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Dell SC Series vs IBM System Storage DS8000 Series comparison

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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 SC Series
Ranking in Frame-Based Disk Arrays
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (20th)
IBM System Storage DS8000 S...
Ranking in Frame-Based Disk Arrays
3rd
Average Rating
9.4
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Frame-Based Disk Arrays category, the mindshare of Dell SC Series is 14.9%, up from 11.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM System Storage DS8000 Series is 16.2%, down from 26.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Frame-Based Disk Arrays Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Dell SC Series14.9%
IBM System Storage DS8000 Series16.2%
Other68.9%
Frame-Based Disk Arrays
 

Featured Reviews

RK
System Administrator at Lovely Professional University
Storage solutions accommodate diverse drives and offers good resiliency
Technical support is good. I can log complaints online through the portal and have engineers in line. I can also take dedicated engineers if needed, although this involves a different support cost. As far as my requirements are concerned, it is working fine. There are two or three types of support. Standard support involves logging a complaint and receiving a call from the OEM on the same day, but hardware replacement takes two to three days. Advanced support offers instant replacement without delays. Hardware support terms include calling or emailing the company or logging the call in the portal to receive remote support, or getting a dedicated engineer or account manager from Dell.
it_user1303074 - PeerSpot reviewer
Team Leader at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
An advanced enterprise storage system with a powerful throughput feature
I use this solution to lighten the workload. Oracle databases and SQL databases have a high workload in IBM The high throughput feature is the most powerful thing in this product. The GUI isn't as user-friendly as other options. The price could also be better. I would like to see a better GUI…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's very scalable, especially with federation. If you outgrow the number of spindles that a unit can support, depending on the model, you can go into federation."
"Component support was great; on a scale of one to ten they were a ten, they were always helpful."
"The support is good."
"We never had a single crash with this product."
"Technical support is really good. We have had good, high-quality support with our SC Series."
"It has a good price point and offers some value-added enterprise features."
"I would recommend to buy Dell EMC 3020 to anyone researching these type of solutions."
"There's some new stuff coming with 7.3, which just got released, where they're spreading the sparing across the whole array, rather than having a dedicated spare disk, and have it sit there and do nothing until one of them dies, and then it kicks in - and having to rebuild all of that. Now, they'll do the sparing across all the disks and they say that is going to add not only space but performance to the array, with 7.3."
"I really recommend the IBM DS8000 solution as it is the most advanced technology available for storage solutions."
"We have had no outages now for literally six years and that's really impressive."
"These are global mirror and replication for DR, which allow us to do a lot of DR testing."
"The main benefit is from the standpoint of recovery; recovery time and being able to quickly replicate data."
"The solution is very stable; there aren't any problems there at all as it doesn't have bugs or glitches and doesn't crash or freeze, and we've found it to be very reliable."
"The Global Copy and Global Mirror features are the solution's most valuable aspects."
"The high throughput feature is the most powerful thing in this product."
 

Cons

"While the price is competitive, in the next release it would be better if they could reduce the fees."
"We had times that we needed a file service solution. We've used FluidFS, but it's a solution that is being transitioned out."
"This system is not a good fit for most customers. It's not only the fact that it's too old, but it has not developed any more since Dell bought it."
"The lower model, the 3000, should have duplication. It doesn't right now. It's only from 5000 that this is offered, but it depends on the performance. It could be they don't offer it on lower models because the duplication is too much of a burden to the performance."
"I would like to see an integrated key manager in the controllers. Currently, it's an external product. It would be nice to have the option of having a built-in key for self-encrypting drive features."
"I would like the ability to monitor and manage the storage. The web GUI is not fully there."
"We have seen some degraded throughput with mixed workloads. We have been working with Dell EMC to correct some of these latency issues."
"What I understand is that this is a 13 year old architecture, so it has lived its life and they're phasing it out. Honestly, we were initially struggling with the integration with VMware (but it was fixed with the VMware 6.5) and, then, it was around a 10GB network. At that time, it had the longevity to go to 100GB as well. It got us thinking about, when we go into the containerized architecture, what do we need to do to fix the infrastructure?"
"I would like it to be easier to use. Some of it is so complex that we've got a lot of scripts and automation and things tied around it."
"The solution should embedded replication switches into the hardware instead of using them externally."
"We need the GUI feature to be improved. If the GUI is good, then it is easier to manage with just the clicks, rather than going in with CLI and commands to do the stuff."
"Sometimes when we do encounter problems, but not a complete system shutdown, that gets a little bit frustrating."
"The GUI isn't as user-friendly as other options."
"The pricing of the solution is difficult to deal with. Lower pricing would be preferred."
"On the open system side, it's a little different."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have found it to be affordable. Comparing the cost with other hardware, it seems to be right in line with the compute and the storage that we get with it."
"Pricing depends on varying life cycles."
"The scalability seems a bit more expensive than even buying a brand new one so far. That has been kind of a drawback."
"We were able to afford two tiers of flash storage at a price where the competition was giving us one tier or just a handful of discs."
"Support typically depends on the array. It can range anywhere from $7,000 to a couple of hundred thousand dollars."
"We have found the solution to be affordable."
"Always keep in mind, this is not just a enclosure with disks is a complete SAN as a service. There is software, license, and storage in one single solution."
"The maintenance is usually pretty good. It's not like some of the others where they increase it in the fourth, fifth, or sixth years."
"The license is very expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Healthcare Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell SC Series?
In our case, we received favorable pricing with Dell because of our strong partnership. While I acknowledge that Dell SC Series can be expensive for many companies, we received good discounts. The ...
What needs improvement with Dell SC Series?
For us, it is a great product. The deduplication and compression could potentially be improved, though they are already good. We cannot identify any significant areas that need improvement.
What is your primary use case for Dell SC Series?
We use Dell SC Series in a VMware environment.
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

SC Series Storage, Compellent
System Storage DS8000
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

TGen, Frost Science, Gerrie Electric
Renfe, Park Nicollet Health Services, Ricoh Americas Corporation, SK Energy, SWK STADTWERKE KREFELD AG
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell SC Series vs. IBM System Storage DS8000 Series and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.