One of the standout features of StarWind.com is its remarkable ability to seamlessly integrate with Dell systems. This integration provides users with an unmatched level of convenience and compatibility, allowing for streamlined operations within a Dell environment. This compatibility factor alone can save significant time and effort for IT professionals, ensuring a smooth integration process and optimized performance.
Senior Network Engineer at Accel Entertainment Inc
User
Top 20
2023-04-20T20:21:00Z
Apr 20, 2023
I like StarWind's high availability. The failover is almost immediate, so the end users have no idea the guest VM moved at all. We can failover all guest VMs onto a single hypervisor, place it into maintenance mode, install updates, and reboot a hypervisor all during the daytime and remotely, with confidence the process will be successful.
Senior Cyber Security Pre-sales/Solution architect/ SOC Consultant at Hilal Computers
User
2023-03-27T08:20:00Z
Mar 27, 2023
StarWind Virtual SAN can improve an organization's storage infrastructure by providing high availability, scalability, cost-effectiveness, performance, and ease of use.
Principal of ICT Infrastructure and Services at Northgate High School
User
Top 20
2022-11-21T10:09:00Z
Nov 21, 2022
The fact that we can expand our storage and add on to our compute nodes easily and how amazing the StarWind technical support team is really adding value to our purchase.
Immediately we noticed huge performance gains, even on older hardware and once we implemented a 10GB link between both servers, the sync was near-instant after the initial sync was complete.
Virtual SAN runs on iSCSI, which is free and easy to configure. It's easy to manage from StarWind's GUI console, and it only required a few extra switch ports.
The solution is also quite flexible. As an example, other vSAN solutions that we looked at had more stringent requirements regarding mixed HDD/SSD storage which wouldn't have worked in our environment.
This solution enables us to make better cost-effective use of our existing hardware and leverage the current infrastructure at a higher level than we could before.
Informatics Analyst III at University of Alabama at Birmingham
Real User
2021-01-22T16:20:00Z
Jan 22, 2021
The primary purpose of this software is to create a virtual SAN between local storage on Hyper-V hosts. I find this feature most valuable since it accomplishes this quite well.
PowerShell library is pretty good feature as I created with APC PowerChute a script to put volumes on maintenance mode then turning off the StarWind nodes together with the VM and Hosts when UPS reaches 15 percent, this way after a blackout or electrical problems when turning servers on again, there is no issues for syncing or data loss due to energy interrupts.
IT Supervisor at Area Agency on Aging Region 9, Inc.
Real User
Top 10
2020-07-27T14:42:00Z
Jul 27, 2020
Highly available storage is the most valuable feature. The entire rollout is hyper-converged and requires no extra storage further than the hosts in which Hyper-V is running. Another feature that has been great is the support from StarWind in general. We have their proactive support package on the main cluster that employs Starwind Virtual SAN.
System Engineer & IT Manager at General Computer Italia
Real User
2020-07-10T14:20:00Z
Jul 10, 2020
The ability to run the software virtually on every virtualization platform and the ability to eliminate all storage vendor locking are the most valuable features.
Updates to server hardware are now painless and done during working hours with zero stress. We had a RAID failure a few months back, and nobody in the building even noticed and there was no after hours time used for repair.
Digital Archive System Administrator at Rahvusarhiiv
Real User
2020-06-28T08:57:00Z
Jun 28, 2020
StarWind Virtual SAN for vSphere is a software-defined storage solution that has reduced administration time for storage. It's pretty straightforward to install and setup it and so far it has been robust and worked as advertised from StarWind.
The management interface on the software is very simple. It is insanely simple compared to most SANs. The interface is also powerful when used to complete tasks that an IT administrator needs to complete.
Deputy Director at a government with 11-50 employees
Real User
2019-12-20T06:36:00Z
Dec 20, 2019
When using new (warranty) servers, you can forget about the storage service for several years. The users will not even notice the failure of two servers out of three.
Director of Systems and Security at a wellness & fitness company with 11-50 employees
Real User
2019-12-04T18:12:00Z
Dec 4, 2019
It allows me to configure High Availability and failover clustering with some fault tolerance, at a cost point that doesn’t break the bank for a small business budget.
The most valuable feature for us is having the ability to configure our local storage using a limited number of disks and using the StarWind VSAN software to keep the cluster nodes in perfect sync.
StarWind Virtual SAN is a very easy-to-use solution that can be quickly and easily deployed and configured without intimate and specific knowledge in the virtualization sphere.
Information Systems Manager at a aerospace/defense firm with 51-200 employees
Real User
2019-01-31T08:49:00Z
Jan 31, 2019
One of the most valuable features is the way it sets up the virtual SAN, because we don't have to buy a separate appliance for storage. It uses the existing storage on the servers, which is definitely a cost savings for us.
IT Manager at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
Real User
2019-01-24T09:35:00Z
Jan 24, 2019
I like the asynchronous replication and failover features. They are what I'm primarily using it for. The asynchronous replication is helpful because our servers are backed up continuously throughout the day. If anything goes wrong we just fail over immediately. That is a very nice feature to have.
Deputy Director of Technology and Communications at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
Real User
2019-01-23T11:26:00Z
Jan 23, 2019
The ProActive support gives me peace of mind because I am a one man shop, but with the technical support behind me, I feel like more than just one person. We spent two to three hours, depending on what we have to do, always on the phone, and they do not push to end the call.
It has reduced our overall maintenance and overhead by having to only maintain physical boxes for one cluster instead of having to manage physical boxes for two clusters.
You can build cheap, reliable, replicated virtual machines clusters using simple servers with an all flash disk or SAS\SATA hybrid tiered by performance storage.
As a nonprofit with a limited budget, we are very satisfied with the licensing model provided by StarWind. The initial setup was quick and mostly effortless. Additionally, the support has been superb on the few occasions we've had to reach out to them.
Please share with the community what you think needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN. What are its weaknesses? What would you like to see changed in a future version?
Very few aspects of this solution need improvement. Sometimes documentation on their site can be out of date, and it is always good to check with support to make sure that whatever you are looking at is current. The good news here is that this is very easy to accomplish. If we stay with the Virtual SAN instead of the managed appliances it would be great to have more automated tooling around managing the iSCSI connections in Windows, which can be a bit confusing at first.
It is difficult to control all of the hardware components. I went through a couple of different NICs before I found the one that would work with my hardware and server OS, and yield the necessary throughput for the StarWind portion.
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We like their high availability. It reduces the downtime for our entire organization's environment.
One of the standout features of StarWind.com is its remarkable ability to seamlessly integrate with Dell systems. This integration provides users with an unmatched level of convenience and compatibility, allowing for streamlined operations within a Dell environment. This compatibility factor alone can save significant time and effort for IT professionals, ensuring a smooth integration process and optimized performance.
It's very easy to resize disks and they show up in VMware almost instantly.
We are able to execute maintenance on one server while the other is still running.
The product creates opportunities with hybrid on-premise solutions.
I save both physical and virtual space.
For those basic uses, it's simple to set up and manage, and it seems to do a fine job.
The performance of the solution is accurate and concise.
The backup is readily available for use, and the restoration process is easy.
I like StarWind's high availability. The failover is almost immediate, so the end users have no idea the guest VM moved at all. We can failover all guest VMs onto a single hypervisor, place it into maintenance mode, install updates, and reboot a hypervisor all during the daytime and remotely, with confidence the process will be successful.
The ease of reaching the support team and their promptness for support is great.
StarWind Virtual SAN can improve an organization's storage infrastructure by providing high availability, scalability, cost-effectiveness, performance, and ease of use.
StarWind is very easy to use, even if you have had no experience using a SAN before.
Integration with virtualization platforms helped us to resolve many issues we were facing while using the physical storage.
StarWind Virtual SAN offers high availability and data resilience features to prevent data loss if hardware fails.
StarWind Virtual SAN is a very mature software that supersedes its capabilities with my use cases.
The product has improved the ability to mimic physical SAN environments to demo scenarios and troubleshoot problems.
Having the ability to migrate machines live in our environment was made possible by this software.
The fact that we can expand our storage and add on to our compute nodes easily and how amazing the StarWind technical support team is really adding value to our purchase.
It includes every feature that a traditional SAN offers and so much more.
We have been able to use more on-prem hardware to reduce cost and also use old disks that we do not trust enough for ordinary RAID or usage.
StarWind vSAN is easy to deploy and administer.
The management and monitoring have been very easy since the solution's dashboard is very simple and user-friendly.
I've had to open a few support cases over the years due to administrator errors, and the support received was top-notch.
The StarWind Virtual SAN provides a clever and unique solution to the Computing Split Brain problem.
The Windows-based StarWind GUI is easy to use and understand and integrates seamlessly with VMware's vSphere portal as well.
The price was right.
The ROI is great on this product.
StarWind SANs come with outstanding support.
It enables us to provide more solution options for our clients, with the reassurance that, when implemented, they will be efficient and stable.
The features that I found most valuable are ease of use of the software that StarWind offers - with the first setup being a bit painful.
The install itself is easy as pie.
Starwind made it easy to deploy fully redundant, highly available storage at a low cost.
Immediately we noticed huge performance gains, even on older hardware and once we implemented a 10GB link between both servers, the sync was near-instant after the initial sync was complete.
The license price is one of the cheapest in the market.
Training is also easy as it is just one system to learn.
The top-notch support before, during, and after deployments are better than any other vendor I have come across.
They offer top-tier support.
Virtual SAN runs on iSCSI, which is free and easy to configure. It's easy to manage from StarWind's GUI console, and it only required a few extra switch ports.
The biggest benefit was that it allowed us to provide SAN services on a limited hardware budget.
The solution is also quite flexible. As an example, other vSAN solutions that we looked at had more stringent requirements regarding mixed HDD/SSD storage which wouldn't have worked in our environment.
vSAN we found was simple to set up, easy to configure and manage and allows us to achieve storage redundancy.
It is extremely stable.
The most useful aspect is the hyper-converged SD SAN and the ease to expand it by just adding cheap SSD or NVME disks.
VSAN works great; it's very easy to install, configure, and manage.
This solution enables us to make better cost-effective use of our existing hardware and leverage the current infrastructure at a higher level than we could before.
StarWind vSAN has allowed us to leverage our server infrastructure more completely without the need to add more hardware.
The vSAN provides full redundancy for storage while reclaiming some rack space.
The most valuable features are high availability and real-time replication between two servers.
In the three years that we have been using StarWind, the product has yet to cause us any problems.
It's quite easy to install.
A great feature is that I basically set it and forget it, as everything is automatic.
The primary purpose of this software is to create a virtual SAN between local storage on Hyper-V hosts. I find this feature most valuable since it accomplishes this quite well.
The iSCSI protocol is quite simple to configure.
Quick setup, great support, stability is great
The fact that I can now count on a true failover solution is what is most appealing.
Speed and high availability have been the most valuable for us.
Recovery and maintenance are now less stressful and most importantly, it allows our users to keep working.
PowerShell library is pretty good feature as I created with APC PowerChute a script to put volumes on maintenance mode then turning off the StarWind nodes together with the VM and Hosts when UPS reaches 15 percent, this way after a blackout or electrical problems when turning servers on again, there is no issues for syncing or data loss due to energy interrupts.
Highly available storage is the most valuable feature. The entire rollout is hyper-converged and requires no extra storage further than the hosts in which Hyper-V is running. Another feature that has been great is the support from StarWind in general. We have their proactive support package on the main cluster that employs Starwind Virtual SAN.
The ability to run the software virtually on every virtualization platform and the ability to eliminate all storage vendor locking are the most valuable features.
Updates to server hardware are now painless and done during working hours with zero stress. We had a RAID failure a few months back, and nobody in the building even noticed and there was no after hours time used for repair.
StarWind Virtual SAN for vSphere is a software-defined storage solution that has reduced administration time for storage. It's pretty straightforward to install and setup it and so far it has been robust and worked as advertised from StarWind.
The management interface on the software is very simple. It is insanely simple compared to most SANs. The interface is also powerful when used to complete tasks that an IT administrator needs to complete.
It has a nice, simple control panel. You can clearly see the state and health of storage along with the synchronization.
The most valuable feature is the reliable storage replication, which enables me to create a robust infrastructure to run our business.
It has given the company an almost zero possibility of downtime.
StarWind vSAN is a great solution to create a redundant two-node-only Hyper-V cluster, both for domain or workgroup scenarios.
When using new (warranty) servers, you can forget about the storage service for several years. The users will not even notice the failure of two servers out of three.
We have experienced multiple hardware failures at one site and the fault-tolerant volume worked exactly as expected with zero downtime.
It allows me to configure High Availability and failover clustering with some fault tolerance, at a cost point that doesn’t break the bank for a small business budget.
The most valuable feature of this solution is the support. They are excellent and you can learn a lot from the support team.
Using our own choice of HW allowed us to price our service to answer our customers' needs.
A typical system administrator with minimal experience in Hyper-V, VMware, or Windows can do VSAN configuration and maintain VSAN operations.
High Availability is the best feature of product.
It has allowed me to effectively and confidently manage the maintenance of hosts where I can power off a host and have its VMs migrate to another one.
In addition to the main functions of the software, I want to note the excellent work of technical support.
The most valuable feature for us is having the ability to configure our local storage using a limited number of disks and using the StarWind VSAN software to keep the cluster nodes in perfect sync.
We can lose a site or even two of our three, and we would lose no data and have no outage.
The most important feature is the ability to experience the loss of one node or one storage device, and not lose the entire cluster.
When we need additional storage but want to keep the size of the SANs manageable, the StarWind Virtual SAN has allowed me to do everything needed.
Active-active work mode leads to true redundancy of storage and allows us to distribute the load between multiple nodes.
The most valuable feature is the fact that the nodes are Active/Active, and allow us to do upgrades on any node without any downtime.
It allows you to use ANY consumer or enterprise HDDs and SSDs, and that's a really great thing!
StarWind allowed us to deploy highly available shared storage within our budget.
This solution has a very good user interface, with simple administration/management.
The most valuable feature is the managed service, which has been an important part of monitoring our critical infrastructure.
The access to our data is quicker and cheaper than it used to be in a traditional storage system.
StarWind Virtual SAN is a very easy-to-use solution that can be quickly and easily deployed and configured without intimate and specific knowledge in the virtualization sphere.
This has helped to improve the reliability of service and operation in all departments, without having to stop in case of emergency situations.
Before VSAN, hypervisor configuration changes and updates resulted in VM outages. Now, downtime is dramatically reduced.
User friendly interface and straight forward implementation.
The StarWind Virtual SAN management console is intuitive and easy to use.
We are able to do maintenance by bringing down one node at a time, rather than having to schedule a complete shutdown.
One of the most valuable features is the way it sets up the virtual SAN, because we don't have to buy a separate appliance for storage. It uses the existing storage on the servers, which is definitely a cost savings for us.
The control panel is nice. It gives you a lot of good feedback as to the status and health of the VSAN.
I like the asynchronous replication and failover features. They are what I'm primarily using it for. The asynchronous replication is helpful because our servers are backed up continuously throughout the day. If anything goes wrong we just fail over immediately. That is a very nice feature to have.
The ProActive support gives me peace of mind because I am a one man shop, but with the technical support behind me, I feel like more than just one person. We spent two to three hours, depending on what we have to do, always on the phone, and they do not push to end the call.
It has reduced our overall maintenance and overhead by having to only maintain physical boxes for one cluster instead of having to manage physical boxes for two clusters.
Their support goes above and beyond with the integration of their software.
The software is easy to setup and manage, and the support is excellent.
You can build cheap, reliable, replicated virtual machines clusters using simple servers with an all flash disk or SAS\SATA hybrid tiered by performance storage.
The best feature is its ease of installation and integration within a current infrastructure.
Active-active HA provides top performance and redundancy.
The product's core feature of virtualizing our storage is by far the most valuable.
Ten gigabit Ethernet compatibility, support, ease of use, and management are some positive features.
The StarWind tech support is extremely helpful, especially during the initial setup.
Integration with Microsoft clustering has been perfect, allowing us to leverage our investment in MS server licensing to the fullest.