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Dell PowerScale vs EXAScaler 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

Dell PowerScale
Ranking in NAS
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
97
Ranking in other categories
File and Object Storage (1st)
EXAScaler
Ranking in NAS
16th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.5
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
File System Software (8th), Cloud Storage (17th), Storage Performance (3rd), Cloud Master Data Management (MDM) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the NAS category, the mindshare of Dell PowerScale is 14.6%, down from 17.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of EXAScaler is 0.9%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NAS Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Dell PowerScale14.6%
EXAScaler0.9%
Other84.5%
NAS
 

Featured Reviews

SK
Solutions Architect at a university with 10,001+ employees
Operates seamlessly and minimizes downtime while meeting enterprise file share demands
The features of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) that I appreciate the most include the scale of architecture and the way it is designed. These features benefit my company by providing less downtime and less overhead. While I have not calculated an exact number regarding the reduction in downtime, we have always been using the product, so we have no baseline to compare it to. However, it is a very good product. Dell PowerScale (Isilon) scales very well with the growing needs of my company.
reviewer2544219 - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Architect at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Solution enables exceptional performance and immense scalability for AI cluster training
I am a system integrator, and my customers are using EXAScaler as the de facto parallel file system for Google Cloud. They primarily use it for large AI cluster training EXAScaler provides amazing performance in terms of sequential read and random access, and it has a significant scalability…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is stable and very user-friendly."
"The inter-cluster replication feature, called SyncIQ, allows you to set up all of the jobs and move your data entirely, either timely or all at once."
"There are also the policies that you set up on replication and purging files, and policies for something called WORM. That's a "write once, read many," where you can't overwrite certain files or certain data. It puts them in a "protected mode" where it becomes very difficult for someone to accidentally delete. We use that for certain files or certain directories, because we're dealing with video and some video has to be protected for chain-of-custody purposes. The WORM feature works great."
"The solution has simplified management by consolidating our workloads, and rather than managing all the different workloads on different storage arrays and Windows Servers, we just have one place per data centre where we manage all their unstructured data, saving us time."
"This has been a valuable solution for our business overall. It offers business continuity and replication features."
"The tool's most valuable features are scalability and stability."
"I would rate Dell PowerScale (Isilon) as a product a ten out of ten."
"Its most valuable feature is the DR capabilities replication."
"The customers who use DDN EXAScaler are happy, especially when using large AI clusters for training."
"EXAScaler provides amazing performance in terms of sequential read and random access, and it has a significant scalability advantage as it is scalable to petabytes."
 

Cons

"If they integrated some functions, as they have on Data Domain with a cyber recovery vault, it would be ideal."
"Dell's customer service needs improvement. Specifically, hardware failures under warranty should be addressed within the promised timeline."
"The product’s expansion capacity, pricing clarity, and ease of use need improvement."
"From the disadvantages perspective, if I need to replace a drive, I must shut down that node."
"For improvements, we can focus on enhancing performance, upgrading the nodes, and accessing data through Isilon for more efficiency."
"The pricing could be reduced."
"I'd like to see more Iceland products in the cloud so that we can port our data into different environments if needed. I would also like to see a virtual appliance or software-defined Iceland product."
"They should add some new services that should be for on-premises, and more analytics should be there for the data, allowing for a deep dive from that analytics, which is currently missing."
"One challenge with EXAScaler is during upgrade time, as it can be problematic when upgrading node by node. Additionally, it is not multi-protocol by nature, requiring additional hardware to support various protocols like NFS or object storage."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The general cost for a system like this is expensive. The total cost depends on your use case. You need to pay for every additional feature that you use."
"We paid an additional fee to have Dell's ProDeploy Plus team implement it."
"The solution is expensive; it is not the cheapest solution out there. If you look at it from a total cost of ownership perspective, then it is a very compelling solution. However, if you're looking at just dollar per terabyte and not looking at the big picture, then you could be distracted by the price. It is not an amazing price, but it's pretty good. It is also very good when you consider the total cost of ownership and ease of management."
"Dell PowerScale is an expensive solution compared to other products like Qumulo."
"It is a really expensive solution."
"Pricing for this solution is reasonable."
"Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is an expensive solution."
"I always want things to be less expensive. However, I would say the pricing is fair. Their costs are in alignment with their competitors. It is a good value for the money."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Government
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise53
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Dell PowerScale has been expensive. Setup costs or provisioning experience has been pleasant. Typically you have kickoff meetings and there...
What needs improvement with Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
For improvements, we can focus on enhancing performance, upgrading the nodes, and accessing data through Isilon for more efficiency. Additionally, improvements to interfaces and certain aspects of ...
What is your primary use case for Dell EMC PowerScale (Isilon)?
Dell PowerScale is our main NAS environment storage where we create CIFS and NFS file shares for users.When users request a CIFS file share, they specify the SMB share name and the SmartConnect zon...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for EXAScaler?
EXAScaler is a bit expensive, particularly when comparing the total cost of ownership.
What needs improvement with EXAScaler?
One challenge with EXAScaler is during upgrade time, as it can be problematic when upgrading node by node. Additionally, it is not multi-protocol by nature, requiring additional hardware to support...
What is your primary use case for EXAScaler?
I am a system integrator, and my customers are using EXAScaler as the de facto parallel file system for Google Cloud. They primarily use it for large AI cluster training.
 

Also Known As

PowerScale, Dell EMC Isilon
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

OMRF, University of Utah, Translational Genetics Research Institute, Arcis, Geofizyka Torumn, Cyprus E&P Corporation, Colburn School, Columbia Sportswear, Harvard Medical School, University of Michigan, National Library of France,
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Technologies, NetApp, CTERA and others in NAS. Updated: May 2026.
902,270 professionals have used our research since 2012.