We compared NetApp AFF and Dell PowerStore based on our user's reviews in several parameters.
NetApp AFF impresses users with exceptional performance, customer service, competitive pricing, and positive ROI, but needs improvements in integration and scalability. Dell PowerStore stands out for storage performance, customer service, pricing, and positive ROI, while users suggest enhancements in ease of use and performance optimization.
Features: NetApp AFF is highly regarded for its exceptional performance, scalability, efficient data management, high availability, and seamless integration. Dell PowerStore, on the other hand, is praised for its ease of use, intuitive interface, robust security features, comprehensive support services, and workload performance optimization.
Pricing and ROI: The setup cost of NetApp AFF is described as straightforward and not difficult for users, while Dell PowerStore is reported to have a relatively low setup cost, making it convenient for users. Users have had positive experiences with the licensing process of both products, finding it smooth and user-friendly., The ROI from NetApp AFF was impressive, with increased productivity, efficiency, and improved data storage capabilities. Users praised its reliability and performance. On the other hand, Dell PowerStore offered flexibility, scalability, and advanced features, delivering tangible benefits and meeting expectations.
Room for Improvement: NetApp AFF would benefit from improvements in performance optimization, software functionality, and scalability for larger deployments. Users also mention the need for a more intuitive and user-friendly interface. Dell PowerStore could benefit from enhancements in ease of use, interface simplicity, and performance optimization. Users desire a more intuitive and efficient interface when navigating the system, with optimized speed and responsiveness for handling large amounts of data. Overall, improvements should focus on enhancing user experience and maximizing system performance.
Deployment and customer support: The user reviews indicate that the duration required for establishing a new tech solution can vary greatly for both NetApp AFF and Dell PowerStore. However, there is a difference in terms of the context in which users use the terms "deployment" and "setup." Some users of NetApp AFF spend three months on deployment and an additional week on setup, while others required only a week for both phases. On the other hand, some Dell PowerStore users reported spending three months on deployment, while others needed a week for setup. It is important to consider the overall timeframes mentioned when evaluating the user reviews for both products., Users have reported highly positive experiences with the customer service and support of both NetApp AFF and Dell PowerStore. NetApp AFF is praised for its knowledgeable and attentive support team, while Dell PowerStore is commended for its prompt and efficient assistance. Both companies demonstrate professionalism and address queries effectively.
The summary above is based on 82 interviews we conducted recently with NetApp AFF and Dell PowerStore users. To access the review's full transcripts, download our report.
"At this point, I don't know anything that they could provide in a better way."
"The most valuable features in Pure Storage FlashArray are deduplication and active cluster."
"We like the speed. It's very low latency. In virtualization, you can mask lots of problems, and even in code you can mask lots of problems, with low latency. It's just pure speed and low latency."
"Performance, deduplication, compression, and fast response time for requests from servers and applications."
"We consume less physical storage because of the solution’s deduplication and compression."
"It gives us capacity planning."
"It is an SSD array that has awesome performance, low submillisecond latency, and does what it is supposed to do. It just works, which is difficult for things to do anymore."
"We find the ease of usability and setup valuable."
"Overall, we're quite happy with the product because we can move the data that is stored on more than 10 of our current storage devices to a single PowerStore."
"Reliable, with comprehensive features and a well-established support base."
"There is no complicated configuration for queries and calls. You just create a model and go."
"The solution is extremely stable."
"The solution is stable."
"The solution is very easy to implement."
"PowerStore is easy to use. All the drives use soft encryption. To upgrade it, you download the app, and it runs by itself. It's very easy to deploy, share, and create volumes."
"The most valuable features of Dell PowerStore are the support for NVMe and SCM, which provides end-to-end performance and high IOPS, minimizing latency. It is a full-fledged storage solution."
"The speed is important; no more problems caused by high latency."
"The most valuable features are high performance and encryption. It also provides aggregate level dedupe."
"Setup was simple and easy."
"The performance is the most valuable feature."
"Previously we had migrated from Dell EMC and we had a lot of difficulties moving data around. Now, if we need to move it to any slower storage, we can move it with just a vault move within the cluster. Even moving data between clusters is extremely simple using SnapMirror. The mobility options for data in All Flash FAS have been awesome."
"The valuable features are the fabric pool. We are taking our cold data and pumping it straight into an estuary bucket. Also, efficiency. We're getting about two and a half times upwards of data efficiency through compaction, compression, deduplication, and it's size. When we refreshed from two or three racks of spinning discs down into 5U of rack space, it not only saved us a whole heap of costs in our data center environment but also it's nice to be green. The power savings alone equated to be about 50 tons of CO2 a year that we no longer emit. It's a big game changer."
"Batch times went from approximately seven hours down to about two and a half. Functionality during the day, such as taking or removing snapshots and cloning instances, is higher than it has ever been."
"The business copy solution has become faster using SnapMirror."
"I would like to see data tiering to AWS."
"Currently, the solution fails to support file screening."
"Self-backup is the only feature lacking in this solution."
"Going forward, don't complicate things for the customers."
"The problem is that we can only make a few groups, around five or six groups. I like groups and we need a lot of them. We had to put all the information in only a few groups and cannot make a more detailed separation of them."
"I would like to see the NAS add-on component become more fault-tolerant than just a single virtual machine running inside the array. I'm unwilling to use it for that reason."
"In the next version of this program, I would like to see increased security, higher encryption, and faster throughput."
"The backend of this solution utilizes an Active/Passive architecture, rather than an Active/Active architecture, which is a disadvantage, when compared to some of its competitors. Its storage capacity should be expanded in the next release."
"I do not like having to use VPLEX for synchronous replication, as opposed to having the store software built-in."
"Horizontal scaling has room for improvement."
"During the installation phase, the licensing part was not straightforward. It was very difficult for the technicians, who are not trained Dell EMC technicians, to do the licensing because the information on their website is not straightforward... Eventually, I had to pass this task to our business partner and they did it for us."
"The cost of technical support is high."
"With PowerStore, we have to choose between block storage and NAS functionality."
"The solution's pricing could be better."
"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."
"It needs more mature code."
"I think adding more features to make it more cloud enabled will help us with cloud tiering and simplify the whole cloud operations when it's integrating with our on-prem AFF products. That is one area where we would like to see more improvements from NetApp."
"The price of NVMe storage is very expensive."
"The graphical interface is still heavy and slow. Needs more improvement in this area."
"We have had issues with CIFS presentations and outages, so if that was removed, we could do seamless upgrades without affecting CIFS presentations. That would be an advantage. That's about the only improvement I can think of."
"The Bezels need improvement."
"In the past, NetApp designed it so that you have a 70% threshold. You would never fill up past 70% since you need to have that room available. Whereas with Pure, I can fill it up to 110% of what they listed and it's still going at full speed. NetApp can't do that."
"The dashboard needs improvement. The dashboard needs some uplift"
"We have had trouble with restoring applications, and if there is more support for application-aware backups then that would be great."
Dell PowerStore is ranked 1st in All-Flash Storage with 46 reviews while NetApp AFF is ranked 2nd in All-Flash Storage with 280 reviews. Dell PowerStore is rated 8.6, while NetApp AFF is rated 9.0. 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 NetApp AFF writes "Since switching, our clients have reported improved performance and reduced latency". Dell PowerStore is most compared with Dell Unity XT, IBM FlashSystem, Dell PowerMax NVMe, HPE Nimble Storage and Huawei OceanStor Dorado, whereas NetApp AFF is most compared with Dell Unity XT, Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series, VMware vSAN, NetApp FAS Series and VAST Data. See our Dell PowerStore vs. NetApp AFF report.
See our list of best All-Flash Storage vendors and best NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays vendors.
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