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IBM System Storage DS8000 Series vs VMAX [EOL] 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

IBM System Storage DS8000 S...
Average Rating
9.4
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Frame-Based Disk Arrays (3rd)
VMAX [EOL]
Average Rating
9.0
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1392684 - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution Architect; Senior Manager Mainframe Technical Service at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Great Global Copy and Global Mirror features with an easy initial setup
We're just a customer. We don't have a business relationship with the company. I'm an outsourcing service provider and I've had a lot of experience using the solution. We have everything from DS8100 disc storage, all the way up to 8990s. I'd advise new users to read the implementation installation guide. Most of the questions are answered in there. People just tend to skim over it and don't get into the details. However, it's important in making everything run smoothly and understanding the solution. That's probably the best advice I've actually heard from anybody. At the end of the day, don't be someone who skips the instructions, and all of a sudden you have a pile of parts. I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.
Ali Yazıcı - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Service Manager at Kuveyt Turk Participation Bank
Good interface that is customizable, and the technical support is good
Our primary use of this product is for our core banking servers over FC It is a high end storage, minimal downtime, reliable, good performance, get speedy support when we need. The user interface is good, and it is also customizable. snap and clone operations easy.  Stability and availability…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The high throughput feature is the most powerful thing in this product."
"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."
"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."
"I really recommend the IBM DS8000 solution as it is the most advanced technology available for storage solutions."
"The Global Copy and Global Mirror features are the solution's most valuable aspects."
"We have had no outages now for literally six years and that's really impressive."
"It works with our replication technology, which is not SRDF, which is native replication technology."
"VMAX is a rock solid foundation to deploy applications which cannot incur a disruption of service."
"It is a high end storage, minimal downtime, reliable, good performance, get speedy support when we need."
"I like the many new features, especially the all-flash solution."
"Furthermore, EMC support is second to none, EMC engineers will visit your site to replace a disk or component before you are even aware that there is a problem (via ESRS – see below)."
"EMC has made remarkable improvements in the overall management simplicity."
"The most valuable features are the interface and performance."
"VMAX is more scalable and has better performance (gives more IOPS, more front end ports...)."
 

Cons

"The pricing of the solution is difficult to deal with. Lower pricing would be preferred."
"The GUI isn't as user-friendly as other options."
"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."
"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."
"On the open system side, it's a little different."
"Stability and availability should be improved."
"I would like to see support for high-availability."
"Resilience replication, reporting, and performance need to be improved."
"Better speed to release new features that have become industry standards. EMC created so many standards in the past. Now, it seems they are playing a me-too game and lagging behind in some areas, specifically data reduction."
"I'm always interested in ways we can scale out and avoid monolithic migrations from one array to another every four to five years."
"The cluster support should be improved."
"The only draw back is you don’t get multiple point in time copies."
"I'd like to see improvements where we can scale out an existing array and remove older controllers\drives\etc., within the same subsystem."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The license is very expensive."
"Our licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"Our licensing fees are billed on a yearly basis."
"There are additional costs to the standard licensing fee, and it just depends on the package."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
21%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise17
 

Also Known As

System Storage DS8000
Symmetrix VMAX
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Renfe, Park Nicollet Health Services, Ricoh Americas Corporation, SK Energy, SWK STADTWERKE KREFELD AG
Wentworth-Douglas Hospital, Kindred Healthcare, Cosentry, Sumitomo Life Insurance Company, Shriners, BZWBK
Find out what your peers are saying about Hitachi Vantara, Dell Technologies, IBM and others in Frame-Based Disk Arrays. Updated: May 2026.
900,644 professionals have used our research since 2012.