We performed a comparison between Azure Stack HCI and VxRail based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two HCI solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."We like their high availability. It reduces the downtime for our entire organization's environment."
"We are running Hyper-V on twin servers in failover, and being able to manage servers from anywhere I need to, virtually, has been a game changer."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the support. They are excellent and you can learn a lot from the support team."
"I've been really impressed with it so far. I think it's pretty great, actually. It does exactly what we need it to do, and it does it well, so I would recommend it. Plus, the support has been very good."
"The ease of reaching the support team and their promptness for support is great."
"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."
"StarWind SANs come with outstanding support."
"Having the ability to scale horizontally if needed is a huge plus for future growth."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its ability to manage VMs."
"The solution has the latest processor."
"In my hybrid cloud setup, there are three features I've found very efficient. The first is software-defined networking. Similar to Azure where you create virtual networks and software load balancing, Azure Stack HCI lets you configure them with a drag-and-drop experience on the on-premises cluster. That's one of the good feature."
"First and foremost, I would advise people to purchase this solution mainly for the simplicity of the system. And it's all managed in one place, which is nice compared to Nutanix where you had to administrate multiple places. And, the support now is so good."
"It's a simple product, fast, and reliable."
"The most valuable feature in the VxRail solution is the software that binds the management portal and its ease of use of managing the environment. The guys don't have to worry about getting multiple solutions specialist. You can have one person looking at and managing the whole environment."
"It supports VDI deployment, enabling easy use for running different platforms in similar environments."
"Cost-effective and easy to install."
"Homogeneity is most valuable. The truth is that having everything in a single cluster helps a lot."
"t's a very good solution with multiple options with VxRail series like based on customer requirements whether they're focused on compute, storage, scalability and high performance, etc. Whether a customer you are going to start your IT Infrastructure footprint with a limited budget, you have freedom of choice and non-disruptive expansion in the future, whether in the main data center or branches. Any idea coming in system admins mind to run this setup continuously and keep service 100% 24/7 is possible in this product line. Hyper-converged appliances allow a datacenter in a box approach, with G, E P, Vand P series."
"The initial setup was very easy."
"The only way I can see this product needing improvement is the consultation level of the StarWind sales and engineers."
"If it's possible to make a driver/solution that does not make use of the iSCSI targets of Windows, that would be great. I don't know if that's possible, however, it could make the configuration a little easier."
"It would be great if the Linux version of the management console offered the same features as Windows."
"Having more support plan options would be nice."
"The main issue we ran into was the documentation. We attempted to set up the product in our test environment by ourselves and ran into several areas of the documentation that were unclear to us."
"If there are domain controllers inside the cluster, there needs to be some sort of logic allowing them to boot independently so all the rest of the domain clients can gain the authority they need to come online."
"Security on the ISCSI protocol could be improved by adding features like OS-type control access, especially for the data center environment."
"Perhaps more reporting features on the utilization, usage, and performance of the configured high-availability images and underlying physical disks would be helpful."
"We faced multiple problems with the product’s stability."
"There are a lot of areas for improvement. Since I've been working very closely with this product, there are many areas, especially in software-defined networking. We had to improve multiple areas because we depended on the service fabric cluster to manage the software-defined network. That means we're already running a hypervisor inside a VM, and we're managing the control plane of the software-defined network. That's another cluster. So, multiple layers make the complexity more. So, from an operational perspective, it's very difficult to manage."
"The product's initial setup phase can be a bit complex, making it an area where improvements are required."
"I wish for the performance environment to be improved."
"When it comes to maintenance, it takes 16 hours to upgrade a 12 node VxRail plus. This could be improved in the system."
"You have to buy a new server if you want to scale up."
"In the version that I was working with, the integrations are in need of improvement."
"I would like to see VxRail add duplication features to its hybrid solution."
"Deployment was not initially straightforward for us. We had an incompatibility issue that was very difficult for Dell Professional Service to solve."
"The support protocols have changed after Broadcom acquired VMware."
"The support charges for VxRail should be optimized and made cheaper."
Azure Stack HCI is ranked 17th in HCI with 3 reviews while VxRail is ranked 1st in HCI with 121 reviews. Azure Stack HCI is rated 8.4, while VxRail is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Azure Stack HCI writes "Performs well, provides good features, and has the latest processor". On the other hand, the top reviewer of VxRail writes "Offers a hassle-free, complete package, and is energy-efficient". Azure Stack HCI is most compared with VMware vSAN and Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converged Infrastructure, whereas VxRail is most compared with Dell PowerFlex, VMware vSAN, HPE SimpliVity, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) and HPE Hyper Converged. See our Azure Stack HCI vs. VxRail report.
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