Amazon FSx vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon) comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Dell Technologies are both solutions in the File and Object Storage category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #15 with an average rating of 8.3, while Dell Technologies is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.7. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 1.1% mindshare in FaOS, compared to Dell Technologies’s 7.1% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 97% of Dell Technologies users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

Dell PowerScale and Amazon FSx compete in the enterprise storage solutions category. Dell PowerScale has the upper hand in customer service, while Amazon FSx is preferred for its advanced feature set.

Features: Dell PowerScale delivers robust data scalability and easy management, supports vast data growth, and excels in network-attached storage capabilities. Amazon FSx offers flexibility through storage types like Lustre for high-performance computing and Windows File Server, aligning features with cloud-centered needs, and enhancing integration with AWS services.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Amazon FSx simplifies deployment and scaling with seamless AWS ecosystem integration but suffers mixed perceptions regarding support. Dell PowerScale, despite a complex setup, benefits from reliable customer service, appealing to enterprises requiring thorough assistance.

Pricing and ROI: Dell PowerScale involves a notable upfront investment but offers strong ROI through scalability and efficient data management. Amazon FSx employs a pay-as-you-go model, reducing initial costs and providing flexibility in expenses, enhancing ROI for cloud-centric needs.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon FSx vs. Dell PowerScale (Isilon) Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon FSx vs. Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

December 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the File and Object Storage category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 5.3%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Amazon FSx is 1.1%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is 7.1%, down from 8.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

File and Object Storage Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Dell PowerScale (Isilon)	7.1%
Pure Storage FlashBlade	5.3%
Amazon FSx	1.1%
Other	86.5%

File and Object Storage

Featured Reviews

MikaelHellström

IT Manager at Regin Dalarna

Has handled backup storage needs reliably and supports seamless upgrades

In environments requiring high throughput and low latency, Pure Storage FlashBlade provides high throughput and normal latency, but we do not have any application that requires low latency right now, so the latency of three to five milliseconds is considered kind of high. Pure Storage FlashBlade's ability to integrate with enterprise applications is not important for us, as we only want to present an S3 bucket for our backup, which we have done, and it works very fast. We use the Purity software's data reduction techniques; we have a backup software that compresses everything before sending it to the S3 bucket, achieving a data reduction of 1.1 to one. I would recommend Pure Storage FlashBlade to other companies because it's a very fast and scalable solution for anyone who needs it. On a scale of 1-10, I rate this solution an 8.

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MuhammadAzhar Khan

Senior DevOps Engineer at Alibaba Group

Shared storage capabilities provide enterprise value with good reliability

Amazon FSx is more costly compared to other storage solutions like EBS or EFS. The auto-scaling feature should be improved, as it currently includes downtime. I need to manually increase the storage, which is not ideal. Integrating FSx with Windows Server is challenging; it's a long process involving Active Directory (AD) setup and synchronization.

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Bill Engelmeyer

Systems Engineer at Unisity LLC

Flexibility and reliability have supported seamless data growth

I cannot think of anything to improve about Dell PowerScale (Isilon). The hardest challenge we have is due to how we've bought things over time. The way that we moved to the PowerEdge platform for the newer systems creates a scale problem as I still buy the older style systems, which are more dense storage. They're different chassis, so the problem we run into in the data center is the depth of the actual equipment. The newer equipment, if we buy an FX910 or a 900, it's a lot shorter in scale than if I buy an 83,000, which is much bigger. This makes it more complicated for deployment.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The snapshots, replication, and the ability to have immutable blades are the most valuable features. You're putting data snapshots out in those blades, and they cannot be touched. Its performance is great."

"It performs well and it is also very fast."

"The most valuable features are the Metro clustering, and disaster recovery."

"I would rate Pure Storage FlashBlade a ten out of ten."

"Speed and ease of use are the two most valuable features."

"The main feature I have found to be product replication."

"Among its most appealing features are its ease of handling and minimal maintenance requirements."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is user-friendly. It's replication feature is great because it has active replication and active DR. That's the beauty of the product. It's a perfect solution for block storage."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"I rate the stability of Amazon FSx ten out of ten."

"FSx operates as an independent service, not tied to any server, which eliminates dependencies between applications for storage."

"We used it for disaster recovery perspective behind a number of resources, like batch services and RDS."

"On a scale of one to ten, I would rate Amazon FSx a ten."

"The shared storage capability is highly valuable."

"Our main goal is to do disaster recovery with whatever solution we use and Isilon makes it pretty simple to replicate those workloads over to our secondary data center."

"Dell PowerScale has the SmartConnect and SmartConnect Pro features. That's why I like the product."

"It assists with eliminating storage silos because it provides SMB and NFS protocols. PowerScale has also helped free up our employee's time to focus on other business priorities."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is the unlimited scalability. The tool has high availability and high storage capacity."

"Dell has the AI to protect the EMA."

"The features of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) that I appreciate the most include the scale of architecture and the way it is designed, which benefit my company by providing less downtime and less overhead."

"The solution provides massive performance, scalability, efficiency, and ease of management."

"It has allowed us to have more consistent quality controls. It has also allowed us to expand the number of servers in clients processing and accessing data, allowing us to get a lot bigger projects out the door."

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) pros

Cons

"We initially encountered challenges with the assembly process due to issues with the documentation required during setup, an area where Pure Storage needs improvement."

"An area for improvement in Pure Storage FlashBlade is its price. It could be reduced. The technical support for Pure Storage FlashBlade also needs improvement. It used to be good, with more experienced engineers. Nowadays, it isn't, and it takes longer for support to solve problems."

"In my opinion, one way Pure Storage FlashBlade can be improved is by having more compatibility between the FlashArray and FlashBlade, allowing for synchronized data between both platforms."

"Compared to, for example, Hitachi NAS, the solution is not mature at all. It's just in its infancy as far as technology goes."

"There could be improvements in public cloud integration."

"To improve FlashBlade, some analysts suggest enhancing its handling of relational database management systems and SQL queries."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade should improve on more cloud integration."

"I would like to have Snapshots and Snapmail in the next release. People who came from a NetApp background, especially expect these features."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"I've been facing a challenge when doing a failover from FSx side. AWS console does not refresh within a half hour."

"Amazon FSx is more costly compared to other storage solutions like EBS or EFS."

"From my experience, there are areas in Amazon FSx where more performance is needed, as they will be looking for higher IOPS."

"A direct FTP feature would be beneficial instead of relying on transmission services."

"Amazon FSx is more costly compared to other storage solutions like EBS or EFS."

"Dell's customer service needs improvement."

"They could improve implementation, as we had to rack and stack it ourselves."

"The solution’s interface and pricing could be improved."

"We have issues in Brazil with the procurement of solutions because we have to check the entire market and justify the pricing to our audit institutions, making it difficult to keep with the same vendor."

"The portal is really complicated to figure out features and functions, and it could be easier to navigate."

"The product needs to improve CLI since commands are complex. The search option is also difficult since you must give the full path."

"If I could improve one thing on Dell PowerScale (Isilon), it would be better object storage as it recently breached into S3, and that capability could be broadened."

"The downside of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is that if we are replacing a drive, sometimes in the worst-case scenarios, some of the other drives will also go to the SmartFail state."

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."

"Our licensing is renewed annually."

"It is within reason for what you get. From what we have found comparing it to other vendors, it is in the same range as others. Given the choice, we would definitely redeploy it based on the cost."

"The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate."

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is a hardware appliance, and it's very expensive if you compare its price with other solutions. You can get the same features and benefits from its competitor, VAST Data, but for half the price of Pure Storage FlashBlade."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"The lowest price I have paid is $370 or $380 per month, while the highest can exceed $3,000 per month."

"The pricing is expensive, but I think it's a fair value because it does manage itself. It definitely is much simpler than any of the other scale-out storage platforms that we've looked at in the past."

"I always want things to be less expensive. However, I would say the pricing is fair. Their costs are in alignment with their competitors. It is a good value for the money."

"Our company finds the pricing high, but it decreases over time."

"We use the TNA approach which is a great opportunity for us to better manage the licenses based on how much consumption is available for the different customers so we can use that approach and scalability."

"The pricing for this solution is reasonable."

"Price was also a significant factor in our decision to go with PowerScale. The team at EMC, now Dell EMC, came through with a highly competitive offer that tipped the scales towards their solution. There was only one other solution around the same price point, but it could not match PowerScale on features. That other solution is no longer on the market."

"The price of the solution can fluctuate. The price can be competitive or other times not. The price of the solution could be better."

"The price of the solution is high."

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Manufacturing Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

11%

University

Retailer

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	21

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	17
Midsize Enterprise	19
Large Enterprise	42

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Regarding pricing, it is okay; we needed exactly this in size, and the price was a lot lower than competitors, making...

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What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

In my opinion, one way Pure Storage FlashBlade can be improved is by having more compatibility between the FlashArray...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Amazon FSx?

From my experience, there are areas in Amazon FSx where more performance is needed, as they will be looking for highe...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Amazon FSx?

Our customers mainly use Amazon FSx for high-performance computing. Our customers are mainly in the Life Science and ...

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What advice do you have for others considering Amazon FSx?

There is an ongoing project where my customers are exploring the FSx solution, but not yet for AI-driven projects; th...

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What do you like most about Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?

The solution provides massive performance, scalability, efficiency, and ease of management.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?

As for my experience with the pricing, setup cost, and licensing, we have had Dell PowerScale (Isilon) for a while no...

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What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?

I think Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is very good right now. Perhaps improvements could be made on the CPU level with a b...

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Comparisons

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 9% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 9% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 7% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 6% of the time

Dell ObjectScale vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 6% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Amazon FSx

Compared 19% of the time

Azure NetApp Files vs Amazon FSx

Compared 10% of the time

Amazon EBS (Elastic Block Store) vs Amazon FSx

Compared 10% of the time

Nasuni vs Amazon FSx

Compared 6% of the time

VAST Data vs Amazon FSx

Compared 4% of the time

More Amazon FSx Competitors

NetApp FAS Series vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 18% of the time

Qumulo vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 7% of the time

Dell ObjectScale vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 5% of the time

HPE StoreEasy vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 4% of the time

VAST Data vs Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

Compared 4% of the time

More Dell PowerScale (Isilon) Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

January 2026

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

Cloud Storage

January 2026

Download Amazon FSx product report

Buyer's Guide

Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

January 2026

Download Dell PowerScale (Isilon) product report

Also Known As

No data available

Amazon FSx for Windows File Server, Amazon FSx for Lustre

PowerScale, Dell EMC Isilon

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

Amazon FSx makes it easy and cost effective to launch and run popular file systems. With Amazon FSx, you can leverage the rich feature sets and fast performance of widely-used open source and commercially-licensed file systems, while avoiding time-consuming administrative tasks like hardware provisioning, software configuration, patching, and backups. It provides cost-efficient capacity and high levels of reliability, and it integrates with other AWS services so that you can manage and use the file systems in cloud-native ways.

Amazon FSx provides you with two file systems to choose from: Amazon FSx for Windows File Server for enterprise workloads and Amazon FSx for Lustre for high-performance workloads.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Dell PowerScale leads in unstructured data management with unified file and object storage, massive scalability, security, and cloud adaptability, enhancing AI, analytics, and enterprise applications with exceptional performance and resilience.

Dell PowerScale Isilon provides a comprehensive platform for unstructured data, excelling in scalability, management, and performance. With features like single-pane management, SyncIQ, and SmartQuotas, it handles large datasets with flexibility and robust security. Its multi-protocol support and seamless expansion improve operational efficiency. While it offers strong data protection, enhancements in cloud integration, cybersecurity, and performance are sought. Users note potential for cost reductions and streamlined configurations and mention desired improvements in object storage handling and NFS support.

What are the key features of Dell PowerScale Isilon?

Single-pane management: Simplifies data control and monitoring through a unified interface.
SyncIQ: Ensures efficient data replication for business continuity.
SmartQuotas: Provides intelligent quota management for optimized storage allocation.
Multi-protocol support: Facilitates cross-platform data access and integration.
Seamless storage expansion: Allows effortless scaling to accommodate growing data needs.

What benefits should users consider when reviewing Dell PowerScale Isilon?

Operational efficiency: Reduces workload with easy management and automation.
Enhanced security: Offers comprehensive data protection and recovery options.
Scalability: Supports large-scale data storage with flexible growth capabilities.
Performance: Delivers high-speed data processing for demanding applications.
Integration flexibility: Adapts to on-prem and hybrid cloud environments for diverse deployment needs.

Organizations across industries utilize Dell PowerScale Isilon for large-scale unstructured storage, supporting applications like video archiving, genomic data storage, and high-resolution imaging. Educational institutions, research centers, and media enterprises rely on its scaled-out storage capabilities, providing centralized, secure storage for diverse applications in hybrid, cloud, and on-prem environments.

Dell Technologies

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Neiman Marcus, T Mobile, Docxellent, Matrix, Lyell

OMRF, University of Utah, Translational Genetics Research Institute, Arcis, Geofizyka Torumn, Cyprus E&P Corporation, Colburn School, Columbia Sportswear, Harvard Medical School, University of Michigan, National Library of France,

Buyer's Guide

Amazon FSx vs. Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

December 2025

Free Report: Amazon FSx vs. Dell PowerScale (Isilon)

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