase new equipment in the future, fitting well with their operations based on expenses.

At cost per feature, the pricing is great.

We've compared Dell's pricing against HP in the past, and I think the pricing is competitive, offering good value.

I would rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers as a solution overall a 10, as I'm not even considering other servers and am happy with PowerEdge.

On-premises

Other

I manage the VxRail environment at our site, and I was somewhat involved in the installation, but Dell completed the deployment.

It is difficult to judge the most valuable feature of Dell VxRail P670N because VMware primarily runs on it; currently, I cannot identify any problems. There were minimal issues, with only one board replacement, but otherwise everything has been functioning well so far.

Since using the VxRail, I would say Dell VxRail P670N environment definitely makes our work easier, whether that is directly due to the VxRail or not.

There could still be improvements in that area, as there was that one motherboard replacement that had to happen. But that is just something that happens. It is probably the same with any other manufacturer.

I have been using Dell VxRail P670N for three years.

I would rate the stability and reliability of Dell VxRail P670N as good. As I mentioned earlier, there have been failures among the 14 servers in two years, with just one motherboard replacement. Otherwise, I have to say the interface of the iDRAC and the management interface are quite adequate.

I definitely have hands-on experience with Dell VxRail P670N, and I am involved in working with it.

I would rate Dell's support as a ten.

There is something going on right now related to AI initiatives. Currently, I would say it is not being utilized, but it could happen in the future.

Positive

Before using Dell VxRail P670N, I used various solutions in other companies, and I can still make comparisons. I have dealt with a direct competitor, HPE, and I cannot say that the difference was that significant.

Everything went smoothly, and all was good with the Dell colleagues who performed it; everything was great.

My company has around 8,000 users worldwide.

Right now, I would not know the performance indicators for Dell VxRail P670N; I know we monitor failures and any outages, but otherwise, we do not run benchmarks.

I gave this review a rating of 9.

On-premises

Other