We performed a comparison between Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] and FlexPod XCS based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, VMware, Nutanix and others in HCI."The fact that I can now count on a true failover solution is what is most appealing."
"The top-notch support before, during, and after deployments are better than any other vendor I have come across."
"In our case, the cost and high availability are the two most important factors which we were looking for in a solution."
"The ability to run a two-node cluster without a dedicated witness has made this an excellent product for small deployments, which is right on target for our needs in regional offices."
"The installation of StarWind Virtual SAN was pretty easy, and the configuration was done in no time."
"The iSCSI protocol is quite simple to configure."
"StarWind Virtual SAN can improve an organization's storage infrastructure by providing high availability, scalability, cost-effectiveness, performance, and ease of use."
"StarWind Virtual SAN is a very mature software that supersedes its capabilities with my use cases."
"Its most valuable feature is its flexibility."
"The solution can scale up and out."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX has improved the way our organization functions on the storage side by having one big storage space for hosting VMs. We do not have to provision other ones. That's a positive aspect of it."
"It has reduced the time it takes to put the servers in production by half the time."
"The solution scales extremely well."
"The automation is a valuable feature, it's interesting."
"The solution is easy to use and to learn. It is well integrated with VMware."
"By configuring networks, we are saving power."
"The most valuable features are the CVDs and the support behind it from both companies."
"SolidFire all-flash block storage system in an existing FlexPod data center environment. This improves the agility and performance, including the additional load of cabling."
"FlexPods allow us to go through and roll out compute, having a converged infrastructure with the same level of simplicity that you would expect of a hyper-converged."
"The solution’s unified support for the entire stack is critically important because we cannot afford downtime."
"We like it because everything is 10 Gig all the way through, from the storage to the switches to everything else, which is more than we need, and that's great."
"It runs very well lights out. Set it and forget it."
"Going from the old monolithic server and silo storage that they used to use is an improvement. With the FlexPod solution, just being able to manage and monitor the overall environment helps."
"The tool provides a single point for storing applications and it increases the availability of them. It also has improved the way we handle applications within VMware."
"Other vendors such as VMware vSAN have a bigger community of users, so it is easier to find more pre-sale or post-sale information from users."
"The initial setup got a little confusing at a few points with differences between the VMware version in documentation vs the latest, etc."
"The console is something that I believe could be enhanced."
"To enable the proactive support capability that is part of our support agreement, I would ask that the terms and conditions be revised and made acceptable to corporate security."
"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."
"If there was a way to automatically put disks in maintenance mode when shutting the host down and exit maintenance mode automatically, that would simplify things."
"Improvements in documentation and support resources could enhance the user experience."
"For the StarWind VSA vSphere solution, I would like to see a simpler and automated virtual machine installation process in terms of network settings."
"There are sometimes issues with memory failure."
"Cisco is quite expensive but not in the initial first buy."
"You have to get the same servers with the same storage; they need to be identical. However, in vSAN or in VMware we don't have to do that. We can just add storage and manage it in the same server."
"The architecture separates data, computing, memory, and storage into different parts."
"We would like to have the ability to not have to reboot while doing updates. Being able to work through updates with as minimal amount of impact to users."
"I would like for them to develop integration with other technologies, like SD Access. It's still lacking an enhancement management player."
"Cisco should combine its features with its prices."
"The additional feature I would like to see included in the next release of this solution is more security. We want to add more data servers to all the hosts all over the world. We have 140 hosts that connect to one data center in Manila."
"The integration between both companies, Cisco and NetApp, is very good but it still needs to be enhanced in terms of visibility and observability."
"I would like to see drag and drop connectivity to Azure and Amazon."
"We would like to see a new design that comes with more productivity or graphics. Currently, the vendors, like HPE and Dell EMC along with NetApp, all have very similar products. We want more diversification."
"I would like to see them reduce the complexity, that would be my number one request because. Right now, doing simple things is pretty complex. You have so many options. It might be better if it were more wizard-driven, as opposed to going through five hundred dials. It's not very easy or intuitive."
"There is a history of issues with hardware availability. For example, we'll buy an array or a filer with a particular configuration and particular size of drive, sizing it appropriately. Then, as we grow, they're like, "Oh, you can always get more." Then when you go to get more, that model or type of disk is no longer available. It becomes this big process to try to figure out what we need to get, how it'll work, and how that'll integrate into the system. That could be simpler. They could do a bit more to guarantee the availability of parts. Obviously, not being the largest storage vendor, I know they can't sometimes control what the hardware vendors do. However, a bit more transparency and communication about this would be helpful."
"The last two calls that I have made to NetApp support have been handled too casually. People are too lax, not quite as professional as I would have liked."
"There were several different management consoles that we had to deal with: UCS, VMware, and separate ESXi installations. Maybe one interface council where we could manage everything from might be a little easier."
"It takes a very sophisticated group of people to run and maintain NetApp and Cisco products."
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Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] doesn't meet the minimum requirements to be ranked in HCI with 90 reviews while FlexPod XCS is ranked 2nd in Converged Infrastructure with 295 reviews. Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] is rated 8.0, while FlexPod XCS is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] writes "A fast and easy deployment that allows secure access to our medical applications ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of FlexPod XCS writes "Integrates everything so you are using fewer tools". Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] is most compared with VMware vSAN, VxRail, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI), Dell PowerFlex and Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converged Infrastructure, whereas FlexPod XCS is most compared with Dell PowerFlex, VxRail, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI), Oracle Exadata and Dell VxBlock System.
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