We performed a comparison between Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers and HPE ProLiant DL Servers based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two Rack Servers solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."Excellent server solution with incredible network throughput."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the expansion and replacement of parts."
"On the Cisco side, there is a benefit in terms of server management. Cisco provides UCS Manager, which is a multi-tenant site manager. We can manage multiple sites while maintaining disaster recovery, a feature not available on other platforms."
"In most cases, computes compute, and there isn't much differentiation, but one point of differentiation is Intersight cloud management."
"The hardware customization capabilities are great."
"Cisco rack servers are very easy to integrate with other products from different vendors."
"The server can be configured easily."
"The product doesn't take up too much space on the rack and I like that."
"ProLiant DL servers are the best on the market. The models support an extensive list of Intel processors."
"iLO, in particular, helps us manage the servers better, especially as a lot of them are remote from where the IT staff are. We have some locations where we just have not got IT presence at those locations, so iLO really helps with that."
"It's easy to upgrade, and it is very easy to take care of the firmware upgrades."
"HPE's iLO server management software is a handy tool to install and deploy."
"We are quite satisfied with the technical support. We have a direct contact with our HP support. They are always very useful."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is HPE Integrated Lights-Out (iLO)...Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"It's reliable and stable."
"ProLiant is highly stable. We've had very few problems with the servers. We only once had an issue with the hard disk in an HPE server."
"The improvement should be done as per customer requirements."
"The warranty and support periods should be extended."
"The product must add customer-friendly monitoring features."
"The C-Series is not designed to be as scalable. They are designed to have enough RAM and enough CPU on their own side. If you want scalability, it's better to choose the B-Series— the Blade Servers — because those are much more scalable with Fabric Interconnect."
"Definitely the support area needs improving. Especially the time response in case of hardware failure."
"The initial setup could be easier."
"I think the pricing is high. Cisco has to look for bundling this solutions with other applications."
"The only thing I would change is to provide more proactive support."
"HPE ProLiant DL Servers are customizable, but when you first deploy them, you basically have to rebuild configurations on them. This is true for large orders. But for small orders, you will be tied up with previous configurations of some other brand like Dell."
"Sometimes, there are connectivity issues and the server is not able to connect to our SAN."
"The speed of the solution could be increased."
"The price in general, including the licensing fee, could be better."
"In DL 500 systems, the flow of air is not good enough, and some components get overheated. IBM systems have better airflow and scalability. We have a data center that has limited physical space. Therefore, we need to maximize the processing or compute systems that we use. In HP servers, such as DL 500, there are only four processors, whereas IBM servers, such as SR 916, have eight processors. We don't get any support from HP because of our geographical location. We solve all problems ourselves by doing research on the internet. It would be good to get HP support."
"They are pretty solid servers, but, just like all servers, they become obsolete after some time. They can maybe provide a console to monitor the health of the servers. There should be some kind of console to which you can log in to remotely check on the health of a server, even when the server is off. The servers that we have are only scalable to some extent. They have got a limited amount of hard drive that you can insert. Their scalability should be improved."
"Most of the servers we use are okay. However, sometimes, you need to change the parts. We'd like the solution to be more robust."
"Its management console could be better."
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Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers is ranked 5th in Rack Servers with 29 reviews while HPE ProLiant DL Servers is ranked 2nd in Rack Servers with 156 reviews. Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers is rated 8.4, while HPE ProLiant DL Servers is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers writes "The VIC card is the most important feature". On the other hand, the top reviewer of HPE ProLiant DL Servers writes "Good availability and management console with good reliability". Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers is most compared with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, Lenovo ThinkSystem Rack Servers, Dell XR2 Rugged Server, IBM Power Systems and HPE Apollo, whereas HPE ProLiant DL Servers is most compared with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, Lenovo ThinkSystem Rack Servers, HPE Apollo, IBM Power Systems and Huawei FusionServer RH Series Rack Servers. See our Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers vs. HPE ProLiant DL Servers report.
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Another good question to consider is, how deeply are security and anti-tampering features built in? With the advent of Gen 10 servers HPE is implementing this right down in silicon whereas the rest of the marketplace is still using firmware features to try to accomplish this. This is arguably too late in the process to be able to guarantee what BIOS code you are actually running, what back doors have been slotted in or what spyware ‘features’ have been embedded!
Also, look where HPE are going with Synergy. They have taken a huge architectural leap forwards and the roadmap is hugely impressive.
I don´t know in deep Cisco servers, but if you compares a HP and a CISCO with identical hardware (same chipset, processor, amount of RAM,..), the benchmark are very similar.
In my humble opinión, it is very important ask for the warranty and tech support. And most important: if you need someday add more hardware to your server, you must know before if you don´t buy it to the server manufacture, you loose the warranty.
It is very tipical some server manufacturer sell very cheap their machines but when you need to add more memory and/or hard drives, it is obligatory buy them to the server manufacturer... an very expensive.
I would suggest visiting spec.org as there is a wealth of information available there. The benchmarks are run by the vendors but within guideline and industry verified. There are many different benchmarks available through this site depending on what you are really interested in.
Hope this helps
Depending on what kind of workload you are looking for, you can find some info. / results from www.spec.org. Since Cisco UCS and Proliant DL are commonly used servers in enterprise, there should be test results of various benchmark on these server models.
As per my experience, CISCO UCS C-series is having scalability issue but for HPE ProLiant DL RACk server is good in terms of scalability. HPE tech support is much better than CISCO UCS.
I suggest checking the key benchmark sites directly – TPC-C, SAP etc. Each benchmark is designed to test a specific system capability.
www.tpc.org
global.sap.com
I have attached the URL’s. The SAP testing is most revealing for overall systems performance and scalability. The most recent certifications show Cisco UCS servers eclipsing their HPE counterparts by notable margins. Standard Proliant systems are lower in total lines processed than Cisco units, and you have to move up to the HPE Synergy line to beat lower end Cisco C240 servers. However, the higher end 4-way Cisco C480 handily beats Synergy.