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Dell Unity XT vs SolidFire comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

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

Everpure FlashArray
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
4th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
217
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Dell Unity XT
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
198
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolidFire
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
33rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
33
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray is 7.5%, up from 6.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Unity XT is 6.0%, down from 7.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolidFire is 0.8%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray7.5%
Dell Unity XT6.0%
SolidFire0.8%
Other85.7%
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Lead at Wipro Limited
Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades
The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.
NR
TSG Manager at Navigator Systems
Ease of implementation and robust performance enhance multi-OEM support experience
We are limited only to hardware replacement, not administration tasks. We work on AMC products through Annual Maintenance Contracts. We provide support up to the 680 model. The XT680F is a newer model, and we support from 380F to 680F. The FlashSystem 8000 series is all-flash, and there is also a 5000 series flash model. We can compare IBM DS series, including the 8000 series for recommendations. For NetApp, we can recommend the FAS 8000 series.
Ramil Cerrada - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution lead at Globe Mobile
A versatile storage solution suitable for various workloads in cloud environments providing scalable architecture, granular Quality of Service and consistent performance
The most significant benefit lies in its exceptional performance, driven by its Flash-based architecture. This enhances routing speed and, consequently, database performance. The provisioning process is efficient and doesn't demand higher latency, ensuring optimal data transfer performance which is particularly valuable for tasks like data mining, where quick results are essential.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This solution has helped my organization by cutting down on provisioning time; I used to have to provision a VM and it would take ten minutes, now, it takes thirty seconds."
"It has simplified our storage."
"Go with Pure (or a flasher rate which is similar) because of the ease of management and performance."
"All our junior partners can administer the storage arrays. It is simple and easy to use. We don't have to dedicate a whole team of full time people to work on it."
"We currently have four Pure Storage FlashArray boxes, and all the storage boxes are on an Evergreen subscription model where we receive the latest hardware and features without any cost in a completely non-intrusive task."
"Data reduction and compression. Sub millisecond latency."
"The connections are a lot faster than what we had in the past. One InfiniBand does what we did on all of our Fibre Channels."
"It helps to simplify storage because it has an easy front-end to access everything."
"At the moment we are using it with VPLEX, which is a very big advantage for us, and although we don't use many of Unity's functions, it provides good provisioning that allows us to save space, and with the all-flash systems it is quite fast."
"The fact that it's hybrid is the most valuable feature. We have the SSD so we put our SharePoint on there and some of the stuff that requires a little more speed. For SharePoint, we want the pages to respond a little more quickly. And it's nice to be able to use the slower storage for stuff that we don't need as quickly, like file servers."
"The product has helpful local technical support."
"It is easy to set up the solution."
"We are happy with the way we have Dell EMC Unity XT configured."
"Unity has reduced the complexity and improved productivity tenfold compared to what it used to be."
"The most valuable feature is the performance; it's still an all-flash array at a good price point."
"For sites that we use it on, it gives us more flexibility and high availability solutions."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is its scalability."
"Given the ease, for the value of the product, it's a great thing to bring in and start going to the cloud with."
"The product is easy to manage and deploy, it's got full API functionality and the performance is pretty steady."
"It is very easy to scale up SolidFire."
"It's got full API functionality and the performance is pretty steady."
"Templates are already predefined for it. If you're coding it up, it will take two days. You can pick up a template right there from the API, and it just works for you. Implementation done in 10 minutes."
"If you buy the solution for its specific purpose it will work well."
"The product is stable and performs very well without any bugs."
 

Cons

"I would prefer that they lower their pricing."
"The GUI is simplistic and basic. I feel like it's explanatory, but not enough, it needs a little more to it."
"It would be beneficial to have a health check command that can be run from the CLI to ensure that all hardware components are functioning properly rather than having to enable remote access and connect to support for a health check."
"I had to contact customer support when a drive failed as I was doing a couple of OS upgrades."
"I feel like there is too much automation; the user doesn't have any manual input."
"We haven't seen ROI yet."
"I would love for them to have a hyper-converged solution."
"As partners, we should have the option to download the software, rather than have to go back through Pure to obtain it."
"Replication with VMware - it's called the vSphere Metro Storage Cluster - is lacking in the Unity and is present in Compellent."
"The price of this product can be more cost-effective."
"The interface and configuration could improve."
"We are running VMware, and with the VNXe it was possible to restore. We're using Veeam for VMware backups and with the predecessor, it was possible to mount a backup or restore a backup from a storage snapshot. With the Unity 300, this is not possible."
"The uses of tools to communicate with EMC directly. With EMC, I am not able to connect and resolve issues without assistance, so they can't do unattended maintenance on devices, which would be a massive benefit if they could."
"Software updates have to be downloaded to the root of the device. This pushes the available space to 95% utilization."
"This product lacks deduplication and compression at the current version 4.1.0. LACP is not available for iSCSI either."
"Since Dell took over EMC, the support has been very bad. Before, the support was fine. Now, the support is slow or they don't react."
"We have a large fiber channel infrastructure, and that's one area that we haven't seen implemented in SolidFire, it's more iSCSI."
"I think there is room for improvement needed with its storage capability. A bigger node is needed."
"For people using FC SAN, SolidFire is not an option because of the interface."
"Though it is a stable solution, its users may face some security issues at times...The security provided by the solution is one area that can be improved."
"One of the challenges we faced while using SolidFire was that the product line that we were using in our company was discontinued."
"The technical support is really bad and has to be improved."
"So feature-wise, I would say more reporting tools that could be merged into it."
"We've had issues with the stability of our platform."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our licensing is on a yearly basis. So, every year, we renew. We could do a three-year contract, but right now, we only do a one-year."
"The price was more favorable than Dell EMC."
"We have an Evergreen Storage subscription, which I think is a great feature."
"Pure Storage has not helped to reduce our HANA licensing costs."
"They have a standardized fee; it's been the same price for 10 years straight. I am happy with the price — I think it's good."
"When you are paying more than you were paying for the storage space, you'd like the cost to be less. If they could get into the spinning disk kind of cost, that would be it."
"When I last looked, the prices were reasonable, and we could get an excellent array for about $60,000."
"There is an annual or perpetual license required for this solution."
"Licensing is fine. We worked with a sales rep to purchase our Unity."
"Obtaining a warranty is easy."
"As far as licensing goes, I love how VMware works with Dell EMC Unity. It's great. They work hand in hand. They have made it so simple."
"In the SQL Server instances in our data warehouse, we immediately saw a great return on investment."
"It scales, but then you have to buy additional stuff."
"Compared to other EMC platforms, Unity is nice because it is all-inclusive, in terms of the licensing model. That's unique for them, compared to other manufacturers. It is beneficial. We could use replication, native, right out-of-the-box."
"One of the most valuable features is its cost. It was inexpensive compared to other arrays that we were looking at."
"The price of Dell EMC Unity XT is higher compared to other solutions. The price should be less expensive."
"It might be considered expensive, but when evaluating performance, it represents good value online because you pay for what you get."
"The price of this solution is more expensive than others."
"On a scale where one is a high price and ten is a low price, I rate the solution between three and four. It is an expensive solution."
"We would probably use SolidFire more, except we're getting more bang for our buck with our purchases of ONTAP right now, and the deal we made with NetApp, so it's more of just a cost decision"
"Based on what I heard from other people, its price was on the higher side."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Construction Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Marketing Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business65
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise151
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business62
Midsize Enterprise49
Large Enterprise94
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise17
 

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?
Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
The only issue is the pricing. Because we have competition, our customers always take another brand and say they can ...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
Our customers using Dell storage also use competing solutions. Our customers who have Everpure FlashArray may also ha...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
I saw that you have doubts about what you chose. I have a lot of experience with the constructor, honestly I can reco...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
They’re both great solutions and I’ve used both. EMC is being VERY aggressive on pricing which may be the undoing of...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
First of all the decision should be taken looking at similar products in terms of capacity and performance. I will sh...
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Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
EMC Unity, Dell EMC Unity
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Draper, Rio Grande Pacific, Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre
California Public Utilities Commission, RFA, 1&1, Ultimate Software , Endicia, ezVerify, MercadoLibre, Sungard Availability Services, ServInt, Elastx, Hosted Network, Colt, Crucial, iWeb, Datapipe, Databarracks
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Unity XT vs. SolidFire and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.