We performed a comparison between Dell EMC PowerStore and IBM FlashSystem based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: When compared, both solutions received similar ratings in all categories except for service and support. Users of IBM FlashSystem were more satisfied with the service.
"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."
"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 most valuable feature of this solution is reliability."
"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 feature of this solution is its ease of use."
"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."
"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."
"There is no complicated configuration for queries and calls. You just create a model and go."
"The administration tools take advantage of machine learning and make recommendations to the admins, and that makes the administration easier."
"The solution is easy to use and has good performance."
"Pricing is very good. It's very competitive against those of all the others that I looked at in the marketplace, such as Hitachi, IBM, HP, and Pure. Dell is right there in the mix as far as providing the best price point as well as meeting the performance requirements that we have."
"The supportability of SCME drives for faster data access from the PowerStore and is the most valuable feature."
"I have found the most valuable part of Dell PowerStore is the price."
"It is a stable solution."
"When compared to Pure Storage, Dell PowerStore's cost was quite attractive."
"IBM FlashSystem is a flexible solution with plenty of features."
"The most valuable features are deduplication and compression."
"The performance of the All-Flash System is very good. There is more enhanced performance and data production in the solution, which I appreciate."
"The Flash core models offer amazing performance."
"One of the valuable features is the performance, it is one of the best in the market."
"The power systems are very reliable if you are running 24/7 operations. For ongoing mission-critical applications, it's the best solution."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is SCM (Storage Class Memory), which has the lowest latency value in the storage industry."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"We have run into a couple of instances recently where we are running out of space. So we have had to buy some more packs for it and they have deployed fine and it has increased smoothly."
"You cannot tag a LUN with a description, and that should be improved. What I like on the Unity side is that when I expand LUNs or do things, there is an information field on the LUN. This is the Information field that you can tag on your LUNs to let yourself know, "Hey, I've added this much space on this date". Pure lacks that ability. So, you don't have a mechanism that's friendly for tracking your data expansions on the LUN and for adding any additional information. That's a downside for me."
"In the future, I would like to see integration with enterprise backup systems."
"We would like to see more visibility into garbage collection and CPU performance in the GUI."
"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."
"It is on the expensive side."
"Many options to check performance, like read, writes, random writes, and random reads, are missing in Pure FlashArray X NVMe."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"Could be improved by including a synchronizing feature for the file systems."
"We would consider this solution if the pricing is competitive with other options, as it offers a very good solution. However, the current price is slightly higher than the competition."
"Where the system needs to improve is by adding more enterprise features like replication on other sites. We would also like it to be much more aligned with the VMware version. For example, today we have two different versions of VMware ESXi running to keep the PowerStore online. It would be better if the software cycling was faster."
"With PowerStore, we have to choose between block storage and NAS functionality."
"I do not like having to use VPLEX for synchronous replication, as opposed to having the store software built-in."
"PowerStore's management console could be improved."
"The solution's pricing could be better."
"The setup process could be improved. We had some issues regarding configuration and the time it took to do things. It wasn't specifically the people we worked with, but more the process and how it's done. They can work on that."
"The basic setup can be challenging when it comes to certain IP addresses and the configuration of the IP. You have to go in to different menus to makes changes and ensure it is stable."
"A big area for improvement is that the data reduction pool feature is not recommended for use in a production environment because it has stability and performance issues."
"The product needs to improve their scalability."
"The solution should improve its pricing and the mechanism in the reduction pool."
"Cloud file sharing is an area that needs improvement."
"The only issue my team faced was transferring the data from the old system to IBM FlashSystem, which is an area for improvement in the solution."
"The installation is not easy. You need to have extensive knowledge to handle it."
"The solution's pricing is a bit high so there is room for improvement."
Dell PowerStore is ranked 1st in All-Flash Storage with 47 reviews while IBM FlashSystem is ranked 6th in All-Flash Storage with 106 reviews. Dell PowerStore is rated 8.6, while IBM FlashSystem is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Dell PowerStore writes "It has a very strong NAS that can support a lot of big, heavy environments". On the other hand, the top reviewer of IBM FlashSystem writes "An easy GUI and simple provisioning but our model does not support compression". Dell PowerStore is most compared with Dell Unity XT, NetApp AFF, Pure Storage FlashArray, Dell PowerMax NVMe and Huawei OceanStor Dorado, whereas IBM FlashSystem is most compared with Pure Storage FlashArray, Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform, Dell Unity XT, NetApp AFF and Huawei OceanStor Dorado. See our Dell PowerStore vs. IBM FlashSystem report.
See our list of best All-Flash Storage vendors.
We monitor all All-Flash Storage 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.
