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Dell XC Appliance vs VxRail comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 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

Dell XC Appliance
Ranking in HCI
17th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.5
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VxRail
Ranking in HCI
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
134
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Dell XC Appliance is 1.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VxRail is 13.2%, down from 19.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
VxRail13.2%
Dell XC Appliance1.4%
Other85.4%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Enables seamless integration with multiple software and outstanding AI tools
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it. I find it overly reliant on VMware. In cases of company mergers involving different platforms, software that can handle a multi-hypervisor environment would facilitate quicker integration.
Saleh Khalid - PeerSpot reviewer
computer scientist at Imam University
Experience improved integration and cost-efficiency while facing support challenges
The best features of VxRail are its compatibility with VMware, its hyper-converged solution capabilities, and its single line of support. These are the most beneficial aspects of VxRail. I switched from the previous HP solution to Dell solution because it was a good decision. With HP servers, we dealt with a vendor for the compute servers, another vendor for the storage servers, and another vendor for the networking, which required us to manage multiple vendors. Now, we have a single team who can handle VxRail and a single line of support. We don't need anything other than that, and these are the differences we noticed after we switched.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What I like the most is that it is easy to implement, easy deployment and that it's easy to manage."
"It's an extremely stable solution, and I highly recommend it."
"From a single screen, I can view VM details, performance, and hardware issues, such as power supply or fan malfunctions, along with RAM module problems."
"When we compare it to normal hardware servers, I'd say it is quite easy to configure and deploy."
"The most valuable feature is that you can assign a volume to an off-shore workload on the fly."
"The solution's hardware is great."
"The solution's best feature is its simplicity. It's so simple to deploy it. You've got the VMware, and it's own appliance. It is really helpful. The system is online within half a day and saves so much time."
"The most valuable feature is the low management overhead, and the lower skill set required to manage it."
"The most valuable feature of VxRail is the VxRail Manager, which centralizes resources like storage built with vSAN."
"VxRail has given us a lot of tools in a one-stop-shop environment."
"The scalability of VxRail is very good."
"The ease of deployment and management of the solution are the most valuable aspects of the product."
"Its ease of administration is extremely valuable. It allows me to make better use of my time for other tasks instead of maintaining systems through multiple administration consoles."
"It supports VDI deployment, enabling easy use for running different platforms in similar environments."
"The initial setup is simple."
"This solution ensures uptime, providing 100% availability so servers can operate without downtime. It works with VMware on the software side. The solution also has AI capabilities. The solution is stable. The solution is scalable. Customer service and support is more than satisfactory. It is easy to deploy. It can be done within a couple of hours. Overall, I rate the product a nine out of ten."
 

Cons

"The cost of using the public cloud deployment is astronomical."
"We are not always advised of new features or updates, so we must research to stay up to date."
"The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it."
"The solution's storage size could be improved."
"There should be more provisioning capabilities within the solution."
"Dell needs to do a lot of work to simplify the maintenance and life-cycle upgrades for the product."
"In the next release, I would like to see support for Docker and containers."
"Currently, there is no support for the servers that are not in the cluster."
"There is an area for improvement with VxRail, specifically the upgrade process. Upgrading the is quite complex and almost exclusively requires Dell support. You can't do it alone, so you need to have support contracts running, which could be streamlined to improve the solution."
"During upgrades, some aspects get broken, requiring us to follow up with the VMware team to fix them."
"VxRail could improve by having domain protection."
"It would be an improvement if VxRail could be integrated with some other hypervisors and not just with VMware."
"From my perspective, the main area for improvement is the license cost, particularly for the standard vSAN offering."
"My main issue so far is that the installation created a default datacenter name of "Marvin" and it cannot be changed."
"It could be improved by having more information on the integration portion of ACI."
"If we could have some out of the box ideas in integration, I think that would be a great feature."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price point is very fair for a product in this category but can vary depending on the components selected within the family of products."
"The pricing is good."
"We received a good price from Dell."
"The pricing for Dell EMC solutions is quite expensive and not really made for small or medium-sized businesses."
"The pricing is dependent on the technology and is in direct relation to the manufacturer and the components."
"This is an expensive product and that should be considered a point to be improved."
"The hardware cost associated is a bit high"
"The pricing for this solution is on the high end but we do get good value for money based on performance."
"It has a yearly subscription. It can be for one year, three years, or five years."
"The real ROI is the benefit of being able to do a true hybrid cloud, not having to move from CAPEX to OPEX in a pure break."
"VxRail is an expensive solution."
"The price is good."
"It is just as cheap to move over to an HCI solution as it is to maintain a legacy system."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
17%
Computer Software Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Energy/Utilities Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise2
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business42
Midsize Enterprise43
Large Enterprise56
 

Questions from the Community

What advice do you have for others considering Dell XC Appliance?
My advice for people who are selling this product is to first make sure that you educate the customers. The customer doesn't often know much about HCI and what the need to be using it for. If they ...
What needs improvement with Dell XC Appliance?
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's applian...
What is your primary use case for Dell XC Appliance?
Dell offers several benefits with its appliances. Primarily, I can combine them horizontally and vertically, reaching up to sixty-four nodes. Additionally, Dell employs its own artificial intellige...
How does HPE Nimble Storage compare to VxRail?
HPE Nimble Storage dHCI Vs. VxRail One of the best things about the HPE Nimble Storage dHCI is the three, two, one, zero rule. That means I need three copies of my data on two different types of me...
What Is The Biggest Difference Between vSAN And VxRail?
While both run on the vSAN technology from VMware, vSAN needs to be deployed on vSAN ready nodes while VxRail is an engineered system. The choice to choose which technology depends on two major fac...
What are the major differences between VxRail and Dell EMC PowerFlex?
VxRail vs. Dell EMC PowerFlex VxRail provides stable solutions for technical problems while at the same time not being too expensive for a company to invest in. Even if the user is working with a l...
 

Also Known As

No data available
VCE VxRail
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cardlytics, AEW Energie, Aubert, Zhongtong Information Service, Commune de Villepinte, Teikyo University Hospital
World Wide Technology Inc, Renault Sport Formula One Team, 8x8 Inc, Brownes, Canadian Pacific, Canopy, Denton, EDF, Unilin, Xerox
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell XC Appliance vs. VxRail and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.