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Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series [EOL] vs NetApp HCI [EOL] 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
NetApp HCI [EOL]
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.6
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

Nuno Mendes - PeerSpot reviewer
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).
MB
Crashed continuously, complex to deploy, and bad after-sales support - NETAPP FIXED the problems in 2022
Their after-sales support, SLA, and third-parties availability should be improved. NetApp's support is very difficult to engage. We have an SLA of onsite support within 24 hours. but they don't respect the SLA. Its stability was very bad. It has been crashing continuously. In one year, we got three crashes, which is unbelievable for an appliance that is guaranteed for 10 years without any crashes. In 2022, NetApp Italy, driven by the country manager Davide Marini, fixed all our issues and added additional computation power for free. This is a great example of customer care. They could have done it right the first time of course, but admitting the errors and putting in place such a remediation plan has been a very professional behavior.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's easy to get the tool started."
"The ease of use and the graphical user interface (GUI) are two of the most valuable features of this solution."
"The implementation process is okay."
"On the VDI side, because the storage is local to the HyperFlex, it was very easy and convenient. The performance is exceptional."
"Cisco provides the ability to configure BIOS, something that no one else can do, on a remote basis. That's really helpful sometimes. The bus-snooping alteration tool for BIOS is fantastic. That's one of the game-changing features that Cisco alone has at this point."
"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."
"There are some slight cost advantages when you need fewer resources to manage it."
"The most valuable feature was the backup - it was easy to back up. It was also very easy to administrate and manage the system; much easier and faster. Finally, it was easy to extend the disk capacities."
"In terms of helping us with storage persistence across private and hybrid clouds, we do store data internally and in Azure. It has allowed us to consolidate a number of workloads, across our old NetApp and a number of our older storage arrays, into a single unit and have that unit also working with Azure."
"Our goal with NetApp HCI is to have no single point of failure."
"It is easy to administrate the solution, and the company handles its technical support well."
"When you are doing lifecycles for your equipment, you can just swap out pieces of equipment. We used to do one big iron to another big iron, and that's a major migration hassle. Whereas, with this environment, you can go with small nodes, one at a time, and do a refresh."
"It allows me to move a VM set and require extra performance. I can easily move them onto it and have it just run."
"The multi-vertical aspect is what is most valuable for us. The main reason we wanted a multi protocol was because Amazon was not able to provide us with access to the same data as we could get from Linux and Windows lengths. That was our value proposition for this solution."
"It is a unique product with simplified setup and independent control over storage and compute."
"We like SnapMirror and we've been using it for many years. We also like the object storage tools, as well as cloud sync for customers wanting to integrate between the cloud and local."
 

Cons

"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."
"Cisco has to continue improve the management tools to provide a better command line interface with more functions. That would be better for administration."
"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."
"I have been receiving a memory overflow message every day when I use the solution."
"The problem is that we always have to keep an eye out for new releases to make sure that the version we're running is up-to-date."
"I would rate the installation of Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series an eight out of ten. It can be complex."
"You have to get the same servers with the same storage; they need to be identical. However, in vSAN or in VMware we don't have to do that. We can just add storage and manage it in the same server."
"The solution could improve by having more customization."
"The networking needs improvement."
"The price should be lowered. It's a little expensive."
"They could improve the packaging."
"I would like to see the implementation process improved."
"In the next version I would like to see bigger GPU types and insurance for including transparency."
"The administration side of it needs to be improved. We expect an easier interface and a single upgrade for updating the infrastructure."
"If you want to have a really dense data center then it's hard to have a big chunk of cabling going through everything."
"I would like to have the ability to replicate to multiple sites."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"HyperFlex is relatively expensive, but you get good value for money."
"When we negotiated with Cisco for the HyperFlex solution, they gave us a good price because they wanted to break into the market in Portugal for the first time. However, in general, I think it's a very expensive solution. It's a huge amount of money to acquire this kind of infrastructure."
"The cost is expensive, but there is a chance to save money in the future."
"We currently have a perpetual license, which is kind of unlimited, so we don't have the normal licensing cost, yet."
"We are on an annual subscription and the price is fair."
"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.""
"Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is expensive. It's a standard license, and we pay for it yearly. I think we pay about 700."
"If you don't look at the costs of the systems, the scalability is quite good."
"Licenses run on a yearly basis, and there aren't any additional fees other than the standard licensing fee."
"The price of the solution is okay but could improve."
"The licensing fees are renewed annually."
"This solution saved our organization time (35 percent) and money. We have a hefty group of developers, and if you multiply that by 30 to 35 percent, that is quite a bit of money."
"Its price is aligned with the market. In addition to the standard licensing fees, there is an integrator cost."
"Its pricing is lower than our previous solution."
"You still have to pay for the licensing for VMware and Red Hat licenses separately. It's not all inclusive at this point."
"There are the overall infrastructure costs. Even though the initial costing was higher, we calculated for year-to-year for five years. That brought us into a position where we decided, we have to go for HCI rather than having distributor systems."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Real Estate/Law Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

BluePearl Veterinary Partners, Ready Pac Foods, Bryant University, Bellevue Group, KPIT Technologies, City Harvest
American Showa, Children's Mercy, Coca-Cola, Consultel Cloud, Evangelische Landeskirche in Wurttemberg, Imperva, Surface Mount Technology
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, VMware, Nutanix and others in HCI. Updated: May 2025.
860,632 professionals have used our research since 2012.