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Dell PowerEdge R-Series vs IBM PureSystems comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 1, 2026

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

Dell PowerEdge R-Series
Ranking in Converged Infrastructure
1st
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
318
Ranking in other categories
Data Center Networking (3rd), Blade Servers (2nd), Rack Servers (1st)
IBM PureSystems
Ranking in Converged Infrastructure
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure for SAP HANA (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Converged Infrastructure category, the mindshare of Dell PowerEdge R-Series is 4.6%, up from 2.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM PureSystems is 5.6%, up from 4.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Converged Infrastructure Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Dell PowerEdge R-Series4.6%
IBM PureSystems5.6%
Other89.8%
Converged Infrastructure
 

Featured Reviews

Tom van Mil - PeerSpot reviewer
Systems Administrator at Lico Innovations B.v.
Supports flexible hosting needs through seamless upgradability and strong monitoring capabilities
The most valuable features of Dell PowerEdge R-Series for me are the feature richness and the upgradability. I really love the way that it is so dynamically applicable for every situation, and they manage to have an all-in-one solution for every single situation. Dell PowerEdge has supported the growth and operational success of my company through its great compute power and price-to-performance ratio. Every time Dell is at the top of its game for us, and there is just no other brand for us that is able to reach that kind of price-to-performance ratio. Dell PowerEdge R-Series has features that specifically cater to the needs of my small company, such as iDRAC. The iDRAC system is a complete feature set for managing servers and hardware technically and monitoring-wise. It really fits in our system and our ecosystem, and monitoring-wise, it is excellent. They have all these sensors available via different protocols and end points, which I love, and the ability to manage and control everything via the iDRAC interface is just a welcome bonus. In our use case, Dell PowerEdge R-Series is very flexible. It is another computer which helps a lot because of the durability over time. They keep running, making scalability for getting more of those resources in our environment so easy.
it_user6186 - PeerSpot reviewer
Independent Analyst and Advisory Consultant at Server StorageIO - www.storageio.com
PureSystems, something old, something new, something from big blue
PART I For a certain generation of IBM faithful or followers the recently announced PureFlex and PureApplication systems might give a sense of DejaVu perhaps even causing some to wonder if they just woke up from a long Rip Van Winkle type nap. Yet for another generation who may not yet be future…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Compared to the other vendors and generations, this one tends to be more user-friendly, so you spend less time trying to get where you want to go."
"In regards to security, I have noticed that we can implement Active Directory to the iDRAC. It is more secure that way. Then, everyone can access it as they please."
"The most valuable feature is reliability. We rarely have any issues and because of this, Dell is our go-to for servers."
"The reliability and the execution of the necessary assignments are valuable."
"It is very easy and seamless to use the Dell OpenManage console for the lifecycle management of PowerEdge Rack Servers, and it is one of the best solutions in the market today to manage the lifecycle of services."
"The solution's analytics helped to decrease production downtime by more than 60%, and PowerEdge has also helped to reduce data processing and has reduced the timing for any workload."
"The most valuable feature is OpenManage. We get a lot out of OpenManage because we have a sprawling infrastructure with around 100 data centers, and managing all of those separately is challenging."
"I rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers as a nine out of ten overall."
"The strengths of the system is how the Flex scales from a very powerful, next generation BladeCenter all the way up to an IaaS platform."
 

Cons

"The solution can be improved in terms of firmware backward supportability. With the sixteenth generation servers I am using, slightly older kernels and drivers are not supported."
"While I wouldn't call it a problem, physically mounting the servers into the rails that come with the servers can be a challenge. They could be engineered to be a little bit easier to use. It's not that significant, we can manage it, but you need at least two people to do it together because they're a bit heavy."
"The management of Dell PowerEdge R-Series seems a little convoluted."
"We'd want the solution to be faster, and of course, for them to bring down the price."
"I'd like to see improvement with the analytics reports, they could be more useful than they currently are."
"There is room for improvement in certain aspects of the deployment process as it is a bit complex."
"The server itself is good, but sometimes, the salesperson forgets to sell us the right controller. It is related to sales. It is not related to the technical part."
"Customer service receives a rating of eight out of ten. A perfect ten cannot be given because there is always something that can be improved."
"The FSM does not quite deliver in the areas it plays too. A fairly sluggish interface that is more complex and less streamlined than it perhaps could be, holds it back and deployment of certain functionality from the switches requires more user intervention than feels necessary."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's a one-time licensing fee for the device and we pay a quota per year for the support."
"Dell is priced better than alternative solutions."
"The pricing is very good because there are a lot of types of PowerEdge Rack Servers. You have the R540, R640, and R740. The prices are very scalable through the specific server, e.g., small businesses can take the R640 while large businesses can take the R740 or R840. Thus, Dell technologies touch on every organization."
"The price is good for the quality of the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers."
"Dell is somewhat more expensive than HPE."
"The solution's prices are good, especially considering what you get to use...The licensing aspect of the solution is also fine."
"The more complex the server requirements, the more expensive it gets."
"The solution's analytics helped to decrease production downtime by at least 30%."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Construction Company
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business112
Midsize Enterprise66
Large Enterprise138
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

When shopping for a rack server, would you go with Dell EMC Poweredge or Lenovo Thinksystem?
Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether the Dell EMC Poweredge or Lenovo Thinksystem rack servers were the better fit for us. We ultimately decided to go with Dell EMC Poweredge....
What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerEdge Rack Servers?
Unplanned production downtime is a concern. According to our experience, when we run a high workload to a certain level, for example, more than 80% or up to 90%, the system does not perform well. T...
What is your primary use case for Dell EMC PowerEdge Rack Servers?
We run multiple workloads on Dell PowerEdge R-Series, including database and virtual machine workloads. Some of our multi-purpose VM workloads are running databases such as Mongo or Oracle. We serv...
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Also Known As

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers
PureSystems
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NxtGen Datacenter, Medien-Service Untermain (MSU), Exasol, IndigoVision, Dayco
ABT Online, Ascent Solutions Inc., Desert Research Institute (DRI), Reflexis, Esri, Avcilar Municipality, ValeCard, Computer Gross Italia S.p.A., DynaFront, Silvermoon Business Systems, Diasoft, BPTP, Temenos, Innovation Group, OneTree Solutions
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, Rackspace Technology and others in Converged Infrastructure. Updated: September 2026.
913,806 professionals have used our research since 2012.