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Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] vs Dell vSAN Ready Nodes comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
90
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Dell vSAN Ready Nodes
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
HCI (10th)
 

Featured Reviews

Nuno Mendes - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Manager - Resp.Department at Parvalorem
High performance solution that makes it easy to efficiently manage VM resources
In our case as a credit recovery company working with the state, our infrastructure is fixed and stable as we don't have the same need for growth as other types of companies. That said, one of the biggest problems with HyperFlex HX is that if you want to adjust your solution in terms of processing power, memory, or disk capacity, you have to buy completely new hosts. From a financial perspective, it can be very expensive to do so, and from a legal perspective, there are all kinds of compliance issues we would have to sort out before buying any new solution or application. Since we as a company will only be operating for perhaps the next ten years, when our HyperFlex solution comes to its end-of-life in 2024 our next step will likely not be with HyperFlex or any other solution from Cisco. Instead, from a financial point of view, we will likely turn toward a cloud solution because, that way, we won't have to spend so much money on physical infrastructure. We are, after all, only a small company and HyperFlex can be very expensive for other companies of our size, whether in Portugal or elsewhere like the United States. One other area for improvement is in regard to HyperFlex's integration with VMware. HyperFlex integrates with a specific version of VMware in such a way that HyperFlex doesn't always resolve security issues with VMware at the same pace as what you see in native implementations of VMware. This has happened in one or two situations in the past. On the other hand, the integration is otherwise adequate, especially in terms of availability and virtualization features (such as being able to split up each of our four hosts within VMware).
HH
Systems Engineer at FNB South Africa
Virtual environment achieves seamless management and reduces downtime through improved fault tolerance
With regards to storage area networks versus virtual SAN, vSAN is better off. It is much faster because the disk is within, utilizing NVMe type disks running SSD for the OS and capacity, making it easier to expand storage. It is stable, and similar to any issues on a standalone machine, there's resilience; if we lose one host, data will not be lost because of the technology on vSAN that allows us to free up that host into maintenance mode without issues. The benefit of using vSAN is that it's easy to manage on vCenter. You can see if there are issues, get recommendations, and overall, it's highly fault-free which is beneficial because we want to minimize downtime. Operationally, we perform well enough during the week; the only time we are highly operational on vSAN is when we do switch upgrades on the MX7000 switches and firmware, which we schedule outside of business hours.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the big benefits of using this solution is security, as it allows us to authorize our residents to come in using their own personal devices to access any of our clinical applications and ensure that the PHI is secure and protected."
"Return on investment is really immediate and substantial."
"By configuring networks, we are saving power."
"The most valuable feature is that it is scalable."
"The main value is it brings the total solution, so you don't need to worry about storage and also networking."
"I love the Cisco design, the visual interface to manage and use the platform."
"The solution is easy to use and to learn. It is well integrated with VMware."
"The initial setup was straightforward. With our partners and the consultancy that we had, we knew what we wanted to do. Therefore, we didn't have any problems with the installation and parametrization."
"They are heading in the right direction and moving to integrate everything with a hybrid cloud, and moving workloads back and forth."
"We previously used the old traditional type of file storage and we switched because there was almost no difference in cost but we got a product with much better features."
"The support was very good."
"The solution immediately expands storage area when you add nodes."
"Dell's technical support is generally very good."
"The tool's most valuable features are compression and its usage in Kubernetes."
"vSAN ReadyNodes offer easy scalability, which has proven beneficial for storage needs."
"This is a product I recommend."
 

Cons

"There are sometimes issues with memory failure."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is stable. However, this solution has a lot of dependencies, and if there is a single point of failure the solution will be impacted."
"Its price is a big road blocker when competing against Nutanix and VMware, which are its main competitors."
"One aspect that really needs to be looked at, is to fix the bugs issue."
"If you need to expand, scalability is an issue."
"The initial setup could be faster, due to the prerequisites."
"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."
"The product is expensive. Other solutions are cheaper."
"The deployment is done by doing it one by one and could be simplified."
"Dell vSAN Ready Nodes' deployment is complex."
"The Dell VxRail solution is based on vSAN Ready Nodes, but the Dell VxRail is fully automated. It would be helpful if this automation feature could be added to the Dell vSAN Ready Nodes. For example, we need to install VMware ESXi, and manually expand the cluster."
"The Dell vSAN Ready Nodes can be improved if Broadcom reverts to VMware's previous licensing approach because they've made it difficult for smaller environments to consume the product."
"This product is not sufficiently scalable."
"Upgrades are carried out manually."
"Currently, it's like a black box that only Dell technical support knows how to handle."
"Although vSAN ReadyNodes work well, a faster firmware lifecycle with the release of validated firmware catalogs more quickly would be a desired improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a 30 percent additional premium that all the companies are charging for Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series because of the lack of chips and bottlenecks in the market. The cost of the solution is high right now."
"We would not have invested if we didn't feel the return was there for our customers."
"There is no additional licensing cost other than the cost for each part."
"The product is expensive. Other solutions are cheaper."
"They are not the cheapest on the market. But there's an old saying I like to quote: "If you know that you are getting what you pay for, it's fine if it's expensive.""
"Initially HyperFlex was a little costly, it was higher, but Cisco wanted to get into our company, so they gave us a fair discount."
"One of the challenges we have with HyperFlex is that they have a subscription fee for the operating system that runs on it, and if I remember correctly, it costs approximately $15,000 USD per month."
"There is a license required to use this solution."
"The solution is more expensive than a traditional array. The prices are skyrocketing."
"There is a problem, which is the lack of an integrated price structure."
"Comparing the price of Dell vSAN Ready Nodes to other solutions it is not expensive."
"The tool's pricing is competitive compared to others. The tool's licensing is based on annual subscriptions."
"The price of the solution was reasonable."
"My company makes yearly payments towards the licensing charges attached to the solution. The solution is expensive."
"We have a four-year contract to use Dell EMC vSAN Ready Nodes."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Construction Company
15%
Marketing Services Firm
9%
Educational Organization
7%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Government
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business24
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise57
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

How do I choose between Cisco Hyperflex HX Series and Nutanix Acropolis AOS?
Cisco HyperFlex HS series vs Nutanix Acropolis AOS Cisco HyperFlex gives extended hyper-convergence functions from core to edge and multi-cloud environments. It helps IT and OT teams deploy hyper...
How does VxRail compare with Cisco HyperFlex HX Series?
VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if you are working with a limited budget, this platform offer...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell vSAN Ready Nodes?
There is no specific licensing model for vSAN ReadyNodes as it is linked with Broadcom VMware's solutions rather than Dell's. As a group under Comcast, we receive very good pricing from Dell due to...
What needs improvement with Dell vSAN Ready Nodes?
I would want VMware to ensure that when there's a hardware failure on a host, it should gracefully migrate the VMs to another host available in the cluster without restarting, which would be a grea...
What is your primary use case for Dell vSAN Ready Nodes?
I am familiar with VMware Workstation, but we don't actually use a workstation. We only use ESXi because we're running a big organization. We have people that are responsible for a Citrix farm that...
 

Also Known As

No data available
vSAN Ready Nodes
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

BluePearl Veterinary Partners, Ready Pac Foods, Bryant University, Bellevue Group, KPIT Technologies, City Harvest
Rackspace
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