DataCore SANsymphony vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between DataCore SANsymphony and StarWind Virtual SAN based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Software Defined Storage (SDS) solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN Report (Updated: March 2024).
763,955 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"Active-active is the most valuable aspect for us.""The use of the RAM cache allows you to speed up the writing and reading of data while also allowing for a possible increase in performance by increasing the RAM on the servers.""The most useful feature of SANsymphony is that it's able to manage any brand of block storage.""I found the solution to be very stable.""Mirroring is the most valuable feature because I can provide a high-level of service and optimize the use of obsolete storage.""It allows data to be available from two DataCore servers.""For us, fault tolerance is the most important feature of DataCore.""I am very happy with this product's ability to adapt, increase, and modify existing infrastructures."

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"The features that I found most valuable are ease of use of the software that StarWind offers - with the first setup being a bit painful.""The user interface for this application is amazing.""When we need additional storage but want to keep the size of the SANs manageable, the StarWind Virtual SAN has allowed me to do everything needed.""Virtual SAN runs on iSCSI, which is free and easy to configure. It's easy to manage from StarWind's GUI console, and it only required a few extra switch ports.""It eliminates the use of expensive physical shared storage.""The ability to choose our own hardware and our own vendors for this was hugely beneficial, as we had pre-existing relationships with vendors we wanted to maintain.""When using new (warranty) servers, you can forget about the storage service for several years. The users will not even notice the failure of two servers out of three.""StarWind saved us about 80% of our storage costs over our old solution."

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Cons
"I would like for it to improve into a more ergonomic management console and a translation into the French language. It should have some process for a shutdown of a VM properly in case of a problem.""If it could integrate to a cloud gateway, then we could carry it directly to storage, instead of having middleware in between the storage and the cloud.""The main problem is there is no DataCore OS.""We'd like to manage the raid on the disk directly in SanSymphony.""I think an easier way to open a service call, right through the DataCore GUI, would be an improvement, especially when there is an urgent issue.""I would like to see reporting added, such as a monthly connectivity report.""I'd like to see the company make the renewal of the software cheaper.""Datacore is developing a new WebUI with new dashboards. It is a good idea as the classic GUI is lacking dashboards."

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"I found that certain browsers are not fully compatible with the administration web access portal.""I'd love to see native export of metrics (via Prometheus or something of that nature) to allow us to get more metrics available on our existing dashboard software.""The StarWind Management Console is available only for Microsoft Windows/Windows Server, and should also be available for Linux and macOS, as it would reduce implementation costs.""StarWind relies on the underlying OS to manage the "SAN files" whether that would be a RAID volume, software RAID (such as LVM), etc. It would be useful if StarWind could incorporate the actual physical drive management inside of the solution, similar to Storage Spaces Direct.""We would like to see the documentation more fully developed.""When StarWind Virtual SAN for vSphere nodes go offline unexpectedly, the nodes have to re-sync disks fully which takes a long time. We had a power failure and when both nodes came online, VMware vSphere didn't see StarWind disks before I manually re-scanned them form ESXi administration console even though it should happen automatically""StarWind Command Center's single-pane management solution only works with Hyper-V.""The documentation could be a little more concise, but, for the most part, it just works."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "In my case, the licensing per terabytes is very high and it must be licensed for each extra functionality."
  • "The pricing and licensing are better with DataCore."
  • "The cost is at the same level as other storage solutions and it is easy to understand the licensing."
  • "Make sure you are made aware of the annual subscription cost when purchasing."
  • "Pricing has improved but it is still expensive."
  • "This product has a good ratio between quality and price. In many cases, it's less expensive to work with DataCore than other storage systems."
  • "This solution allows the use of off-the-shelf hardware and charges by the TB of storage."
  • "The solution is cost effective."
  • More DataCore SANsymphony Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "The setup cost is very low. The pricing is great."
  • "We are happy with the price."
  • "The license is reusable. We can always rebuild it and apply the license. Then, boom, we get new servers, apply the license, and we're back up and running."
  • "The pricing is fine for the work that it does."
  • "When we did all the analysis for StarWind, it was approximately 20 percent less than any of the other solutions that we looked at."
  • "The scalability limitation for us is its licensing. At some point in the fairly near future, we will probably have to upgrade our license so we can store eight terabytes instead of four. We are currently at four terabytes, but we're starting to knock on the door of that capacity."
  • "The pricing is excellent. It will run on anything. You don't have to buy a $100,000 server, with hardware you don't need. You just pay for the license and you're good to go."
  • "The licensing is a bit weird. If you license the standard version of StarWind, it allows you four terabytes. Then, they have a pro version, but with the pro version, the only difference is it doubles the terabytes to eight."
  • More StarWind Virtual SAN Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:Good sizing is the basis for a stable and high-performance environment. It is important to plan in sufficient reserves. It can make sense to license a higher number of TB if this puts you in a better… more »
    Top Answer:It's difficult to say if something is missing in this solution. Maybe we'd like to manage the raid on the disk directly in SanSymphony. We essentially use RAID5 for our SAS disk and SSD, and now we… more »
    Top Answer:We test live failovers every week, and so far, everything has been running smoothly without anything unexpected.
    Top Answer:The cost of this is less than you expect. Since they're selling a software stack, you do need to consider your own hardware costs.
    Top Answer:Pricing is a bit high. That said, the support is worth it. It's really hard to point out any other negatives. The licensing and support pricing structure could have been laid out a little simpler, and… more »
    Ranking
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    Average Words per Review
    627
    Rating
    9.5
    Views
    4,798
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    Reviews
    103
    Average Words per Review
    596
    Rating
    9.6
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    DataCore Virtual SAN
    StarWind SAN & NAS
    Learn More
    Overview

    Experience peace of mind with DataCore SANsymphony, the ultimate software-defined storage solution alleviating storage management challenges. Say goodbye to the complexities of managing different storage tiers and disruptions with SANsymphony's block-level storage virtualization technology, empowering you to automate capacity provisioning and data placement across diverse storage environments including SAN, DAS, HCI, and JBOD. Break down silos, control data placement, meet business continuity objectives, boost performance, and seamlessly expand or refresh hardware with SANsymphony. Benefit from features like asynchronous replication for disaster recovery, minimizing data loss, accelerating application responsiveness, and integrating new technology non-disruptively. Trusted by industry leaders like NASA, Thorntons, Inc., and TUI Cruises, DataCore SANsymphony guarantees unparalleled flexibility, scalability, and reliability, ensuring uninterrupted data access and application availability while reducing storage costs and inefficiencies.

    StarWind Virtual SAN provides high availability and fault tolerance for virtualized environments without the need for dedicated SAN hardware. It allows for real-time replication between servers, shared storage for Hyper-V clusters, and enables vMotion and High Availability features for VMware vSphere. The solution reduces costs and leverages existing hardware while providing a scalable and reliable infrastructure. Valuable features include ease of use, scalability, top-tier support, hardware agnosticism, and the ability to use off-the-shelf standard servers to increase storage space. StarWind VSAN has helped organizations improve performance, data availability, and data security while reducing downtime and providing cost-saving storage options.

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    Sample Customers
    Volkswagen , Maimonides Medical Center, NASA, Thorntons, Inc., TUI, ISCO Industries, Pee Dee Electric Cooperative, United Financial Credit Union, Derby Supply Chain Solutions, Mission Community Hospital, Bellarmine College Preparatory, Colby-Sawyer College, Mount Sinai Health System, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Quorn Foods, Bitburger, University of Birmingham, Stadtverwaltung Heidelberg, NetEnt to name a few.
    Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Non Profit27%
    Government11%
    Computer Software Company8%
    Analyst Firm5%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company24%
    Comms Service Provider8%
    Government6%
    Financial Services Firm6%
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company10%
    Construction Company8%
    Educational Organization8%
    Computer Software Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company18%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    Government9%
    Financial Services Firm8%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business48%
    Midsize Enterprise17%
    Large Enterprise35%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business43%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise42%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business64%
    Midsize Enterprise22%
    Large Enterprise13%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business25%
    Midsize Enterprise17%
    Large Enterprise58%
    Buyer's Guide
    DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    763,955 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    DataCore SANsymphony is ranked 4th in Software Defined Storage (SDS) with 17 reviews while StarWind Virtual SAN is ranked 1st in Software Defined Storage (SDS) with 105 reviews. DataCore SANsymphony is rated 9.2, while StarWind Virtual SAN is rated 9.6. The top reviewer of DataCore SANsymphony writes "Easily scalable with great technical support and very good snapshot capabilities". On the other hand, the top reviewer of StarWind Virtual SAN writes "Easy to set up and maintain with good performance capabilities". DataCore SANsymphony is most compared with VMware vSAN, HPE SimpliVity, StorMagic SvSAN, Red Hat Ceph Storage and VxRail, whereas StarWind Virtual SAN is most compared with VMware vSAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct, StorMagic SvSAN, Red Hat Ceph Storage and HPE SimpliVity. See our DataCore SANsymphony vs. StarWind Virtual SAN report.

    See our list of best Software Defined Storage (SDS) vendors and best HCI vendors.

    We monitor all Software Defined Storage (SDS) 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.