We performed a comparison between Dell SC Series and Pure Storage FlashArray based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two All-Flash Storage solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
"It has good, reliable, fast storage."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use."
"Technical support has been helpful and responsive."
"The latency is good."
"We're able to get higher-density workloads on the same infrastructure, and we have a smaller physical footprint. The performance is excellent – during our test the bottlenecks are never on the X array, it just keeps picking up the pace to match what you need. The real-time visibility is a differentiator in my opinion."
"The most valuable features of Pure FlashArray X NVMe are its superior performance compared to other flash tiers, as well as its ease of use, with an intuitive user interface that is simple to deploy and use."
"It is very easy to install and configure. It has got excellent diagnostics. If you really need to see how the box is performing, the console gives you a lot of information. You can set thresholds as well as alerts based on the thresholds, which is a very powerful functionality. They are very proactive. They know how to monitor and manage the systems. They see a problem, and they are all over it before us. They see the problem before we see it, which is very good."
"The most valuable features of this solution are its ease of use and performance."
"The solution is stable."
"Performance-wise it's high speed. It's also more stable and scalable."
"The most valuable feature is the speed for the end-user."
"The user interface is good, I would rate it a nine out of ten."
"With auto-tiering, it's easier to understand than most arrays, knowing that all of your writes go to the tier that you specify, with easy-to-create storage profiles."
"One of the most valuable features is the capability to switch between all-flash to hybrid, which have have actually done for one of our arrays. We started with the hybrid, with the limited if I'm not mistaken, and then over a period of time, we swapped all the hybrids with the SSDs. This was one of the big features because it gave us the capability to not stick with just one kind of media. Secondly, since it has sorted clustering, we were able to bring in the newer boxes and have it all clustered together. These were the two main features that we really looked into, which benefited our use case from an expansion/growth perspective. Another valuable feature is the ease of management."
"In terms of stability, it's good enough. It's okay."
"It had many features, like a snapshot, replication, on-the-file RAID levels, mix-and-match files, those kinds of things."
"The solution helps to simplify storage."
"It is an SSD array that has awesome performance, low submillisecond latency, and does what it is supposed to do. It just works, which is difficult for things to do anymore."
"We've had different types of storage, and three things of this solution are valuable. The first one is its outstanding performance. The second one is its stability. In the about three years that we've had it, we've had component failures, but we never had a service interruption or any data loss. The third one, which is really critical, is that it is super easy to use in terms of provisioning, storage, and managing the arrays. I'm able to maintain a multi-site environment with a couple of dozen arrays with a single mid-level storage admin."
"The first set up we had was really straight forward and simple."
"Having an intuitive user interface to get things running is great."
"Data reduction and compression. Sub millisecond latency."
"Non-disruptive upgrades: You can upgrade at anytime without worry."
"The most valuable feature is its data reduction."
"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."
"We've seen that when we create a POD in synchronous mode, it increases the latency."
"Right now, the box itself is just strictly working as a backend storage system. It would be fantastic if we could access it directly like a NAS device through network access or SIS drives. I think they have an interface, but I am not sure how good it is. If we could address a box directly on the network without having to go through a server, it would be great. The replication schemas could be improved. We are not using replication on the storage level right now. We use a different type of replication. If their replication would be as good as the one that we have, I would probably run the replication schema because it might be faster, but I don't know that for a fact. So, I cannot say that they have good replication. All I can say is that they need to inform us better."
"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."
"We would like to see VNC integration or be able to use Pure Storage with VNC."
"In terms of what needs improvement, the dashboard and management could be simplified."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"In the next release, I would like to see real-time analytics for further insight into consumption models."
"It would be helpful if the solution offered higher performance, at least on the back end."
"Compellent comes in the form of a component that's not true of a unified storage platform."
"The SC Series doesn't support NVMe storage."
"Dell could improve the upgrading process."
"From a performance point of view, it's getting a bit old."
"The administration and support (on the way that they delivered) was a little bit slow."
"The ease of use could be improved. It took me a while to learn it."
"The initial setup is somewhat complex and should be made simpler to do."
"A three wave application or multi wave application synchronization would be an improvement."
"We understand that they're thinking about it, but one of the things that would be nice is if they added some basic file-level capabilities to the platform. The idea is that they would run a basic NFS or CIF share from the controllers. FlashBlade is the powerhouse for File and Object storage, but if you don't need all that power, a lightweight file function would make FlashArrays more versatile."
"It is way in excess of what we need. If anything, we could see a bit more speed. I'm just comparing it with what some of my colleagues who are implementing their own systems do."
"The scalability of the solution is not as good as it probably could be."
"The technical support is okay, but could be improved."
"The only time that we had problems with it was that there was a bug in the VVol implementation but, outside of that, it has been flawless."
"Pure Storage support could be a little better."
"I would like to see active replication. I know that it's available now but I haven't tried it yet. I hope that it works."
Dell SC Series is ranked 25th in All-Flash Storage with 49 reviews while Pure Storage FlashArray is ranked 3rd in All-Flash Storage with 174 reviews. Dell SC Series is rated 8.4, while Pure Storage FlashArray is rated 9.2. The top reviewer of Dell SC Series writes "Automated architecture that proactively optimizes your database ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Pure Storage FlashArray writes "Effective provisioning, helpful support, and reliable". Dell SC Series is most compared with Dell PowerStore, Dell Unity XT, IBM FlashSystem, Huawei OceanStor and NetApp AFF, whereas Pure Storage FlashArray is most compared with Dell PowerStore, NetApp AFF, HPE Nimble Storage, IBM FlashSystem and VMware vSAN. See our Dell SC Series vs. Pure Storage FlashArray report.
See our list of best All-Flash Storage vendors.
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