DataCore SANsymphony vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize comparison

DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize

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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 May 2025, in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 4.2%, down from 4.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DataCore SANsymphony is 6.8%, up from 5.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Spectrum Virtualize is 1.5%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Software Defined Storage (SDS)

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

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TempreviewerD

Architecte Principal at Orange

Robust with good replication and access protection

The solution is constantly evolving. Recently, deduplication and compression have been further improved to meet customer needs, and updates are easily implemented without stopping production. The update assistant checks the state of health before using good practices, during checks that the data is still presented for service continuity, and afterward, if the actions carried out are indeed active. Technical support is truly available even without a production incident. This is really essential right now.

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MD.Faisal Alam

Manager, Technical Services, IBM Storage & Backup Solutions. at Thakral

Built-in compression enhances data management efficiency

I have noticed that the technical support for software issues, such as with Spectrum Protect, needs improvement. The case logging process is efficient, but resolving software problems takes too much time. This delay can hinder customers and strain vendor relationships. For hardware issues, IBM handles them efficiently, but software-related support requires enhancement. Overall improvement in support for software cases is necessary.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We have integrated it with VMware. The integration process is pretty good. Especially with VMware, it helps with the capacity of it."

"The performance of FlashBlade is excellent. It does not necessarily leverage the SOS API that some of the newer products leverage, but I found its speed pretty much on par and comparable. It is fast, and it does what it is supposed to do."

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

"What I like best about Pure Storage FlashBlade is its object storage functionality, plus it has fast underlying hardware. Pure Storage FlashBlade is also very stable. I find its stability one of its valuable features."

"It is very easy to use, and it is very fast."

"The solution is able to handle workloads and is easy to use. It allows us to actually manage the boxes in less time."

"The most valuable features include the ease of implementation, ease of use and the speed that you can do backup and recovery on."

"The most valuable features of this solution are the rewrite speed and the nonstop services."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"An advantage of SANsymphony is its ease of use, especially when installing or upgrading the system."

"The documentation repository is really useful and kept updated."

"The platform's most valuable feature is its synchronous mirroring capability, which ensures bit-identical copies of data and offers excellent failover capacity."

"Storage is always available."

"Auto-tiering to obtain performance at a lower cost without the customer having to purchase ultra-fast storage is great."

"CDP is an important feature for avoiding data loss in the event of ransomware attacks. You need more storage capacity, however, you get the possibility to return at any time and use the data saved up to that point. The recovery is much faster than with a classic restore."

"For us, fault tolerance is the most important feature of DataCore."

"It is a very stable solution."

More DataCore SANsymphony pros

"The abstraction flair and the abstraction layer. We had a mixture of different storage arrays, and the wonderful thing about SVC is is that it normalizes all it into a single driver. A single view that all hosts see simultaneously."

"When we add storage behind it, the product is good for the customers because their customers do not notice that anything is happening due to the virtualization."

"The SVC gives excellent performance with tiered storage behind it."

"In my opinion, the quick restore, the low latency, and the ease of use are some of the most valuable features."

"The ability to have a feature-rich software set which extends the capabilities of the back-end storage arrays."

"We are happy with the support that IBM provides us."

"The biggest benefits of IBM Spectrum Virtualize are its stability, data security, and customer support."

"I like all the features, but the most impressive recently has been the introduction of IBM's Flash Core Modules. They are a form of a flash drive, but they have many more features."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize pros

Cons

"On our dedupe during our initial buy, we were expecting a number a little higher like 4x. However, we are getting about 3.6. While it is close enough, it doesn't quite hit the numbers. So, this has been a challenge."

"There is some room for new features related to authentication and integration with Kubernetes, and other solution using S3 Bucket."

"I would like to see more VM-Aware features in the next release of this solution."

"Recently, while upgrading the version code, one of the controllers failed. Replacing the controller took between 14 to 20 days."

"There could be improvements in public cloud integration."

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

"I would like to see better integration."

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

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"The graphical interface is not always very stable."

"Its interface could be better."

"The cost is becoming prohibitive since they moved to a subscription model."

"The solution could be better packaged and marketed."

"I'd like to see the company make the renewal of the software cheaper."

"We are waiting for container support (on the roadmap), as well as a user-friendly full web-administration capability, and an improved API."

"SANsymphony is missing some features that vSAN has. For example, vSAN has a special feature called continuous data protection. It provides the ability to go back in time to a given moment. You can see what was on your disk in the past up to two weeks. That's a great feature because ransomware attacks are increasingly common, and that provides you some kind of protection."

"Problem detection could be easier. It should help customers identify problems very quickly because it's not easy to analyze on the platform today."

More DataCore SANsymphony cons

"NBME support and support for a higher Fibre Channel lengths could be improved, but those are already on the roadmap."

"I would like to see more baseline replication and integration with the operating system between Vmware and IBMI."

"I hate I/O groups. If you start swapping I/O groups, they can be potentially risky. If they could get rid of the whole I/O group principle, the risk is not there anymore. I understand the fundamental thing about I/O groups, but they are risky."

"Tighter integration with cloud storage might be useful as a target for a variety of use cases."

"The case logging process is efficient, but resolving software problems takes too much time."

"GUI should be developed in HTML5 as opposed to Java."

"The only errors I find sometimes is the solution tells me I cannot operate it because a service has turned off, you can just go back to the VM, go to services, and turn back the services. However, this should improve."

"There are big arrays now, and if a customer wants add more disks to it, you have to have another array. Adding disks to existing arrays is one of the most demanded things from our customers."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In my opinion, we have paid the right price for the product. I don't think that it is too much or too little."

"I feel that the price could always be lowered."

"The price could be cheaper."

"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."

"We used a reseller for the purchase."

"Our licensing is renewed annually."

"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."

"The product is very expensive."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"The pricing and licensing are better with DataCore."

"DataCore SANsymphony's pricing is very high and should be much cheaper."

"Make sure you are made aware of the annual subscription cost when purchasing."

"It is relatively expensive, and the additional costs for hardware and storage can make it a significant investment for customers."

"This solution allows the use of off-the-shelf hardware and charges by the TB of storage."

"The solution is cost effective."

"In my case, the licensing per terabytes is very high and it must be licensed for each extra functionality."

"The cost is at the same level as other storage solutions and it is easy to understand the licensing."

More DataCore SANsymphony pricing and cost advice

"The entry point of pricing for this product is the most amazing price ever in the industry."

"We would like the CPU cycle to save more on the licensing costs for us."

"Do a proof of concept, if you are not comfortable jumping in, but do it."

"Generally the bundled licensing is more cost effective and gives flexibility to the solution. Linking into the Spectrum Suite can also be advantageous, but depends on the scale of the enterprise."

"We have struggled with Pure Storage, but people are understanding that much of Pure has been consumer grade SSDs. Therefore, when the customer is really understands what they are getting, they realize that IBM presents the same sort of value as existing vendors."

"I think it is a good value for the price."

"It has a lot of advanced functions for a reasonable price."

"I am very happy with the pricing. There is no comparison when it comes to pricing. I have looked at all solutions from EMC, Veritas, Hitachi, Dell, etc. None of them compares to IBM when it comes to pricing. I get great pricing from them."

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

27%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

19%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

21%

Financial Services Firm

15%

Government

12%

Real Estate/Law Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

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...

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

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for DataCore SANsymphony SDS?

The cost changed from a perpetual license to a subscription model, and it seems reasonable. I am technical personnel ...

What do you like most about DataCore SANsymphony?

The dashboard is very intuitive, and there are a lot of counters to diagnose what happens during a short period (like...

What needs improvement with DataCore SANsymphony?

In my opinion, there should be improvements in how to get and filter logs. However, this is not a frequent need becau...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

IBM Spectrum Virtualize is not an expensive product. It offers flexibility with different flavors, whether appliance-...

What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

IBM could improve IBM Spectrum Virtualize by bundling Storage Scale and Storage Virtualize into a single appliance. T...

What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Virtualize?

I primarily use IBM Spectrum Virtualize ( /products/ibm-spectrum-virtualize-reviews ) when I have different hardware ...

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Comparisons

Compared 21% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 12% of the time

VMware vSAN vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 11% of the time

StarWind Virtual SAN vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 10% of the time

HPE SimpliVity vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 10% of the time

StorMagic SvSAN vs DataCore SANsymphony

Compared 9% of the time

More DataCore SANsymphony Competitors

VxRail vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 28% of the time

Dell VPLEX vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 23% of the time

VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 19% of the time

IBM Spectrum Scale vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 18% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Compared 14% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Virtualize Competitors

Product Reports

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

DataCore SANsymphony

Download DataCore SANsymphony product report

IBM Spectrum Virtualize

Download IBM Spectrum Virtualize product report

Also Known As

No data available

DataCore Virtual SAN

No data available

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

Experience peace of mind with DataCore SANsymphony, the ultimate software-defined storage solution alleviating storage management challenges. Say goodbye to the complexities of managing different storage tiers and disruptions with SANsymphony's block-level storage virtualization technology, empowering you to automate capacity provisioning and data placement across diverse storage environments including SAN, DAS, HCI, and JBOD. Break down silos, control data placement, meet business continuity objectives, boost performance, and seamlessly expand or refresh hardware with SANsymphony. Benefit from features like asynchronous replication for disaster recovery, minimizing data loss, accelerating application responsiveness, and integrating new technology non-disruptively. Trusted by industry leaders like NASA, Thorntons, Inc., and TUI Cruises, DataCore SANsymphony guarantees unparalleled flexibility, scalability, and reliability, ensuring uninterrupted data access and application availability while reducing storage costs and inefficiencies.

DataCore

IBM Spectrum Virtualize is a dependable solution that improves data value, security, and simplicity for new and existing storage infrastructure. Proven over 12 years in thousands of deployments, its innovative virtualization capabilities help organizations achieve better data economics by supporting new workloads that are critical to their success. IBM Spectrum Virtualize software helps make new and existing storage more effective and standardizes functions traditionally deployed separately in disk systems for greater flexibility and potentially lower costs.

IBM

Sample Customers

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

Volkswagen , Maimonides Medical Center, NASA, Thorntons, Inc., TUI, ISCO Industries, Pee Dee Electric Cooperative, United Financial Credit Union, Derby Supply Chain Solutions, Mission Community Hospital, Bellarmine College Preparatory, Colby-Sawyer College, Mount Sinai Health System, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Quorn Foods, Bitburger, University of Birmingham, Stadtverwaltung Heidelberg, NetEnt to name a few.

Pelephone, Sprint IT Enterprise Services

DataCore SANsymphony vs. IBM Spectrum Virtualize