HPE Alletra Storage vs IBM FlashSystem comparison

Hewlett Packard Enterprise and IBM are both solutions in the All-Flash Storage category. Hewlett Packard Enterprise is ranked #4 with an average rating of 9.1, while IBM is ranked #12 with an average rating of 8.5. Hewlett Packard Enterprise holds a 9.2% mindshare in AFS, compared to IBM’s 6.6% mindshare. Additionally, 98% of Hewlett Packard Enterprise users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of IBM users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

IBM FlashSystem and HPE Alletra Storage compete in the storage solutions market. HPE Alletra Storage has the upper hand due to its advanced management features and superior scalability.

Features: IBM FlashSystem offers robust data protection, high-performance capabilities, and reliability. HPE Alletra Storage provides advanced management, scalability, and intuitive controls.

Room for Improvement: IBM FlashSystem needs better cost efficiency, enhanced analytics, and customer support responsiveness. HPE Alletra Storage requires more comprehensive support resources, improved update processes, and cost-effective solutions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM FlashSystem is noted for its straightforward deployment but has mixed customer service reviews. HPE Alletra Storage is praised for easy implementation and consistently favorable customer support.

Pricing and ROI: IBM FlashSystem has competitive initial setup costs but questionable long-term ROI. HPE Alletra Storage, though initially more expensive, delivers better ROI through advanced features and long-term reliability.

To learn more, read our detailed HPE Alletra Storage vs. IBM FlashSystem Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

HPE Alletra Storage vs. IBM FlashSystem

April 2025

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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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 0.8%, down from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE Alletra Storage is 9.2%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM FlashSystem is 6.6%, down from 6.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

All-Flash Storage

Featured Reviews

Eugene Hemphill

Sales Manager at Multicomputos PR

Helps to save money and resources with the data compression feature

One point I'd like to improve is that the tool should start selling small boxes again. It discontinued some products and is focusing on bigger, more capable boxes, neglecting the SMB market. Even though it's not a big market, it shouldn't have removed them. One way to improve the product is to add an operational assistant that doesn't depend on VMware. It could also establish more alliances with other operational systems.

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Lisa Whalen

System Engineer at University of Nebraska

Provides a cloud-like operation model on-prem for managing data infrastructure

I've always said I love that it's easy to use. At one point in time, we had a 3PAR. And with 3PAR, I always thought it was a little more difficult. There was so much more to maintaining it, setting it up, and everything. With the [HPE] Alletra [Storage], it's just easy. It's easy to provision space to use and to set up. InfoSight is invaluable to me. With it, I can just quickly go out there and see what is going on. Alletra provides a cloud-like operation model on-prem for managing data infrastructure. [HPE] Alletra [Storage] is very good for predicting problems and preventing them before they occur. InfoSight has really helped with that. I honestly don't have to look at it much. However, there's the alerting and everything that will tell us what's going on. That said, I check InfoSight every once in a while. [HPE Alletra Storage] reduced the time spent on storage provision. It's so much easier than the 3PAR. It's just so much easier. I don't spend time in there at all. The product improved our storage performance experience in terms of IOPS. Our end users that use the SAP environment were a little concerned at first. We said we were going to switch over from the 3PAR to the Alletra since they've always been more familiar with the 3PAR. However, when we moved them over, they noticed a performance increase.

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Raanan Sitton

Vice President Sales at BELOCAL LTD

Offers cost-effective storage for small companies with budget constraints

IBM FlashSystem 5300 is offered at a very low cost in Israel, which is advantageous for small companies. However, other features like deduplication and compression do not perform effectively. The price sensitivity makes it a viable option for clients with budgetary constraints, as it allows us to secure deals based on the cost rather than advanced performance.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution."

"We are satisfied with the performance as it is significantly faster compared to traditional storage options."

"Everything, especially the VMs inside, is pretty fast."

"The solution is scalable."

"The Pure1 component is most valuable at this point in time when comparing it with EMC. Pure1 is where you can have your diagnostics in the cloud, so you can look at things from your mobile phone."

"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."

"The solution uses newer technology for deduplication and compression."

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe has low latency and high Ops. It is an evergreen model."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe pros

"It is the simplicity of the deployment. They have unified all the features they have."

"We have improved storage performance."

"The most important feature is scalability, which enables us to rapidly scale without any disruptions. We can easily scale up to more arrays without stopping any services."

"It's good for preventing problems before they occur."

"More deduplication and compression are valuable because capacity matters."

"The uptime is excellent."

"The stability is incredible. We haven't had a single storage event since we put it into production."

"The solution has been rock-solid since we've had it."

More HPE Alletra Storage pros

"The FlashSystem 900 consistently delivers performance below 1ms for read/write. This performance is essential for an effective SVC stretch-cluster configuration across two datacenters, and presenting active-active storage to the customer."

"The valuable features are high availability, compression, and a failover mechanism. It's a very highly available storage solution."

"This solution is convenient, user-friendly, convenient and reliable."

"IBM FlashSystem has an easy to use GUI, similar to the IBM Storewize family, which make it one of the best flash storage systems in the market."

"The initial setup is straightforward and can be done in an hour and a half by one person."

"It's a mature product. It's like a BMW that evolves consistently."

"The performance of the solution is noteworthy."

"The most valuable feature in demand is virtualization and its support storage of virtualization features."

More IBM FlashSystem pros

Cons

"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."

"It feels more suitable for small and medium-sized businesses rather than enterprises."

"Many options to check performance, like read, writes, random writes, and random reads, are missing in Pure FlashArray X NVMe."

"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."

"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."

"We need better data deduplication."

"Right now, the box itself is just strictly working as a backend storage system. It would be fantastic if we could access it directly like a NAS device through network access or SIS drives. I think they have an interface, but I am not sure how good it is. If we could address a box directly on the network without having to go through a server, it would be great. The replication schemas could be improved. We are not using replication on the storage level right now. We use a different type of replication. If their replication would be as good as the one that we have, I would probably run the replication schema because it might be faster, but I don't know that for a fact. So, I cannot say that they have good replication. All I can say is that they need to inform us better."

"I would like to see replication and DR features in the next release of this solution."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe cons

"I'd like the solution to offer more free training."

"Sometimes, with HP, there may be language barriers, and they seem to cycle through tech a lot more. That said, overall, I always get the answers I need."

"I do not have any issues with it. It has been good for us. There are no cons that I see, and that is why we use it."

"I do not have any requirements. They can maybe have more flexibility for configurations or things like that."

"We have more than traditional use cases. If they could explore new configurations for data storage, it would be ideal."

"I would like to see some form of direct connect fiber channel options."

"I need the protocol expected. I want them to include NVMe protocol in VMware compatibilities."

"Long-distance, high-latency replication enhancements would be delightful to see in future versions."

More HPE Alletra Storage cons

"Events/log analysis tools."

"We use some open-source tools for monitoring, such as Grafana and it should be bundled along with IBM FlashSystem."

"IBM could do more marketing and improve brand awareness. I had never heard of this product until a colleague told me about it. FlashSystem could add a few features, but it would probably increase the price. For example, Pure Storage offers instant snapshotting and partitioning. That would be nice to have, but I think the cost would go up."

"The solution has a low number of NVME host attachments at 16 per IO group over the fiber channel."

"The only issue my team faced was transferring the data from the old system to IBM FlashSystem, which is an area for improvement in the solution."

"The solution's infrastructure technology level could be PCI Express 5 instead of PCI Express 4 for the next version."

"I have looked at a few pages of a report I download and I saw a graph there regarding software-defined vendors. IBM is not in a good position on this graph. I know that they are working very hard on this, to make it much better and to get to a level where it's not only hardware but also software to provide a complete solution."

"Replication features need improvement. Currently, they are there in the product, but I'm not sure as to how it works exactly."

More IBM FlashSystem cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing is on a yearly basis."

"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."

"The support cost per array is about $20,000 a year for 24/7 support."

"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."

"Given its price, Pure is not the first option."

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."

"The product is expensive."

"With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe pricing and cost advice

"HPE was a clear winner on price per terabyte. It was very smooth."

"For us, its price is good."

"It is fairly priced. It is in line with industry standard pricing and cost models."

"Its licensing is good. Pricing-wise, there can be a little bit more flexibility. It would help to have different sizes. However, it fits into the budget that we have, so we are happy."

"Its pricing is very competitive."

"The solution is expensive and can cost around five lakhs."

"So far, so good."

"Overall, it was good. It had a good price per gigabyte."

More HPE Alletra Storage pricing and cost advice

"The tool is cost-efficient."

"Overall the price of the solution is expensive and this includes the license."

"It pays to go back and get the best price you can from your supplier. The first offer is not always at the best discount."

"Regarding licensing make sure you add at least three years software maintenance from IBM at the beginning, because you will not be able to download firmware updates or any fixes/patches without this."

"The price depends of the technology that our customers need. The price can come at a lower cost but this may increase as storage is added."

"The pricing may be a bit higher than other brands. If you compare the IBM FlashSystems in midrange with Dell EMC in midrange, IBM costs a bit more, but I prefer IBM because it has more specs that I can benefit from."

"Our customers would like IMB FlashSystem to be less expensive."

"We have no issues with the price as it is very competitive."

More IBM FlashSystem pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

Computer Software Company

17%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

I am an engineer and am not aware of the setup cost.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics ...

See all answers

What do you like most about HPE Alletra?

It offers rich features and high speed for transferring data.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Alletra?

Scheduling a Proof of Concept to demonstrate ROI - Will be a well documented way to portray Alletra's performance, ju...

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What needs improvement with HPE Alletra?

I would say that maybe the user interface and experience could be improved. There are a few areas where enhancements ...

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What do you like most about IBM FlashSystem?

It is simple to make an update.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM FlashSystem?

Many factors affect purchasing directly from IBM, often involving a multi-step process. Customers, especially in bank...

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM FlashSystem?

The deduplication technology in IBM FlashSystem needs significant improvement. Other vendors like NetApp ( /products/...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerStore vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 31% of the time

TrueNAS R-Series vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 18% of the time

Pure Storage FlashBlade vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 15% of the time

Dell Unity XT vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 7% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 6% of the time

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe Competitors

Dell PowerStore vs HPE Alletra Storage

Compared 28% of the time

HPE Primera vs HPE Alletra Storage

Compared 14% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs HPE Alletra Storage

Compared 9% of the time

HPE 3PAR StoreServ vs HPE Alletra Storage

Compared 8% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs HPE Alletra Storage

Compared 5% of the time

More HPE Alletra Storage Competitors

Dell PowerStore vs IBM FlashSystem

Compared 23% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs IBM FlashSystem

Compared 8% of the time

Huawei OceanStor Dorado vs IBM FlashSystem

Compared 8% of the time

NetApp AFF vs IBM FlashSystem

Compared 6% of the time

Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform vs IBM FlashSystem

Compared 6% of the time

More IBM FlashSystem Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure FlashArray X NVMe

May 2025

Download Pure FlashArray X NVMe product report

Buyer's Guide

HPE Alletra Storage

May 2025

Download HPE Alletra Storage product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM FlashSystem

May 2025

Download IBM FlashSystem product report

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X

No data available

IBM Storwize

Overview

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.

Pure Storage

HPE Alletra Storage is designed for high-performance virtualization, data centers, and hyper-converged infrastructures, supporting applications with block storage and databases across sectors like healthcare and finance.

HPE Alletra Storage excels in delivering low-latency, high-I/O operations and data reduction capabilities. It integrates seamlessly with VMware and vCenter, handling large SQL databases and multiple virtual machines efficiently. Its features, such as NVMe drives and predictive analytics with InfoSight, offer a streamlined management experience. However, users seek improvements in NVMe tier integration, a more compact chassis design, and better energy efficiency. The operational efficiency is increased by reducing data provisioning time and enhancing storage performance for complex environments.

What are the key features of HPE Alletra Storage?

Seamless vCenter Integration: Enhances virtualization management.
High IOPS NVMe Drives: Delivers high-speed and low-latency access.
Deduplication & Replication: Increases storage efficiency and protection.
Cloud-like Models: Simplifies operations with intuitive management.
InfoSight Analytics: Provides predictive diagnostics and proactive problem-solving.

What benefits and ROI can users expect?

Reduced Provisioning Time: Accelerates deployment processes.
100% Data Availability: Ensures uninterrupted access to data.
Simplified Management: Streamlines storage operations and enhances satisfaction.
Reliability and Performance: Supports demanding applications with reliable performance.

In healthcare and financial industries, HPE Alletra Storage supports the storage of sensitive data and operations of critical applications, facilitating quick access to information and maintaining high availability. However, users recommend improvements in training resources, energy efficiency, and integration with backup solutions like Veeam to enhance implementation efficiency and cost management.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

IBM FlashSystem products are enterprise computer data storage systems that store data on flash memory chips. Unlike storage systems that use standard solid-state drives, IBM FlashSystem products incorporate custom hardware based on technology from the 2012 acquisition of Texas Memory Systems. This hardware provides performance, reliability, and efficiency benefits versus competitive offerings.

IBM

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company

Accenture, Aetna, AIG, Airbus, Allianz, American Express, ATT, Bank of America, Barclays, BASF, Bayer, Berkshire Hathaway, Boeing, BNP Paribas, Citigroup, Coca Cola, Comcast, Credit Suisse, Dell, Deutsche Bank, ExxonMobil, Ford Motor Company, General Electric, Google, HSBC, IBM, Intel, JPMorgan Chase, Kroger, L'Oreal, Merck

Celero, Friedhelm Loh Group, Clarks, Mingkang Natregro Health Food Group, Sofia, Etisalat Fights Fraud, UF Health Shands Hospital, Generali, Elecon Engineering Company Limited, Ventiv , Technology, CPFL Energia, Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., SciQuest, Coca-Cola Bottling Co. Consolidated, Paddy Power, Kelsey-Seybold Clinic, Interconnect Services, Severstal IP-Only AB, PVU Group GmbH

Buyer's Guide

HPE Alletra Storage vs. IBM FlashSystem

April 2025

Free Report: HPE Alletra Storage vs. IBM FlashSystem

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