My main use case for StarWind Virtual SAN is to host data stores for our virtual machines, which we host across three nodes, giving us high availability and failover.
The setup has worked out for me in terms of reliability and performance as it's made a difference because on two occasions we've had disk failures that impacted an entire RAID array on one node. If that were on a single host, we would have lost data, so the high availability came in handy then.
The best features that StarWind Virtual SAN offers include the fact that you can utilize your own hardware, which allows us to repurpose a lot of surplus equipment we had instead of seeing it go into recycling, which was a really good plus point. Other good points are the low entry price; even though we've used our own hardware, the software was cheap and it's just the support that's costing us on a continuous basis, but that's really good. If you didn't want to take out the support, the free community would also be an option.
StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted our organization with massive cost savings. We moved from a different vendor who changed their licensing model, and if I compare StarWind's price versus the previous vendor's, there's been a massive saving. We wouldn't have been able to afford the old vendor on the current budget. So switching to StarWind allows us to maintain budget and also maintain the service levels that our internal customers were accustomed to. It's also allowed us to increase the feature set; we've been able to utilize more storage space with the offset savings.
I think StarWind Virtual SAN could be improved in that I really wish I could use it straight onto tin without any hypervisor or host operating system. I'd also like to mention that the acoustic noise from the Supermicro hardware, which we did purchase via StarWind, was a bit noisy and we had to relocate it into an acoustic rack because when those fans start spinning up, it was really noisy. Lastly, I think the severity two response time incidents could be improved upon; it's eight hours, and if that could be better, I'd like that.
I have been using StarWind Virtual SAN for three years.
StarWind Virtual SAN is very stable.
StarWind Virtual SAN's scalability has been sufficient for the high availability we need; we went across three nodes initially and haven't needed to scale up or out yet. I've seen the documents and know how it works in practice, and we're keeping an eye on usage, but we don't envisage having to scale out anytime soon.
Customer support is one of the really plus points for us; they've got a free community environment where you can get really quick answers from fellow users of the product. Additionally, we're also a paid customer for their increased support for severity one and severity two incidents. On the occasions when they have been needed to be engaged, they've been really knowledgeable on the product and remote in on several occasions to resolve issues very quickly while giving us tips and tricks to avoid it happening again.
I previously used VMware vSAN; we switched because VMware was bought by Broadcom and they changed the licensing model that made VMware vSAN not an attractive option for us.
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing has been that the setup cost initially was really cheap since we used our own hardware. We used it in-house to demo, so we did some use cases and some pilot deployments, which were free in the first three months of using it in a non-production environment. Once we moved it into production, we took out the support and that was the only cost.
After a year of running on our own hardware, that's when we purchased hardware via StarWind, and that's when it got expensive, but it was still a saving versus the previous vendor.
We saw that the cost was paid for within 18 months since moving to StarWind. Headcount was still the same; we kept the same number of people and sent them off to external training to get them all familiar with the StarWind product. There was a little bit of cost involved in that, but it was easy to offset with the savings.
We've saved 40% versus the previous vendor, and the storage space has increased 300% across the three nodes since moving to StarWind.
Before choosing StarWind Virtual SAN, I evaluated other options, including cloud storage for offsite backup and on-prem backup with HP products using Nimble storage and 3PAR storage. I also compared it to the previous vendor on VMware vSAN, but of course that wasn't an option on the new licensing model.
My advice for others looking into using StarWind Virtual SAN is to make sure you've got it on some good hardware. We made the mistake initially of using hardware that wasn't meeting the minimum requirements, and within a month or two, we spotted the issue of the network cards not providing enough throughput. So definitely make sure if you're using your own hardware, it's sufficiently specified and specked up. Alternatively, you could buy the hardware via StarWind, but as I mentioned about those Supermicro fans, I'd urge against that. If we did it again, we'd use StarWind Virtual SAN on HPE ProLiant hardware.
I would mention that my team is really passionate about the product because there's a free option; they've actually started using this product in their home lab environments, and I find that really fosters engagement. The team is eager to learn the product inside and outside of work, and you can really see the benefits of that from the workplace.
On a scale of 1-10, I rate StarWind Virtual SAN a 10.
