


Pure Storage FlashBlade and Dell PowerMax are leading storage solutions that compete in providing advanced storage capabilities for enterprises. Pure Storage FlashBlade offers a better pricing model and bundled support, potentially giving it an edge for customers seeking cost-effective solutions, while Dell PowerMax's comprehensive feature set and high performance justify its higher cost, appealing to large enterprises.
Features:Pure Storage FlashBlade is known for its ease of use, rapid integration, and high throughput. It supports seamless Kubernetes deployments and simplifies storage management with features like inline deduplication. Dell PowerMax excels in high performance, strong data compression, and broad data management capabilities. Its robust scalability and NVMe support enhance performance and compatibility, making it suitable for large-scale enterprise environments.
Room for Improvement:Pure Storage FlashBlade could improve with enhanced cloud integration, better deduplication rates, and expanded feature sets for VM-Aware and microservices. Improved support for SMB customers and more straightforward documentation would enhance user experience. Dell PowerMax users seek better public cloud integration, simplified management tools, and pricing improvements. Further integration with modern platforms like Kubernetes and AI enhancements is desired.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service:Both solutions perform well in on-premises deployments; however, Pure Storage FlashBlade also offers private cloud capabilities, though there are concerns about its support response speed. Dell PowerMax is recognized for its comprehensive on-premises and hybrid deployment capabilities despite mixed reviews for technical support. Customer service can vary for both, but Pure Storage often garners praise for quicker support and proactive communication.
Pricing and ROI:Pure Storage FlashBlade has a high upfront cost but offers value through its simplicity and operational savings from reduced management overhead. Its consistent pricing model is appreciated by customers. Dell PowerMax, viewed as costly due to its enterprise-focused features, provides significant operational efficiencies and reduction in total cost of ownership, with meaningful ROI despite its initial expense.
If you wait more than seven years to buy another one, you get a return on your investment.
During a DCDR setup and migration from VMAX to Dell PowerMax, what was planned as a two-day downtime was completed in just three to four hours.
The performance metrics or benchmarks I use to measure success with Dell PowerMax include uptime as well as our response times on our platforms, both of which are exactly where we want them to be, which is five nines and as fast as possible.
My client has seen significant ROI since the install, and when you don't go down, that's an ROI in and of itself.
It does not require much management once you set up correctly, so it saves time, allowing an admin to focus on other work.
Customers always have their issues resolved promptly.
Technical support is good at least through vendors, not directly with the principal.
I would rate Dell PowerMax support as a ten, as I have never had an issue with Dell support as it relates to this product.
ProSupport Next Business Day offers part replacement within four hours for data leaks.
Dell support for Dell PowerMax is exceptional, rating a perfect 10 out of 10.
I would rate them an eight out of ten.
The support is done through email and is not that great, making it a very problematic area I've been dealing with for over four years.
Their technical support has been perfect lately, so I would give it a 10.
It hasn't broken down anytime in the last six to seven years, despite hurricanes, earthquakes, and power outages.
Scalability is not an issue.
Dell PowerMax is good for enterprises, and it also depends on how much workload you're going to bring in on Dell PowerMax in terms of performance and how many users are going to use the database you're hosting.
PowerScale is better suited for AI and overall buzz solution currently.
Pure Storage FlashBlade is scalable.
There are between 5 and 10,000 people using it in our organization.
I would rate the stability of the product at seven out of ten.
These patches can be applied on the fly without requiring software upgrades or system downtime.
I would rate it nine out of ten since there are no required downtimes, even during firmware upgrades.
There has been no downtime with Dell PowerMax; it's been extremely reliable, easy to manage, easy to upgrade, and trustworthy as we've upgraded over the years from one version to another.
In case there is any issue with any blade, the data is moved to another.
One way to improve the product is to add an operational assistant that doesn't depend on VMware.
I would like to see some AI features that would allow arrays to intelligently identify threats or unusual behavior in the data pattern and give an alert.
Storage replication should be essential.
Compared to competitors such as NetApp, which integrates with public cloud hyperscalers (GCP, Azure, AWS), Dell PowerMax lacks in this aspect.
Dell can assist by providing plug-and-play integrated templates that allow customers to drag, drop, modify, and connect with any target system for generating snapshots without logging into the storage directly.
Dell PowerMax NVMe is very reliable storage and cannot experience downtime.
Technical support definitely needs significant improvement.
Its configuration should be easier.
One way Pure Storage FlashBlade can be improved is by having more compatibility between the FlashArray and FlashBlade.
While the prices may be higher than those of other vendors, we see it as a market leader with benefits.
The support can be a bit pricey, but the solution is more cost-effective than anything else out there.
The higher cost compared to other vendors is justified by additional features, vendor-managed upgrades, and superior support services.
It is the best choice for large projects in terms of price and features compared to midrange solutions.
The price is starting from $500,000.
The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the past, but one benefit is that they have built-in ransomware protection.
Regarding pricing, it is okay; we needed exactly this in size, and the price was a lot lower than competitors, making it good for us.
Its data compression feature is the best that we have ever seen.
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed.
We are satisfied with the performance as it is significantly faster compared to traditional storage options.
NVMe provides additional fast cache, similar to random access memory (RAM), which improves overall system performance and read/write experience for users.
Dell PowerMax NVMe is very supportive of our operational growth since we require daily performance from our core banking systems and need to facilitate data movement efficiently.
The key benefits of using Dell PowerMax, quantified in terms of saved hours and saved costs, is having one single platform that provides functionality to all of our internal customers.
We can plug in many blades, and we can have data up to one terabyte.
The best features of Pure Storage FlashBlade include better throughput and better performance.
Pure Storage FlashBlade's scalability is one of the most valuable features, and importantly, it always works, allowing for seamless upgrades.
| Product | Market Share (%) |
|---|---|
| Dell PowerMax | 4.8% |
| Pure Storage FlashBlade | 2.2% |
| Pure FlashArray X NVMe | 1.4% |
| Other | 91.6% |



| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 15 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 11 |
| Large Enterprise | 12 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 17 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 15 |
| Large Enterprise | 55 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 11 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 11 |
| Large Enterprise | 21 |
Pure Storage FlashArray//X is the world’s first enterprise-class, all-NVMe flash storage array. It represents a new class of storage – shared accelerated storage, which is a term coined by Gartner – that delivers major breakthroughs in performance, simplicity, and consolidation.
PowerMax leads in mission-critical enterprise storage with advanced architecture and AI-driven automation, ensuring secure and efficient IT optimization. Its multi-node NVMe scale-out framework delivers unmatched performance and consolidation, backed by Dell’s Future-Proof Program.
PowerMax is renowned for its robust reliability, performance, and efficient data reduction capabilities. Users benefit from its NVMe architecture, aiding significant scalability and cost efficiency through effective deduplication and compression. Unisphere simplifies management, while CloudIQ provides enhanced monitoring. With high availability and strong IOPS capabilities, PowerMax effectively manages demanding workloads and ensures seamless operations. Its compact design and increased storage capacity enhance user experience, particularly with easy maintenance and robust performance.
What are the key features of PowerMax?Dell PowerMax is predominantly employed in mission-critical applications such as SQL, Oracle databases, ERP systems, and high transactional environments. Healthcare, finance, and e-commerce sectors leverage its high performance, scalability, and NVMe technology for low latency and redundancy. It is adept in storage consolidation, data analytics, and disaster recovery.
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.
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