We performed a comparison between Dell Unity XT and NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays 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."The solution is very straightforward to set up."
"Pure has signature security technology, which cannot be deleted, even if you are an administrator."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe will quickly overcome all the hurdles you face, including network and latency issues."
"The most valuable features of this solution are its ease of use and performance."
"The latency is good."
"FlashArray has some fresh efficiency features. I've never seen a storage solution with a compression rating this high before. It's at least 4-to-1 on Oracle databases. It's the best flash storage for Oracle."
"Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution."
"The initial setup was extremely simple and straightforward."
"The NAS capability is mainly what we're looking for from this product, and being able to recover fast in DR."
"It is completely reliable. The plugins for it are quite mature. I don't really have any issues with the interactions with vSphere, they all work as intended."
"VMware integration makes the life of our engineers easier, as we are almost 100% virtualized and this feature is used on a daily basis."
"When I have an issue and need technical support, I reach out to them either through chat or by submitting a service request, and the response is good."
"It is easy to manage. A lot of the system manages itself."
"They have a Unity REST API that I use to automate some of the storage stuff. I'm just getting started with it, but it seems pretty easy to use."
"All-flash is a game changer. If you need performance, simple operations, and you plan to use it with VMware, it is a good choice."
"I like the idea that it can compress and dedupe inline. That is quite a stunning feature for mid-range customers."
"Rapid deployment, easy integration management and cloning of areas."
"The stability, speed, and reliability are the solution's best features. The information is also very secure."
"Considering the cost, I find NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays to be the best storage available in the market."
"Its performance is most valuable. This solution is much faster than other as well as older storage solutions. The performance of the system is very good. We are getting 50 times better experience than the older storages. We are using AFF 300. It also has native cloud integration and most of the features."
"Having the option of such high-speed storage in the data center is what makes it valuable."
"The benefits are better up-time, better response time."
"The main advantage of this solution is performance."
"The management of it is very simple. that is the most valuable feature."
"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."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."
"There is room for improvement in catering to midrange storage needs, especially for customers seeking Enterprise-class features."
"If the customer only needs 500 terabytes and doesn't care how much data they'll put in the server, IBM is cheaper than Pure."
"Every time I think of something that needs to improve, they're one step ahead, which I love. The only area I wish to see improve, I believe is coming, is in the FlashBlade product. Blade implementation fell short on a few of the services."
"It's more multi-tenant functionality in their Pure1 manage portal that is lacking."
"We need better data deduplication."
"We did encounter a firmware bug which actually caused loss of data. There was some heartburn around that. But in general, it has operated as expected, except for that bug."
"In terms of what could be improved, I would say its capacity and its connection."
"There are some features in VNX that I wish were in the Unity. For example, Storage Groups for isolating LANs and hosts. That is a big issue."
"The Host LUN ID is sequential by access in the hosts. When one LUN needs access by many hosts (for cluster purposes), in some cases the Host LUN ID remains different on each host."
"I called about an issue where I couldn't get VVOLs registered. It turns out it is a bug in the code and that there is no information about when it will be fixed. It's just not going to work. I was a little miffed about that."
"Issues with slow responses from the support team."
"More integration with VMware would always be helpful, plugins that go directly into the vSphere management. A single pane of glass is always beneficial."
"Dell Unity XT could add a unit-to-unit replication. We haven't seen that because we don't have an additional one to test. However, it is not an improvement, but something that we would like to have visibility on how it's done or how it works."
"Better support technicians for CAPP."
"I’d like to see bigger, faster, better hardware, of course. I think that is the way the hardware is trending anyway; bigger, faster CPU, better software, fewer bugs, all that stuff. T"
"As far as the manageability, being able to port between the two and have to do less training in-house from a customer point of view, that would be the part to improve."
"A little more manageability, a simpler management interface. It's not necessarily that it's way overly complex. It's just that it's not as easy as the FAS series."
"I would like to have the ability to replicate data between All Flash and other NetApp storage systems."
"The pricing could be cheaper and it should have documentation in more languages, specifically, Russian."
"Things like the FlexClones, SnapVault, SnapMirror, all of that. Some of it's available on the EF series, but we like what we have in the FAS system."
"This solution has limited storage."
More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays Pricing and Cost Advice →
Dell Unity XT is ranked 4th in All-Flash Storage with 189 reviews while NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is ranked 23rd in All-Flash Storage with 38 reviews. Dell Unity XT is rated 8.4, while NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Dell Unity XT writes "Easy to set up with good data compression technology and useful deduplication". On the other hand, the top reviewer of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays writes "A storage solution that offers great stability, resilience, and support". Dell Unity XT is most compared with Dell PowerStore, NetApp AFF, HPE Nimble Storage, Pure Storage FlashArray and IBM FlashSystem, whereas NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is most compared with Dell PowerStore, NetApp AFF, Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series, Huawei OceanStor Dorado and HPE Primera. See our Dell Unity XT vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays report.
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