Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers vs HPE Synergy comparison

The compared Cisco and Hewlett Packard Enterprise solutions aren't in the same category. Cisco is ranked #6 in Rack Servers , with an average rating of 9.0, and holds a 5.6% mindshare in the category. Hewlett Packard Enterprise is ranked #3 in Blade Servers , with an average rating of 8.5, and holds a 11.9% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of Hewlett Packard Enterprise users who would recommend it.

Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Ser...

Read 31 Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers reviews

2,386 Views
2,243 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

HPE Synergy

Read 91 HPE Synergy reviews

3,744 Views
2,434 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Ser...

HPE Synergy

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers and HPE Synergy based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, IBM and others in Rack Servers.

To learn more, read our detailed Rack Servers Report (Updated: February 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Rack Servers

February 2026

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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

Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Ser...

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

4.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Rack Servers (6th), Density Optimized Servers (3rd)

HPE Synergy

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Blade Servers (3rd), Composable Infrastructure (1st)

Mindshare comparison

While both are IT Hardware and Infrastructure solutions, they serve different purposes. Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers is designed for Rack Servers and holds a mindshare of 5.6%, up 4.5% compared to last year.
HPE Synergy, on the other hand, focuses on Blade Servers, holds 11.9% mindshare, down 21.9% since last year.

Rack Servers Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers	5.6%
Dell PowerEdge R-Series	25.4%
HPE ProLiant DL Servers	20.2%
Other	48.8%

Rack Servers

Blade Servers Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
HPE Synergy	11.9%
Dell PowerEdge MX- Series	11.3%
HPE BladeSystem	9.8%
Other	67.0%

Blade Servers

Featured Reviews

reviewer1441011

Sr, Manager- Network Solution Architect at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees

Comprehensive support and integration ensure smooth cloud infrastructure operations

I may not be the right person to comment on advanced improvements because we are just using basic functionalities. We are getting all the functionalities which we used to get in other OEM rack servers. Potential areas for improvement may include a more flexible pricing model, better technical support, or tutorials from the vendor for users.

Read full review

CarlosArdila

Project Manager, Information Technology at Telelago

Helps grow horizontally or vertically within one box or chassis

The initial setup is very easy. We deployed this in two days, including installation, system setup, firmware upgrades, configuration, and network connection. By the next day, we were already deploying virtual machines. We initially began with the Blade system. As the migration to SAP HANA approached, it seemed prudent to upgrade our hardware. Consequently, we facilitated their transition from the Blade system to Synergy. Subsequently, we collaborated closely with the SAP consultancy company to oversee the migration process, ensuring seamless integration of all workloads and sub-environments. We have four people working on the deployment, including a project manager, two specialists, and one tech support.

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

"When you hear the brand Cisco, you don't really need to recommend it."

"The product's stability is good. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a nine to ten out of ten."

"The solution has improved our organization by easily integrating with our VMware and storage solutions."

"The server can be configured easily."

"Excellent server solution with incredible network throughput."

"It is very nice and stable with an easy administration GUI."

"In summary, this is a good product and it's sustainable."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is performance."

More Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers pros

"Spinning up an environment is much quicker, because I don't have to reconfigure networking and redesign everything from the ground up."

"The insert RAM feature is the most valuable, and it is a simple software to integrate with others like service desk applications and engine management."

"The manageability is its most valuable feature. It is a fully managed platform, which is very simple to manage."

"The most valuable features are the converged network adapters."

"This is a robust, stable, scalable solution."

"The composable infrastructure allows us to build our own server profiles, then build up the infrastructure that we need from compute modules."

"The solution has decreased our deployment time by 10 to 20 percent."

"We like that the solution can be arranged for an all-in-one single pane of glass, something our customers find important."

More HPE Synergy pros

Cons

"Absolutely we had scalability issues. We tried several times to upgrade, scale up, expand our infrastructure, but Cisco insists to demand excessive amounts of money."

"I would like to see a little more integration with VMware."

"Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers could improve integration with third-party solutions."

"The only thing I would change is to provide more proactive support."

"Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers could improve by adding a wider portfolio because they only have two main categories, the C-220 and 240. There is no wide range of options as other solutions have, such as Dell."

"The price of the solution is problematic, not the solution itself. It could be less expensive."

"In the version we need to use, the manager is still reliant on a full Java install on a Windows OS. This is inconvenient and problematic if you have multiple management tools on different versions of Java or if you move to a machine without the appropriate Java environment."

"The only thing I would change is to provide more proactive support."

More Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers cons

"This solution could be improved by increasing the speed on the conversion adapters. It should be 100 gigs."

"The initial setup was complex. We had a couple of bright engineers working on it, and they figured out a lot of things that they don't know... The problem was that they couldn't find documentation easily, to walk them through setup when they just didn't know the platform."

"The expansion was complex, because adding a second frame onto the original frame caused an outage."

"I didn't see a lot of valuable features with Synergy. The Blade Enclosure was easier to use."

"The networking part is very complex; it should be simplified."

"I would be more comfortable if Ansible actually rolled back the data used for automating platforms. If it could be communicated to the upstream Ansible, I wouldn't need to go back and forth and validate the libraries as we upgrade the Ansible version."

"I think the main issue with Synergy is a topology that HPE defines to connecting and creating a cluster."

"You can always improve some things."

More HPE Synergy cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution requires an annual licensing fee."

"If they plan to expand their infrastructure in periods, then simply Cisco is not a good choice."

"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis, which is only $2,000 or $3,000."

"We have to pay for the VMware and Cisco licenses."

"The price for Cisco is a bit higher than its competitors. We paid 40k for one server."

"The solution is expensive and I give the price a four out of ten."

"This solution is a little expensive."

"The server itself isn't costly at all, but the CPU and the RAM can be pretty expensive. You can buy a UCS for $2,000, but the RAM and CPU can cost up to $80,000. The most expensive asset is the intel processor, but it depends on how many cores you want and the technology you want to use on your CPU, like Hyper-V, etc."

More Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers pricing and cost advice

"We pay about £500 for the solution."

"VMware is part of the cost. We bought the chassis, we bought the solution. The blades are roughly running us $60,000 a pop right now."

"The solution has reduced our IT infrastructure costs because we have had to buy less services than we used to."

"It costs us around $60,000 a year."

"Nutanix was really hard to implement, and it was very pricey compared to what we get from Synergy."

"The platform that we run Synergy on is all virtualized. Our primary cost is likely VMware."

"The hardware licensing cost is reasonable."

"For me, the scalability is how much money that I need to spend on switches for how many frames, which ultimately means servers. To get the best bandwidth before the most recent product announcement, I have buy new switches every three frames. The competition is shipping a product right now where I only need switches every ten frames."

More HPE Synergy pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	14

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	31
Midsize Enterprise	15
Large Enterprise	56

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers?

We are running AI on Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers, and we can do it sometimes even without any GPU.

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers?

I would strongly recommend Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers to others.

See all answers

How would you choose between HPE's Bladesystem and Synergy?

For me, choosing between HPE’s Bladesystem and Synergy came down to which solution was more powerful, reliable, and stable. It turns out Bladesystem was the winner. Bladesystem is excellent because...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Synergy?

As far as the prices are concerned, rack mount solutions are less expensive than HPE Synergy prices; however, HPE Synergy prices are higher but justify themselves as the solution accommodates all t...

See all answers

What needs improvement with HPE Synergy?

In my opinion, for future improvements in HPE Synergy, there should be better management of power consumption complexity as well as an increase in the number of servers that can fit in a single Syn...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerEdge R-Series vs Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers

Compared 42% of the time

HPE ProLiant DL Servers vs Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers

Compared 19% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem Rack Servers vs Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers

Compared 7% of the time

Dell PowerEdge XE-Series vs Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers

Compared 6% of the time

IBM Power Systems vs Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers

Compared 5% of the time

More Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers Competitors

HPE ProLiant DL Servers vs HPE Synergy

Compared 18% of the time

HPE BladeSystem vs HPE Synergy

Compared 16% of the time

Dell PowerEdge MX- Series vs HPE Synergy

Compared 13% of the time

Cisco UCS B-Series vs HPE Synergy

Compared 9% of the time

HPE Apollo Systems vs HPE Synergy

Compared 4% of the time

More HPE Synergy Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers

March 2026

Download Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers product report

Buyer's Guide

HPE Synergy

March 2026

Download HPE Synergy product report

Also Known As

Unified Computing System C-Series, Cisco UCS C-Series

No data available

Overview

UCS C-Series Rack Servers deliver unified computing in an industry-standard form factor to reduce TCO and increase agility. Each server addresses varying workload challenges through a balance of processing, memory, I/O, and internal storage resources.

Cisco

HPE Synergy, the first platform built from the ground up for Composable Infrastructure, offers an experience that empowers IT to create and deliver new value instantly and continuously. It is a single infrastructure that reduces operational complexity for traditional workloads and increases operational velocity for the new breed of applications and services. Through a single interface, HPE Synergy composes physical and virtual compute, storage, and fabric pools into any configuration for any application. As an extensible platform, it easily enables a broad range of applications and operational models such as virtualization, hybrid cloud, and DevOps. With HPE Synergy, IT can become not just the internal service provider but the business partner to rapidly launch new applications that become the business.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Sample Customers

Advanced Medical Transport, Aegean Motorway, Anilana Hotels and Resorts, Artoni Transporti, BH Telecom, Bowling Green State University, City of Mississauga, Dualtec Cloud Builders, Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Grupo Industrial Saltillo (GIS), Kind en Gezin, Kuwait Petroleum Italia, Nationwide, Quest, Talbots, University of St. Gallen

HudsonAlpha, Virgin Media, EMIS, United

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