Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] Reviews

We use this solution for virtualization. 

Its simplicity has been a benefit for our organization. 

The most valuable feature is that it is scalable. It has many resources and is easy to expand. 

They should improve the price. A lot of people complain that the price is an issue. For smaller countries, this solution is too expensive. 

The stability has not really improved. Also, their upgrades are complicated. This is something that needs to be fixed, which I'm sure they'll do. 

Scalability is easy and simple. 

Their technical support is very bad. We had an issue where instead of an engineer we got a PDF "doctor" that didn't know anything about our problem which was very frustrating.  

The setup is simple. We understand how it works so it's not a problem for us but I can imagine that for somebody who doesn't know UCS so well, the setup can be complex. 

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten. The solution is not so bad. To get a ten, the upgrades should be smoother and without any problems so that we're not scared to do them. It could also be more traditional. It's hard to trust the new product especially because we've had issues with the upgrades. It may take some time but it is getting better. 

You should try this solution, you won't regret it. 

Our primary use case of this solution is for data center virtualization.

There's high commodity stuff but nothing is very useful inside. The automation is a valuable feature, it's interesting. 

Mostly documentation needs to be improved, we need strong documentation. We also want to not need to open a tech case every time we need to troubleshoot. Stability and storage need to be improved. 

Stability is really poor, especially the storage stability. We lost data. There were disruptions of clusters and that's one big pain point of the solution. It's not stable enough, the documentation is not good, there's not much documentation available. We need a tech engineer for every call. 

Scalability was cool on the marketing site but the two node clusters crashed. I'm not willing to build large scale infrastructure with this product because it's not stable enough.

Technical support is good but we need it for every piece we do. For every change, we need technical support. They are quick to respond and help us solve the issue. 

We switched solutions because the market drives us, mostly Cisco drives us. They have high goals. Normally, we build up a classic converged infrastructure but now Cisco wanted us to deploy hyperconverged.

The initial setup is very complex. 

We are partners so we integrate it ourselves. 

We did not look at other solutions. We only focus on Cisco. We love Cisco and hopefully,  HyperFlex will become a better product. 

I would rate it a four out of ten. I would advise someone considering this solution to be careful. 

Our primary use case is to reduce our hardware storage and to make it virtual so we use vSAN and HyperFlex.

The most valuable features are scalability and the easy operation - if it works. You can configure everything from just one window.

They can't get a POC to work because there are big latencies between the two sites we have. Even though we have a private fiber connection and everything else works well, they can't get the two products to talk to each other. They are not able to build it up. It looks like it's a firmware issue. They said it isn't but now it's looking like it is. I hope we can sort it out. 

In terms of the stability, we can't get it to work. We have one or two VMs online but nothing we could say to get an overview of it.

In terms of scalability, we can add servers, storage servers or computing servers, and we're much more flexible with block-based storage.

We had one other block-based storage just run out of support and service so we thought we'd go with migration. We have a dual-vendor concept and so we wanted to go with vSAN and something else in storage so we chose HyperFlex.

The setup is pretty much is straightforward. The issue is that it doesn't work afterwards.

We integrated directly through Cisco. 

I would rate this solution a three out of ten. I would advise someone considering this solution not to spread it over two data centers.

Our primary use case is for desktop infrastructure.

The most important benefits that we've seen from this solution is that it reduces the cost of management and it has easy monitoring systems.

The most valuable features are that you can easily scale up and compute.

A stretch function is really needed. Germans think that because of the high availability and the security that two data centers are better but we want edge all in one cluster. This is a needed feature, the cluster feature, and we'd also like to see a possibility for ROBO offices.

We had some trouble during the implementation, but it was one of the first versions and everything is fine now. Stability was only an issue at the beginning.

Scalability is really great because you can adjust the HyperFlex node. If you need more storage, you can add some more drives when it's not full at the beginning. Also, you have the possibility to edge the compute resources with the plates. 

The first version was complex to set up because there were some open questions within the workflows. Now, the new installer is great. It's really great, really fast, and it's easy to set up.

I would rate this solution a nine out of ten. 

We use this solution for many banks in Egypt. 

This solution has improved my organization because workers are more efficient and the time it takes to complete daily activities has been significantly reduced. It has also enhanced KPIs for the workers and the remote sites don't have any delay reaching the required data. 

The most valuable features are that it's an all in one solution, requires low power, it's easy for management, and easy to implement and train.

I would like for them to develop integration with other technologies, like SD Access. It's still lacking an enhancement management player.

Stability is very good. 

Their technicians are very qualified and supportive. 

Our customers knew they needed to switch to this solution because we have had good experiences with Cisco. It has a strong presence in Egypt and a good technical support and sales team.  

Our customers have seen ROI in terms of the time they save troubleshooting.

We also considered Dell EMC. 

I would rate it a nine out of ten, not a ten because nothing is perfect. 

Our primary use case of this solution is for data storage for the network.

Integration to third-parties is the most valuable feature. 

Scalability and performance are good. 

Technical support is very good. Not excellent, but good. There's still not enough data available on the web. For example, for the integration to VMware, I had a case recently and I searched for more information but didn't find any. 

We knew we needed to switch solutions because we needed a solution with good performance, scanning, and an overall new and innovative solution. 

We had some hardware problems at the beginning of the initial setup but after that was resolved the setup was straightforward. 

We implemented through an integrator and had a great experience with them. 

The ROI we have seen from the high performance that has saved us time and money.

We also looked at Nutanix. We ended up going with Cisco because our whole network is based on Cisco. 

I would give this solution a seven out of ten because it's still new and I still haven't practiced a lot with it but I have had a good experience until now. 

I would advise someone considering this solution to sit with your integrator, discuss the different products, comply with the competitors, and you will get your desired results.

Our use case would be deployable mobile headquarters, headquarters on the move, where we can quickly deploy to our small user community and quickly create a mobile data center. This includes using business advantage communications.

We are in the architecting phase. We are looking at it being more agile in our deployed headquarters. We are in the testing and deployment phase.

The flexibility is its most valuable feature; the ability to quickly deploy a number of help machines. It is not constrained by what we want to do. 

The product's disadvantage is that it is not necessarily open as I would like it to be. The main platform has some closed features that I would rather not see. For example, I need a mechanism to orchestrate services and an infrastructure as a service model, which is how we are deploying it. We would like to orchestrate it using an open, non-Cisco tool. While there is an API, in order to deploy it, we need to indicate it with a higher layer Network Services Orchestrator. This requires a lot of work to be done. If it could support a more open model, where we have standardized blueprints, templates, or virtual machines, it would be nice. This is an industry problem, not necessarily specific to Cisco.

I would like a lighter product; something which can be carried by a mere human. The typical size still looks like a stack of data center-sized servers, which is typically fine, but not so good if you want to carry it around.

It works as expected.

Based on the bigger picture, scalability should be good. However, we haven't tested in on scale yet. On paper, it is perfectly fine.

The technical support is good.

Our other solution works perfectly fine. However, we do capability upgrades every so often. This is a trigger for me to determine if we are looking in the right direction. As our requirements to be more agile have increased over time when working with our previous system, we learned the system is too complicated. We needed something which is smarter and can be more automated, where a physical engineer use a template and let it run, then get a green light because the system works.

The initial setup was somewhat complex, but this was because of our requirements. We were pushing the physical structure beyond what Cisco could deliver. This made life a bit miserable for the engineer.

Cisco delivered the solution directly to us. They contributed skill, personnel, equipment, and prototypes.

We are looking at Microsoft, VMware, Cisco, and Dell EMC. In the end, we will make our decision on price and functionality.

Give it a go. Work with their engineers and support staff to see if your solution fits. Challenge them to go a bit further than than their standard product.

We use it mostly for our business customers.

Cisco should combine its features with its prices.

The product is stable. No one complains about the stability, which is fabulous.

The scalability is okay. Our customers don't complain about it.

Our technical team said that this is the best solution for us.

The initial setup was straightforward. It was implemented three months ago.

Three months is too soon to see ROI.

The price is a bit too high.

Our technical team made this decision.

Be more careful if your technical person says, "It is necessary to implement and develop the infrastructure."

We are using HyperFlex for heavy workloads and virtual machines which are on a separate network.

• Past deployments
• The possibility to share the workload. We have many applications which have need of workloads only a few times in a month, so we share HyperFlex with them.
• The product works quickly.

We are working with a lot of different technologies and trying to manage them with one tool. The API could be improved for better integration with other systems. For example, the integration to VMware could be better.

We haven't had any downtime. It is absolutely stable.

The scalability is good. We use the nodes that we bought, and they have really scaled out.

Cisco technical support often makes things too complicated. We have easy problems, but they want to WebEx and constantly testing. In the end, we have to exchange a disk and everything is okay. In the beginning, we said the disk is defect, but they want us to test and retest, before acknowledging the disk is defect and we can exchange it. That is a problem for me.

We worked for years with HPE services. We didn't see that they developed, so we looked for other vendors. In the end, we decided on Cisco and are now testing some Cisco technologies. The main technology for us is UCS. HyperFlex was an idea which came from our account manager. I said, "Okay, we can test it." We have a use case. Now, we are working with it.

From day one, it worked. The initial setup was okay.

Cisco helped us to deploy and integrate. Our experience with them was fine.

We are testing it on the slowest workloads. We think by sharing the hardware with several applications that we can save money.

We considered all the vendors. In the end, Cisco checked all the boxes.

At the moment, Cisco is a good vendor, as far as networking solutions. I connect the servers to the network, and the compatibility is good.

We haven't tested the new container functionality. I hope it's good, because this is very important for us.

The primary use case is VDI and virtualization. We are testing it for VDI. For VDI, HyperFlex has been pretty useful.

Everything is in the solution. We don't have to connect to something else or pieces from somewhere else. We also receive centralized reports from it.

The compute storage and virtualization come all in one box.

We would like HyperFlex to connect the storage directly into Fabric Interconnect along with the features of the solution. We have enough ports in HyperFlex. We don't want to buy another set of switches to connect to Fabric Interconnect, complicating the solution. This change would be a great improvement.

We are happy with the stability.

The scalability is fantastic. It scales much more than we need.

We have not used the technical support yet.

Cisco let us know about HyperFlex. We receive training and liked it. We said, "Why not? Let's test it."

The setup is not easy, but it's not complicated. How you implement things can be complex.

We had some courses on it and followed them. So, we did the deployment on ourselves.

We have seen ROI.

We also evaluated VxRail from Dell EMC. However, we went with HyperFlex because it is a Cisco product.

Give HyperFlex a try. Try a demo.

The solution is fantastic for VDI usage.