VxRail Reviews

We have a good mix of everything. There are terminal servers, routers, firewalls, and customer servers, and all are on VMs. We are replacing our old hardware servers. We have virtualized those as well.

By implementing VxRail, we wanted scalability. We wanted to be able to easily add a server and configure it. We wanted the simplicity of configurations for the team so that I do not need to extensively train the team. They know immediately what to do.

VxRail has improved our availability. This means we no longer stress when a server fails. It immediately switches VMs to another machine. I can update without having to set a maintenance window. I have become more independent.

Because everything happens in one window, it is absolutely easy to handle.

VxRail has the ability to consolidate infrastructure from multiple locations, but we are only at one location.

VxRail has had quite a positive effect in terms of energy consumption. I can compare what individual hardware is needed. I can also see which hardware and what capacities are being used. When the VMs move themselves to work evenly on all computers or servers, it is an advantage.

VxRail has helped to reduce unplanned production downtime because we now have a cluster, and the VMs move themselves. We have had two outages in a year. One was a hardware failure, and the other was an update problem. Only two or three VMs were turned off because a component was defective. Otherwise, there was no major outage. They moved everything to other machines as planned, and we could work with it.

With VxRail, the flexibility is very high because we can scale it without any problems for new projects. For example, we have a larger project coming up where many associations will be involved. I can simply plug in additional devices, set up the initial configuration, and let the service configure itself immediately. I am very flexible.

For sustainability, we can recycle them. We have not done it, but we had the option to do it as a lease purchase. That is also advantageous for the future.

The assurance that my systems would not suffer a performance drop no matter where they are is valuable. I do not need any extra hardware.

They should have better compatibility with other processors, such as AMD processors.

I have been using VxRail since the beginning of 2023.

It has broken twice now, but everything still ran, so I would rate it a nine out of ten for stability. It is great that things can fail without a major impact. 

It is scalable. Scalability is given by the fact that we can simply add more servers.

Their support is superb. Because of CloudIQ and the proactive approach of Dell, the support for customers is top-notch. We had new hardware or replacement parts on-site within three hours. 

I would rate their support a nine out of ten. I do not have a problem with English, but if you want to get support in German, it is a bit more difficult. It used to be easier. It is not a dealbreaker, but it would be nice to have. We are doing great with what we have, but it would be an advantage if from 9 to 10, there was a German-speaking support person. For example, when we were upgrading from version 7 to 8, it would have been nicer to be able to converse more fluently with someone, but that is more of a problem on my end and not with the support.

Positive

We have not used any other similar solution.

If I had done it without the help of the person from Dell for the first time, it would have been more complex. Because he showed me once, it was very easy. If I want to change something now, it is just easy. There is all the automation behind it. When I have a new server, I slide it into the rack, connect all the wiring, give it an IP address, and click a button to bring up the server.

We had someone from Dell who helped us with the installation and configuration.

There is an advantage for those who have a good deal with Dell. Its price is good. From a company's perspective, it is always too expensive, but it is about value for money.

We did not evaluate other options. We had other Dell servers, but we did not have VxRail. We did not need any alternatives. We like working with Dell. The colleagues offered it to us and sold it to us.

We did not consider a public cloud infrastructure before choosing VxRail.

Overall, I would rate VxRail a ten out of ten. I am satisfied with it. Once you get the hang of it, you can just work on it. If you need support, they can help you configure something.

Foreign Language:(German)

Gute Leistung, viel Flexibilität und erstklassiger Support

Was ist unser Hauptanwendungsfall?

Wir haben eine gute Mischung aus allem. Es gibt Terminalserver, Router, Firewalls und Kundenserver, die alle auf VMs laufen. Wir sind dabei, unsere alten Hardwareserver zu ersetzen. Auch diese haben wir virtualisiert.

Wie hat es meiner Organisation geholfen?

Mit der Implementierung von VxRail wollten wir Skalierbarkeit erreichen. Wir wollten in der Lage sein, einfach einen Server hinzuzufügen und ihn zu konfigurieren. Wir wollten, dass die Konfigurationen für das Team so einfach sind, dass ich das Team nicht ausgiebig schulen muss. Sie wissen sofort, was zu tun ist.

VxRail hat unsere Verfügbarkeit verbessert. Das bedeutet, dass wir keinen Stress mehr haben, wenn ein Server ausfällt. Es schaltet die VMs sofort auf einen anderen Rechner um. Ich kann Updates durchführen, ohne ein Wartungsfenster festlegen zu müssen. Ich bin unabhängiger geworden.

Da alles in der gleichen Ansicht geschieht, ist es absolut einfach zu handhaben.

VxRail hat die Möglichkeit, die Infrastruktur von mehreren Standorten aus zu konsolidieren, aber wir sind nur an einem Standort.

VxRail hat sich in Bezug auf den Energieverbrauch sehr positiv ausgewirkt. Ich kann vergleichen, welche Hardware im Einzelnen benötigt wird. Ich kann auch sehen, welche Hardware und welche Kapazitäten genutzt werden. Es ist von Vorteil, wenn sich die VMs so verschieben, dass sie gleichmäßig auf allen Rechnern oder Servern arbeiten.

VxRail hat dazu geführt, dass wir weniger ungeplante Produktionsausfälle haben, weil wir jetzt einen Cluster haben und die VMs sich selbst verschieben. Wir hatten in einem Jahr zwei Ausfälle. Bei einem handelte es sich um einen Hardwareausfall, bei dem anderen um ein Update-Problem. Nur zwei oder drei VMs wurden abgeschaltet, weil eine Komponente defekt war. Ansonsten gab es keine größeren Ausfälle. Sie haben alles wie geplant auf andere Maschinen verschoben, und wir konnten damit arbeiten.

Mit VxRail ist die Flexibilität sehr hoch, weil wir es ohne Probleme für neue Projekte skalieren können. Wir haben zum Beispiel ein größeres Projekt vor uns, an dem viele Verbände beteiligt sein werden. Ich kann einfach zusätzliche Geräte anschließen, die Erstkonfiguration einrichten und den Dienst sofort selbst konfigurieren lassen. Ich bin sehr flexibel.

Im Sinne der Nachhaltigkeit können wir die Geräte recyceln. Das haben wir nicht getan, aber wir hatten die Möglichkeit, sie als Mietkauf zu erwerben. Das ist auch für die Zukunft von Vorteil.

Was ist am wertvollsten?

Die Gewissheit, dass meine Systeme keine Leistungseinbußen erleiden, egal wo sie sich befinden, ist wertvoll. Ich benötige keine zusätzliche Hardware.

Was muss verbessert werden?

Sie sollten eine bessere Kompatibilität mit anderen Prozessoren, z. B. AMD-Prozessoren, aufweisen.

Wie lange nutze ich die Lösung schon?

Ich verwende VxRail seit Anfang 2023.

Was halte ich von der Stabilität der Lösung?

Es ist jetzt zweimal kaputt gegangen, aber alles lief noch, also würde ich es mit neun von zehn Punkten für die Stabilität bewerten. Es ist toll, dass Dinge ohne größere Auswirkungen ausfallen können.

Was denke ich über die Skalierbarkeit der Lösung?

Es ist skalierbar. Die Skalierbarkeit ist dadurch gegeben, dass wir einfach weitere Server hinzufügen können.

Wie sind Kundenservice und Support?

Der Support ist hervorragend. Aufgrund von CloudIQ und dem proaktiven Ansatz von Dell ist der Support für Kunden erstklassig. Wir hatten innerhalb von drei Stunden neue Hardware oder Ersatzteile vor Ort.

Ich würde den Support mit neun von zehn Punkten bewerten. Mit Englisch habe ich kein Problem, aber wenn man Support auf Deutsch haben möchte, ist es etwas schwieriger. Früher war das einfacher. Das ist kein Hindernis, aber es wäre schön, wenn man es hätte. Wir kommen mit dem, was wir haben, gut zurecht, aber es wäre von Vorteil, wenn es von 9 bis 10 einen deutschsprachigen Supportmitarbeiter gäbe. Als wir zum Beispiel von Version 7 auf 8 umgestiegen sind, wäre es schöner gewesen, sich mit jemandem fließend unterhalten zu können, aber das ist eher ein Problem meinerseits und nicht des Supports.

Wie bewerten Sie den Kundenservice und -support?

Positiv

Welche Lösung habe ich vorher verwendet und warum habe ich gewechselt?

Wir haben keine andere ähnliche Lösung verwendet.

Wie war die Ersteinrichtung?

Wenn ich es ohne die Hilfe des Dell-Mitarbeiters zum ersten Mal gemacht hätte, wäre es komplizierter gewesen. Weil er es mir einmal gezeigt hat, war es sehr einfach. Wenn ich jetzt etwas ändern will, ist das ganz einfach. Dahinter verbirgt sich die ganze Automatisierung. Wenn ich einen neuen Server habe, schiebe ich ihn in das Rack, schließe alle Kabel an, gebe ihm eine IP-Adresse und klicke auf eine Schaltfläche, um den Server hochzufahren.

Was ist mit dem Implementierungsteam?

Wir hatten jemanden von Dell, der uns bei der Installation und Konfiguration geholfen hat.

Welche Erfahrungen habe ich mit den Preisen, den Implementierungskosten und der Lizenzierung gemacht?

Es gibt einen Vorteil für diejenigen, die ein gutes Geschäft mit Dell haben. Sein Preis ist gut. Aus der Sicht eines Unternehmens ist es immer zu teuer, aber es geht um ein gutes Preis-Leistungs-Verhältnis.

Welche anderen Lösungen habe ich bewertet?

Wir haben keine anderen Optionen evaluiert. Wir hatten andere Dell-Server, aber wir hatten kein VxRail. Wir brauchten keine Alternativen. Wir arbeiten gerne mit Dell. Die Kollegen haben es uns angeboten und verkauft.

Bevor wir uns für VxRail entschieden haben, haben wir keine öffentliche Cloud-Infrastruktur in Betracht gezogen.

Welche anderen Ratschläge kann ich geben?

Insgesamt würde ich VxRail mit zehn von zehn Punkten bewerten. Ich bin sehr zufrieden damit. Wenn man einmal den Umgang damit gefunden hat, kann man einfach damit arbeiten. Falls man Unterstützung braucht, kann man sich bei der Konfiguration helfen lassen.

We have our internal servers allocated to the solution.

The tool's price is competitive and it is easy to use.

The tool needs to improve its price.

I have been using the solution for two years.

The tool is scalable and I would rate it a nine out of ten.

We used VMware before. We switched to the solution because we needed a system with more performance and scalability.

I would rate the tool's setup an eight out of ten. The tool's deployment got completed in a few hours.

I would rate the solution an eight out of ten. The tool fulfills our needs.

We were using VMWare and Dell products from long time. We wanted reliable technology partner who can provide technology, solution and support during migration. We use Microsoft technology.

We are not just purchased the server, we transformed our infrastructure into Powerful and Efficient, agile, flexible and scalable, polished and proven technology solution build with VMWare. New HCI - VxRail replaced with our existing 42U rack devices consists of BladeCenter, storage and other rack mountable servers into simple, more powerful 4 node VxRail device

which saves power and maintenance cost very drastically.

We are in the process of exploring more options which is bundle with this solution.

We have been using VxRail for two years.

It is a stable product, deploy appliance with ease, update all software in single click, monitor using dashboards for health, events and physical views. And maintain with direct access to support, articles and community.

The solution is scalable.

Whenever there are any technical or hardware issues, we contact Dell. They will attend to us immediately. On a scale of one to five, I would give them a five.

Positive

We switched to VxRail because our previous solution was at the end of service life. We had used it for more than six years. We wanted new technology with new scalability. power, technology and easy maintenance.

We migrated from our older hardware consists of multiple servers, storage and switches to simple and more powerful HCI - 4 node VxRail device.

Studying current and future Business requirement, validating multiple solution which suits our requirement, which is agile, easily scalable and more power to suite our future plans.  It took almost six plus months to freeze the VxRail solution.  Post finalization, releasing the order and receiving to hardware it took almost 6 months to complete the migration to new setup.  Delay was due to lockdown, travel restrictions otherwise it would have been completed within three months.  Complete migration was very smooth and very minimal downtime without any Business impact.

In-house team with OEM Support.

Identifying and freezing the solution by multiple tech discussions and negations. Finalizing solution with hardware is bundled with license. Closing the order with Five-year Support and migration support from OEM.

We evaluated couple of other solutions, also gone through Nutanix demo. Nutanix is a very good solution, but they don't have their own hardware, we have to depend on third party people like Dell, HP or IBM. We were long time Dell product user and preferred the Dell.

I would rate this solution 10 out of 10.

Just buying the product is not important, along with solution on-time support is very crucial for Business-critical applications.  We are using Dell products, solutions and services from more than 10years.  From my experience with Dell, their technology, support and services which plays a critical role to select Dell as our products and solution vendor.

All of our servers run on this system and we are also able to use it for file servers, domain controllers, print servers, SQL servers, etc.

I have two teams - one in Copenhagen with about 400 people and one in New York with about 200 people. Their roles are mainly architects and administration.

It would be nice if the update process was shortened and that patching would be simpler.

I have been using the solution for a year and a half.

It's so reliable that we haven't had one breakdown since we got it. It's very stable.

It is very scalable. You can scale compute or storage or both. I am looking to expand my New York cluster this quarter.

Initially, they had a lot of issues when I bought it as they were understaffed. So, it was a little bit hard to get support. But now, a year and a half later, it's so much better and very good.

We were originally using VMware and SAN. We switched so that it can be administered and managed in a centralized format.

The initial setup was straightforward. It took about a week initially, plus three weeks to move all my VMs to the new system.

I was able to perform this myself with the assistance of a consultant.

Fees vary by license type.

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 very good.

We're using three nodes appliance.

VxRail is a hyper-converged infrastructure that delivers a solution with full performance. It's scalable and easy to maintain. 

The replication capabilities have been great.

We find the solution easy to manage. 

The product is user-friendly and easy to navigate.

We have had zero problems so far with this product. It's quite reliable.

There is good support on offer. 

It's a very quick product.

Updating the product has been very easy. Often, they let us know that there is an update pending so we can expect it. 

The features are very powerful.

There are a lot of great features on offer. 

We've found the scalability to be very good.

The solution is stable. 

The cost is quite high. It's a very expensive solution to run.

We purchased the solution originally in 2017. We've been using it for about four years or so at this point. 

The stability of the product is great. We have not had any issues whatsoever and find it to be very reliable. The performance is good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. 

VxRail is easy to scale out. That said, from 2017 until now we're using just three nodes. We haven't upgraded our VxRail to scale. Therefore, we haven't personally scaled. 

Dell EMC support is very, very good. They offer lots of useful information and are very friendly. We find them to be helpful and supportive. We're quite satisfied with the level of service they provide. They offer very good after-sales support. YOu can even invest in premium support.

The product is very, very expensive, even when you are renewing. It's a problem for us as management is complaining about the price. 

I'm a customer and an end-user.

I'd recommend this solution to others. It has a lot going for it in that the performance is good and it's reliable. They have great after-sales support and is generally easy to maintain. However, it is a very expensive option and a company needs to be prepared for the price tag.

I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten, however, if the pricing was a bit more reasonable, I would rate it higher. 

Overall, I'm very impressed with the product.

We use it for provisioning the applications for customers. There are no specific sets of installations for using the solutions. We meet the customers' needs through their requests. 

It is easily scalable, easy to manage, and has rapid provisioning. 

In the future, they could provide faster performance. 

VxRail has many components integrated into one solution. Instead of integrating many components, having a single component with VMware as a solution; this could be useful.

We have been using the solution for around three years now.

It is a stable product.

It is an easily scalable product. It is a perfect fit for use in small and medium businesses. For the larger enterprise, you can use it, but again it depends on the use case. If you have a specific use case that fuels for VxRail, definitely it can be used.

The technical support is good but could be better.

We have used other solutions in the past like Nutanix and SimpliVity but VxRail definitely has more advantages. Mainly it uses the VMware vSAN technology, and it is ever-evolving. It integrates with a large ecosystem of solutions. When you consider a large enterprise, these organizations require solutions that include security, scalability, and all the network components in place and integrated. VxRail is more capable of handling these complexities than any other product.

The setup is very simple.

We provided the deployment service and depending on if all the prerequisites are met, we can have it all completed in one day.

The price would be in the middle to the expensive range. It is not cheap. There are different licensing models as well which can meet the requirements of the customer.

I would recommend VxRail, it works for most of the use cases. 

It is good to understand you can't have 100% of all the applications installed. It's never possible with a product like this. At the end of the day, it's a good solution. Whenever there is a need for IT infrastructure requirements, you can definitely consider VxRail. 

If there are very specific requirements or things that are very specific to traditional infrastructure, they can go with that, or for intensive cloud-native applications, they can go with cloud. VxRail comes in the middle. It can extend to use all the applications but do have a proper study to get the right solution for you. 

I rate VxRail an eight out of ten.

We use VxRail for private cloud and running core applications.

VxRail is aligned with the VMware environment, and VMware is a stable product. Running a virtual machine on it is much easier and more accessible because it is a configured appliance. VxRail allows us to contain the sprawling of servers and provides visibility. With VxRail, we can manage the life cycle of a virtual machine.

The support charges for VxRail should be optimized and made cheaper.

I have been using VxRail for approximately six years.

VxRail is a stable solution.

Scalability-wise, VMware or Dell says the solution can go up to 64 nodes in a single cluster. We have gone to almost 48 to 50 server nodes, and it is stable. Around 30 customers are using the solution.

The solution’s initial setup is straightforward. The solution's implementation is straightforward and presents no challenges. However, upgrading the versions of the solution requires some time.

The solution's deployment took 30 to 45 minutes per box.

We have seen a good return on investment with VxRail.

VxRail has a subscription model usually tagged with the appliance box only.

VxRail is a scalable and easy-to-use solution. Creating a private cloud helps us help our customers create a streamlined environment with fewer engineers. VxRail supports our virtual desktop infrastructure.

The initial setup of boxes is much cheaper than when we go for upgrades or add more nodes into the cluster. It is easy to manage VxRail.

Overall, I rate the solution an eight or nine out of ten.

We use it for implementing VDI solutions.

Hyperscale is the most valuable feature I found on this solution. It's the ability to utilize the resources for the VMware cluster setup on which Citrix VDA runs.

The only issue we've faced is with their Call Home Support Center. Any alert that has to be triggered, we're just currently working on to fix. Otherwise, it has been a pretty good system.

One problem we had was when we ordered the first node of cluster setup, and then we wanted to add two more nodes, we could not get the same configuration. We had to use a different configuration for the cluster setup.

Scalability becomes a problem when two or three years have passed because you don't get the same model. You get a better model and to make that model work, you need to have a different cluster setup. You tend to lose on the continuity or expansion. I would recommend having a capability where even your older versions of hardware can be seamlessly utilized and additional expansion becomes so much easier.

I've been using this solution since 2020.

The stability of VxRail is good. We are content with its stability.

This solution is scalable. We purchased two additional units the following year.

Technical support for this solution was very good, professional, and they had the skills to get it implemented.

We used Nutanix. VxRail is more economical than Nutanix. It's more cost-effective so we prefer it over Nutanix.

We used so far three different solutions. The first was not a recommended solution. It was pushed down our throats to use that particular hardware. As I was involved in that setup, I knew the first time that implementation was on the wrong hardware, against the recommendation of the partner and the implementer. We definitely did not succeed. The second was a failure again, because of not following the recommendation of the implementer or the partner. The third one, lesson learned and we had no objections to that. We got a better recommendation from someone we trusted, so we were successful with our choice.

The initial setup was straightforward. The engineers asked for what is required and they came with the same initial set.

We used a partner for the deployment. My experience with them was good. They fully supported us during the pandemic situation to get this up and running.

We evaluated Nutanix.

We're quite content with this solution for the purposes it was purchased.

Deployment was completed within two weeks.

Almost all of the people in the company used this solution since the pandemic. Now it's mostly used by the task workers.

For deployment and maintenance of this solution, we require four staff where some are admins who handle multiple storages in other systems as well. They don't do this full-time. They only spend one-third or less of their time managing deployment and maintenance.

I have no plans to increase VxRail usage in the future. The only problem with it is the usage of the cloud is being promoted to its peak, so the next expansion would be on the cloud.

The cloud has always been talked about and people have been asked to venture into it. On the cloud, you don't have to wait and implement or pay upfront for the whole hardware. For some of the cloud versions, you can pay as much as you use. You can start with 50 users and then grow. If it has to be on-prem though, I'll have to at least factor a box that can cater to 200 or 300 users. You need to pre-plan and the hardware delivery might take some time, so making it market-ready is a little time-consuming.

I'm rating this solution a ten out of ten. This is because of my previous experience with other solutions where I had three failed implementations on different hardware. They failed because of one particular reason: They're not low-maintenance. This solution, on the other hand, does not need heavy system maintenance. People prefer to use the system rather than the desktop, which makes it convenient for them to work from anywhere. There are a lot of benefits. You have your data saved on a data center. The availability is there which makes it flexible for users.

After the pandemic, when people returned to the office, we utilized this solution as an agile workspace, so people can sit and work on any desk. When they come to the office, they don't have to go to a particular desk. They can choose where they want to work, so this solution provides a lot of benefits for us.