Overall, I would rate it nine out of ten.

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I'd advise learning about the device before implementing it. Take some time and get an idea of how it works. It's a very interesting new technology. It's a good concept.

Overall, it was a good experience working with this solution. I'd rate it an eight out of ten.

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I'm not sure why SF isn't more popular in the SMB space. To my mind, it offers a unique combination that isn't easily matched in the marketplace. Kaminario seems to be the closest. I haven't had it long enough to truly "know" the product, but will happily revisit this in 6-12 months.

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Since the intial rollout, we have implemented VVOLs on SF with our VMware 6 setup.  Once setup - the initial configuration and communication, plus the SPBM policies - it is quite easy to use, and allows the vmware admin to do it all without having to touch the SF webadmin URL - even setting IOPS per volumes is done there.  Very nice. 

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Lastly... scaling up, either for perf. or capacity (more likely), is so much of a non-issue that it is hard to over-state:

- predictable cost: you are adding a node, you know how much they cost.  No "threshold" where you have to add add'l controllers, or a new shelf, nothing like that

- no (minimal) impact to add to a running system.  They _say_ that when data is re-balanced (across the new node(s)), you have a percentage perf. hit, but we have not noticed this (and we've added 2 add'l nodes so far).  

- in fact, adding OR removing nodes requires no downtime, literally a 'non-event'

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I would recommend the solution to those planning to use it. I rate the overall solution an eight out of ten.

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We're a distributor.

SolidFire is on its own standard storage platform, and, as it's embedded with HCI from NetApp, adds to the storage for the hyper-converged solution.

There are a lot of use cases for SolidFire within HCI. It can address most of the workloads we have on the customer side. It's really something. We can build solutions that really fit the customer and we can size the compute as needed. 

For the VMware server, we use ESX, and we can also add into the compute nodes some CPU cards for all that is graphic or scientific calculations. On the storage side, we can build the storage we need with the SolidFire nodes. We can really address on one side, the computer needs, and on the other side, the storage needs. In fact, that's the value of HCI by NetApp. What is nice with SolidFire is that the QoS is embedded, and for each volume you create, you put the QoS on it. And you're sure to grantee the service level agreement for the customer, depending on the workloads he needs.

Overall, I would rate the solution at an eight out of ten. It doesn't quite have the same amount of options and features as Pure Storage. Yet, it's pretty impressive.

The only recommendation I have to others is on the network side. You need to really get all the information required before you try to deploy this solution. That's all. It's a little work to do beforehand, however, it's really important to address everything before implementing SolidFire.

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Only because of the solution's pricing, I won't be able to give a ten out of ten. I rate the overall solution a nine out of ten.

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I advise that if the environment is confined, if there is a need for solid-state devices and flash devices, and if there is a need for better logs, then SolidFire is a good choice because it has good support and is easy to manage. The upgrades and data sync is easy to manage on the UI console. I would rate SolidFire a seven out of ten; it is a good choice but still has room for improvement.

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When it comes to selecting a vendor, first, we don't deal with small vendors typically. We don't generally want to buy something that's VC-backed. We probably would not have considered SolidFire pre NetApp acquisition. But after it was acquired by NetApp, then we said, "Okay look, this company's not going go away overnight." So that's one criterion, that's a big one.

And the second is, am I going to get a commitment in the level of support that I get. When I buy this, are we going to be working together like we're partners, that we're in the same boat together?

We're an enterprise level company and I think SolidFire is uniquely valuable to a company our size. Because the price to get in there, that initial footprint, it's somewhat high. I think for the small business, I think Pure is killing it over there. I talked to them, I think Pure has got a great product, an all-flash product. But its dual controller and they're not going to play in a space where we're going to have hundreds and hundreds of connected hosts, and I need all those front-end ports. It's just not going to work. That's why, while Pure was interesting, they washed out for us pretty early. They would work great, I think, for our small robos, our small sites.

If a colleague at another company was researching a similar product I'd say make sure whatever you're looking at, you're not buying a legacy architecture with bolt-on flash drive. That's what we're trying to get away from, the pitfalls, because they're always tied to poor architecture decisions; things like cache-slot ratios to disk. We end up seeing that they have other problems. We definitely look at something that's designed ground up with flash in mind. And secondly, a company that's definitely going to be around.

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If you're bring up cloud in-house and you're still not aware of OpenStack Kubernetes, that's the way ahead. If you are putting up NetApp in the background, I think you're all sorted out. Your cloud is all prepared, so all done.

The way I see it, there's the scalability and the complexity part of it. And then errors are huge, and when I say huge I mean they are costly. So the way I compare it with other products, maybe the other vendors, the cost is a major factor.

And with that, there is complexity, work in silos, so right now it is coming to OpenStack and then beneath you have NetApp SolidFire, it's all simple. No more complexities.

Most important criteria when selecting a vendor:

• Implementation, it should be quite simple to understand.
• It should be customizable; it should not be that the vendor is saying, "No, this is something that we are providing, it cannot be customized for your environment." That doesn't work for me. It should be as customizable as possible
• Costing of course
• The support that comes with that

We are an enterprise level company. SolidFire is definitely uniquely valuable to a company of our size, because the way the market is going ahead, on the cloud. Large companies have got their old stuff kept in old datacenters wherein you have huge, costly storage boxes of course, and you want to bring that up. So SolidFire is something that is giving you a migration platform. I mean, it's a steady platform for you, the way you prefer it.

I would say go ahead with this and then if they are good with the API part of it, configuration specifically with Python or OpenStack, just go for it.

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We are currently a customer and an end-user.

I did not use the latest version of the solution. We were a couple of years behind. We were most recently at version 11. I've been out of the operations group now for the last, probably eight months or so, however, it's my understanding that they recently updated it, however, the last one I worked with was version 11.

I'd rate the solution at a solid eight out of ten simply due to the hardware issues which are pretty impactful lately and the issues with the upgrades that we've seen lately.

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Most of the time when we sell SolidFire, it is integrated with NetApp HCI. Together, they make up part of a whole package that includes servers, compute, storage, and network. SolidFire can be fun in standalone mode but most of the time, if we have a need for flash storage then we will use the EF-Series. We also have the AFF storage with ONTAP as an option.

My advice to anybody who is implementing this solution is to make sure that it is properly designed. There are always things that you need to be aware of when designing an efficient system.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

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The most important criterion when selecting a vendor to work with, for me personally, is partnership. I think it's also important that the vendor has vision. I think it's important that they are willing to collaborate with customers and not just throw solutions at them. I think they should really want to understand your workflows, how they can benefit you and how they can make your life easier in terms of automation or efficiencies or performance. I want to find that they actually really care about what you are doing, as opposed to just throwing a solution out there.

Do your due diligence. Do proofs of concept. Make sure that you try to break it with what you are trying to do, and make sure you engage the vendor. Tell them exactly and share exactly what you trying to do and let them help you build the correct solution. Especially with NetApp, they have such a huge portfolio. You might be thinking traditionally you have experience in AFF or FAS but SolidFire might be a good fit, or E-Series might be a good fit, or cloud ONTAP might be a good fit. So it's important to engage the vendor and find out what the best solution is for your use case.

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For SolidFire, we're looking into better IOPS for database workloads and for other VM use cases. We purchased it for customer-facing applications, mostly for database administration-type work.

We are an enterprise level company, but we are federal. SolidFire is uniquely valuable for a company our size because our company scales, we're supporting thousands of users. And with SolidFire, we can handle the workload.

For us the most important criteria when selecting a vendor are reputation, reliability, support. All these things we have gotten from NetApp.

NetApp has been out for a long time, they know the storage business. And they've been very responsive to our needs when there are issues. Our contact team, they're right there to support us and make anything that we need right.

Look at the reputation of a company, the innovation, how they are able to support their customer needs. And seeing that many of the companies are doing pretty much the same thing, which one stands out in the reviews. That's very important.

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I would rate the tool an eight out of ten. You need to analyze your requirement before selecting the tool. SolidFire may not fit the requirements of every customer.

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We purchased SolidFire, in some aspects, for customer facing application. We have started to bring SolidFire into our house to use for our own applications, versus just using it for our customers.

The most important criteria when selecting a vendor to work with are, I would say, performance, ease of of using, how to incorporate it in to our datacenter. And that's one of the things with ONTAP - that it's able to be used on SolidFire -  we know ONTAP. It made it a lot easier than to have to bring in a different application, learn something new. So that also helped in our decision, it was the ease of bringing it in.

I didn't give it a 10 out of 10 because, like I said, the things that we need it for, that we're still missing - some of the Linux and the Unix-type connections - that would really help it. 

Given the ease, for the value of the product, it's a great thing to bring in and start going to the cloud with.

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Look at SolidFire. It sounds cliché but it's true. For us, it worked really well.

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If they are using block storage, then it is very user-friendly. It's easy to use out-of-the-box. I was not a storage admin when I came to this team. I was a server guy, so it was all new to me, and SolidFire was the easiest thing for me to pick up. We had old 7-Mode systems. We had C-Mode. We had Isilon systems on EMC, and SolidFire was in a day, you knew how to do everything. It is just a real easy setup.

We don't have a reason to not use solid states. I don't know why we'd use anything else at this point other than solid state.

Most important criteria when selecting a vendor:

For a storage vendor, it is price and stability are probably the main thing. We like vendor support, but we have a huge internal IT shop with a lot of engineers, so we don't need that much support and hand-holding. It's really the following:

• Management
• A cost decision, who gives us the best deal.
• Stability.

If there's stability, and we haven't had stability issues with NetApp, they are a better deal than EMC, so that's why we've been using them. We were an EMC shop until three or four years ago.

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Primary use case purchase for us was VDI or virtual desktop infrastructure, with the intention of VDI and our whole assortment of load, for the server infrastructure.

Important criteria when selecting a vendor would be reputation, accountability. Support was big for us as well, knowing that support will be there, ten-year, long term. And just durability, and knowing it'll be there.

Regarding advice for a colleague researching this type of solution, do your research, obviously. Check it out, give SolidFire a fair chance if that means you're demoing, bring it on for a bake off, definitely do so. It's worth your time and effort to look into SolidFire and what it has to offer.

It comes down to reliability, and it just runs. It just literally runs itself, which is all I could ask for.

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Definitely give it an opportunity; put in on a network, then put the different loads on the system and show how they do QoS across those loads to make sure you've got the guaranteed bandwidth.

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We are in a crisis situation for everyone, for customers, for partners, for principals, manufacturers. We need a specific solution to move on to the new normal. So from the available solutions, HCI (Hyper Converged Infrastructure) would be the future of IT. HCI is the future, it is easy faster to deploy collectively. You don't need to buy frequently - just buy once and scale out when you need more resources.

So, I think for the customers want their IT to have a continuous support and response for business needs, then they should choose HCI solutions.

I will advise to choose HCI from NetApp, others can choose HCI from other hardware manufacturers, but the future I believe is HCI.I believe and recommend that the best HCI is the NetApp HCI(The back-end Storage used for NetApp HCI is SolidFire)

The difference between SolidFire and other storage is that it is a stand alone storage. No one has that good storage software or that scalability and performance. On a scale of one to ten, I would rate SolidFire an eight.

The only thing is the initial cost because we have to convince the customer that he has to pay more. That's the only thing in this case. It's not an overall technical, scalability, or simplicity issue. Only the price factor brings it down to eight. Otherwise, if any NetApp partner is a gold partner and they get the good discount then I can easily give SolidFire a 10.

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I'd recommend the solution. Implementing it is a breeze, support is good and scaling is easy. If you do not have a lot of technical capability on-premise, that would certainly be a leading reason to look at this solution. View full review »

The suitability of this solution depends on the use case, so anybody who is researching this solution should take care to consider their use cases first.

I cannot think of any additional features this solution needs, but there is a long list of improvements.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

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I would definitely say have a look at SolidFire, just because of the scalability, the ability to add additional nodes, the resiliency of the product. There are definitely other solutions that may come in and say they can do everything that SolidFire does, but in our testing we were unable to find a solution that mirrored what SolidFire could do. I think it just makes a lot of sense to just continue down that path with Solid Fire.

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Evaluate everything. But if you're looking for an easy-to-implement solution from an all-flash perspective, really take a look at SolidFire. Try to get a PoC in house and run from a proof-of-concept perspective. The API's implementation is all very easy. You can look at it from your power and cooling aspects as well. That's the advice I have: Do a good proof of concept on the flash storage.

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I would rate it a nine out of ten.

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We purchased SolidFire for customer facing applications, they're all internal, house-developed applications that we sell to customers, to financial services.

When selecting a vendor to work with what's important to me are

• support
• viability - are they going to be around?

Support is the big one. Is it just reactionary support, or proactive support? You need both of those.

I gave it a seven out of 10 based on what I've already explained. In the past, they seemed like more like a small company - and they were. But what I explained before, the hardware replacement, just replace a node. That's a small company.

Make sure that you have the performance requirement for it, because its price per gigabyte is a lot more than other solutions out there, if you don't need the performance requirements. You can get by on all-flash unless you have the need to guarantee performance on specific volumes.

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Start small, then expand. That's what I would do.

I think the solution was very simple and easy to set up, which I really appreciated.

To give it a higher rating, I'll have to thoroughly test it and have a better understanding of the whole architecture and the solution and also the capabilities I’ve mentioned.

When I look for a vendor such as NetApp, some of the important criteria are the market space, their customer support, and how responsive they are from the account manager to the SEs, not just tech support but also the other guys involved in the organization, too.

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Our use case is to provide quality of service and guaranteed IOPS.

Replication is okay, meaning they do two copies, they are routing two copies. We're not going more than that, because of the cost. I'm satisfied.

The first and foremost criteria when selecting a vendor is that the vendor should have a unique niche. Number two, they should know what they're doing, meaning technical support. Whether it comes to technical support or e-sales. If they're not able to answer my questions on time, then it's a problem. The third is being able to integrate with my existing environment.

To a colleague researching a similar solution, I would say look for a stable company and look for a company that has good backing. Look for a good price versus performance ratio.

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Rating this solution is difficult because I would rate SolidFire very high and NetApp very low.

I have no trouble with features but we need the proper support. Whether I would recommend this solution depends on the requirements, although without knowing more, I would recommend something else.

Overall, I would rate this solution a five out of ten.

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