Dell PowerMax NVMe vs VAST Data comparison

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98% willing to recommend
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100% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Dell PowerMax NVMe and VAST Data based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, Hitachi Vantara and others in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays.
To learn more, read our detailed NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays Report (Updated: May 2024).
771,157 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The duplication algorithm allows us to get a lot more use out of less storage. We're running a five terabyte array right now and we're running probably about 30 terabytes on it. So the duplication rate is pretty phenomenal, without a cost to performance. It still runs pretty smoothly.""The system allows for seamless learning experiences, facilitating quick and easy cloning of environments within minutes.""The most valuable features of this solution are its ease of use and performance.""The Pure1 component is most valuable at this point in time when comparing it with EMC. Pure1 is where you can have your diagnostics in the cloud, so you can look at things from your mobile phone.""Pure FlashArray X NVMe will quickly overcome all the hurdles you face, including network and latency issues.""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.""Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution.""The most valuable feature of this solution is its ease of use."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe Pros →

"A huge benefit of the PowerMax has been the decreasing of our physical footprint. We recently did a consolidation where we went from 58 tiles down to 5. If we had used just the PowerMax, we could have gone from 58 tiles down to 2 tiles, which is huge space savings. If you have 56 newly available floor tiles on a raised floor data center, which you previously had to cool and provide power to, then now, not only are my costs going down, I now have more revenue opportunities because I have more space to put new customers.""It is a scalable solution. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.""The uptime is the most valuable feature.""The smaller footprint of the device has been really nice. We have gone from eight bays to one bay. Having one floor tile in our data center has been pretty awesome. A lot less power and HVAC cooling is being consumed.""The stability is amazing. Zero downtime reported over the last years.""It has reduced our footprint in different physical locations.""The best feature is the protection - PowerMax NVMe is volume-based and replicates data, so it's very comfortable for us to use.""We use ESRS for our call-home, and a lot of times, Dell EMC will respond to the issue before we even know it."

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"The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations.""This has been one of the most reliable storage systems that I have ever used."

More VAST Data Pros →

Cons
"Many options to check performance, like read, writes, random writes, and random reads, are missing in Pure FlashArray X NVMe.""In the next release, I would like to see real-time analytics for further insight into consumption models.""We would like to see more visibility into garbage collection and CPU performance in the GUI.""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.""Our use cases require more multi-tenant capabilities and additional VLAN interfaces for separating different customers. We currently use it to provide storage, sometimes shared storage, to different customers, but it is less flexible in comparison to a dedicated solution.""It's more multi-tenant functionality in their Pure1 manage portal that is lacking.""I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe Cons →

"There is room for improvement in terms of integration with various service providers for public clouds.""PowerMax's software is highly stable, but we faced two hardware issues in one year. We had a failure of the storage director module, and the physical disk failed on another occasion. Dell EMC should improve its hardware quality.""I would like them to continue improving the management tools and continue moving towards a RESTful API versus CLI.""The initial setup was a little bit complicated.""The solution is quite expensive.""Remove the need for physical or hardwired virtual servers to run consistency groups, instead make the expensive array controllers handle that.""They should work with the storage engineers to better tweak the management tools to give them improved visibility into their data.""They can make the GUI better, especially for the ones that come out of the box. We did encounter a bit of difficulty in setting up the storage. We had to deploy Solutions Enabler on a Linux machine to be able to fully interact with the storage. They need to upgrade the web interface for the management of the storage that comes out of the box. The management interface for NFS is also a bit old and not very intuitive."

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"The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement.""The write performance could be improved because it is less than half of the read performance."

More VAST Data Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."
  • "We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
  • "With VMware, we pay $300,000 annually."
  • "Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."
  • "As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
  • "They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."
  • "Its price could be better. It is not too expensive, but it is the high-end cost. It is kind of a Rolls-Royce. You pay a lot, but you get a lot out of it. So, the price pressure on the way down would be great, but at the end of the day, if you need to do the work, you just pay for it."
  • "The licensing is on a yearly basis."
  • More Pure FlashArray X NVMe Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "Our costs for the product are three million."
  • "From reclaiming data center space which is so tightly constrained these days, it will pay for itself in a short amount of time, which is fantastic. Anything we can do to get more out of our current physical data center space helps us a ton, and PowerMax has helped enable that."
  • "Our costs are on a yearly basis."
  • "It scales enormously, but it's expensive to do so."
  • "From a general capital investment, it's one of the higher price points in the market. It depends on the size and software features that you would include in a system. So, the cost varies dramatically."
  • "The cost has room for improvement."
  • "The cost is expensive. While VMAX now has good pricing, PowerMax is a little expensive."
  • "We hope that with the combination of both NVMe and SCM the next PowerMax will be much cheaper that the one which we acquired."
  • More Dell PowerMax NVMe Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "We acquired VAST Data as a one-time, capital purchase."
  • "Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one."
  • More VAST Data Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The standout features for us in Pure FlashArray X NVMe are its robust DDoS protection, seamless transparent failover… more »
    Top Answer:I would rate the solution as an eight out of ten in terms of costliness.
    Top Answer:There is room for improvement in catering to midrange storage needs, especially for customers seeking Enterprise-class… more »
    Top Answer:Dell PowerStore is an all-solid-state midrange storage system. It has many internal elements taken from other Dell… more »
    Top Answer:First, it's an enterprise storage solution. This is very important for us. Another important feature is replication.
    Top Answer:The pricing is comparable to other vendors. There aren't significant price differences. Since the price is high, a few… more »
    Top Answer:The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations.
    Top Answer:Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one.
    Top Answer:The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement.
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
    Dell EMC PowerMax, PowerMax
    Learn More
    Overview

    Pure Storage FlashArray//X is the world’s first enterprise-class, all-NVMe flash storage array. It represents a new class of storage – shared accelerated storage, which is a term coined by Gartner – that delivers major breakthroughs in performance, simplicity, and consolidation.

    Dell EMC PowerMax is the world’s fastest storage array. With end-to-end non-volatile memory express (NVMe), real-time machine learning, seamless cloud mobility, and up to 350GB per second bandwidth, PowerMax features high-speed smarts to power your most critical workloads. PowerMax is true modern scale-up and scale-out storageת designed for mission-critical applications of today and tomorrow – including databases and transaction processing applications as well as real-time analytics workloads that demand uncompromising uptime and extremely low latency.

    PowerMax consists of two models, PowerMax 2000 and 8000. The PowerMax 8000 delivers industry-leading performance density with up to 7.5 million IOPS5 per rack and 187,000 IOPS6 per U (rack unit). PowerMax supports mixed open systems, mainframe, IBM i, block, and file environments. The PowerMax 2000 is the entry point into mission-critical storage, high availability, and delivering robust data services in a safe, secure compact package.

    PowerMax systems incorporate the most current and robust end-to-end NVMe technology with industry-standard NVMe flash drives, NVMe storage class memory drives, and FC-NVMe host connectivity via NVMe over Fabrics. PowerMax SCM, powered by dual-port Intel® Optane™ technology, offers rapid-fire fast performance and secure low latency ideal for electronic trading, real-time analytics, high-performance databases, and big data workloads.

    Features of Dell EMC PowerMax NVMe

    Robust architecture with amazing performance combines demanding mixed workloads.

    • Built-in machine learning automates data placement for maximum performance with no additional management cost.
    • Very secure end-to-end dynamic encryption safeguards digital assets with 3.5:1 data reduction, guaranteed by Dell Technologies.
    • Seamless cloud mobility pushes data from PowerMax to AWS, Azure, Dell EMC ECS, and PowerScale for long-term retention on lower-cost object storage.

    Benefits of Dell EMC PowerMax NVMe

    Powerful Architecture

    • Designed for speed – robust multi-controller scale-up, scale-out architecture with built-in end-to-end NVMe.
    • Performance optimized – up to 350GB/s sustained bandwidth2, under 100µs read latency3.
    • Efficiency without compromise – global inline data reduction with guaranteed 3.5:1 average DRR4.

    Simple Operations

    • Intuitive storage management – provision storage in less than 30 seconds.
    • Workload consolidation – outstanding consolidation of block, file, mainframe, IBM i storage on a single array.
    • DevOps automation and containers – workflow automation and streamlined IT processes (vRA, vRO, CSI, CSM, Kubernetes).
    • Non-disruptive data migration – initiate data migrations from older arrays to PowerMax in three simple steps.

    Trusted Innovation

    • Mission-critical availability – proven six nines availability and the best replication for business continuance, disaster recovery (BC/DR).
    • Deep VMware integration – mission-critical availability and the most efficient scalability for VMware Virtual Volumes deployments (64,000 vVols).
    • Flexible consumption – several options, predictability, and investment protection with pay-per-use solutions and Future-Proof guarantees.

    PowerMax sets the standard for data storage today. It is uniquely, intuitively designed with a multi-controller, active/active scale-out architecture, an industry-standard, end-to-end NVMe. Inline, global dedupe and compression add outstanding efficiency to your data center, even while scaling. Additionally, PowerMax offers you the best in remote replication, proven six nines of availability, and end-to-end efficient encryption so that your data is always secure and your resources are fully optimized.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Ahmed K., a senior storage systems engineer at a pharma/biotech company, says Dell EMC PowerMax NVMe has “secure, fast performance, and good reporting capabilities.”

    Nikolay M. a lead system administrator at Central Hospital of Civil Aviation shares that with PowerMax, “we have not yet hit the ceiling in its efficiency, performance, and scalability… Now, with PowerMax, everything runs smoothly.”

    “We don't have to manage much at all. It really is like a set it and forget it solution. My storage engineers love the system. It is a lot less work than our previous systems… We are saving dozens of hours per month for our storage team, and that is a real cost in our business," adds Paul C., a Senior Solution Architect at Rackspace.

    Innovation to break decades of data storage trade-offs.

    Sample Customers
    Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
    Rackspace, Open Line
    Norwest Venture Partners, General Dynamics Information Technology, Ginkgo Bioworks
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company23%
    Financial Services Firm18%
    Manufacturing Company18%
    Comms Service Provider14%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company17%
    Financial Services Firm13%
    Manufacturing Company10%
    Government7%
    REVIEWERS
    Healthcare Company23%
    Financial Services Firm21%
    Retailer10%
    Comms Service Provider10%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company15%
    Financial Services Firm14%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    Government8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company19%
    Manufacturing Company14%
    Financial Services Firm11%
    University6%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business38%
    Midsize Enterprise28%
    Large Enterprise34%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business23%
    Midsize Enterprise17%
    Large Enterprise60%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise19%
    Large Enterprise63%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business21%
    Midsize Enterprise14%
    Large Enterprise65%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business22%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise63%
    Buyer's Guide
    NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
    May 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, Hitachi Vantara and others in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays. Updated: May 2024.
    771,157 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Dell PowerMax NVMe is ranked 3rd in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays with 66 reviews while VAST Data is ranked 8th in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays with 2 reviews. Dell PowerMax NVMe is rated 8.8, while VAST Data is rated 10.0. The top reviewer of Dell PowerMax NVMe writes "Simplified storage provisioning for us, enabling us to assign any volumes in two to three minutes". On the other hand, the top reviewer of VAST Data writes "Stability-wise, a device that has been up and running for years". Dell PowerMax NVMe is most compared with Dell PowerStore, IBM FlashSystem, Dell Unity XT, Pure Storage FlashArray and Huawei OceanStor Dorado, whereas VAST Data is most compared with Pure Storage FlashBlade, NetApp AFF, Pure Storage FlashArray, Qumulo and Dell PowerScale (Isilon).

    See our list of best NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays vendors and best All-Flash Storage vendors.

    We monitor all NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.