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Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays 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
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
231
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
21st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp EF-Series All Flash ...
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
30th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray is 6.9%, up from 6.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is 1.6%, down from 2.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is 1.4%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray6.9%
Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series1.6%
NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays1.4%
Other90.1%
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.
GP
System Administrator at PORTGUARDIAN.COM SRL
Reliable synchronous replication has protected our infrastructure and improved disaster recovery
I do not have anything else to add about how I'm using Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series beyond what I have already discussed. I do not have comprehensive information about all the features, but I can say that we have obtained many performance benefits from the storage using SSD Enterprise disk. Regarding Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series's AI capabilities, I think the best practice is to use it with double factor authentication and AI integration. I believe the accuracy and reliability of output for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series are very good, but I do not have detailed information; I would need to think deeply and try to understand more thoroughly on the web interface to provide more specific feedback. My advice for others looking into using Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is to seek a stable infrastructure with a standard price—not a high price, not a low price, but a standard price with high performance. My overall rating for this product is 10.
Tayo Olubanke - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Director at GCET
Offers flexibility and top-notch technology
You can go to bed peacefully if you have a NetApp. If you have NetApp within your data center, you get to know about power failure if you are using it. Your NetApp will still come alive. Even if it does not come alive, I can say that it is not like other tools when it comes to dealing with power failure. The tool is affordable, and the technology is top-notch. It is the only technology that has software for what we call inline compression and deduplication. All the products under NetApp are aiming to use AI. I know that you can achieve whatever you want to do with NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The performance levels and the storage have improved my organization because we're a 95% virtualized environment and we're able to allocate resources as needed and manage our whole infrastructure that way."
"The solution is very reliable."
"The performance is great."
"VMware has benefited our IT organization because we're 100% VMware, everything is running on it."
"The most valuable features are the ease of use and support."
"The stability of Pure Storage is very very good."
"It's extremely stable and has good performance."
"We have seen savings in our storage, and the speed of deployment has gone from several days to a few minutes, reducing backup and restore times from 93 days to minutes and simplifying storage for us."
"The solution's initial setup process is easy."
"The most valuable features of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series are the dual controllers, available installation documentation, and the option of multiple host bus adapter interfaces."
"My advice to others is that this is a straightforward, detailed documented, and supported solution."
"Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is quite an elementary box, no frills; it does not have all the functionality of the DM but it is acceptable, it does its task, and it integrates pretty well."
"We have had a very good experience with customer service and support, as they answer questions very fast and resolve our issues."
"ThinkSystem is a good offer and can work out well if you can work with it to fit the use cases that you have."
"I would rate the stability of Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series as a ten."
"We have been working with the solution for around a year and so far it has shown itself to be stable."
"The hardware and software of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays are easy for us to use."
"We use it for our VDI environment, and have not had any complaints with it."
"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"This storage solution is both stable and scalable, and it works for our needs."
"The main advantage of this solution is performance."
"Our use case is both corporate storage and for all of our datacenter and back-end enterprise applications."
"The end-user experience has improved the organization as a whole; the customers that the DBAs serve."
"Some of the valuable features include MetroCluster switchover, in terms of disaster recovery, it is easy to use, and flexible."
 

Cons

"The connectivity needs improvement. You do not have the possibility to have a file and block connectivity at the same time on the same machine. It has limited ability to do so."
"I would like to see box-to-box encryption on replication included in the next release."
"Beyond a certain amount of petabytes, you have to have a separate system. Basically, it's not infinitely scalable."
"Technical support needs improvement. With respect to them being able to respond, they're more marketing people, less technical."
"When it comes to Everpure FlashArray ports shown in the GUI, it would be better if, when one of the Pure array ports went down, there was a possibility to highlight that particular port which has gone down."
"It is way in excess of what we need. If anything, we could see a bit more speed. I'm just comparing it with what some of my colleagues who are implementing their own systems do."
"The capability from Pure as far as sharing out files and things of that nature is a little bit lacking."
"In the next release I would like to see integration into other third-party player providers like Google."
"Scalability on rack-mount servers is not as good as with Blade servers."
"The solution could be more scalable, although it suits our present needs."
"The product could support advanced software integrations."
"While it is a reliable product, it could be improved. It would be useful to have structured solutions replicated to other sites."
"Its performance could be faster."
"In the next release, I would like to see support for Hyper-converged infrastructure."
"In the next release, I would like to see more functionality. But, again, it is an entry-level product."
"The features are limited."
"I would like to shrink it more, if we can. The smaller, the better."
"This solution is not available to many users because the cost is very expensive."
"Its pricing should be better. Its price is competitive, but they need to improve the pricing. They have different licensing models, which they need to improve. My expectation was cloud integration, which they have, but it is a different license. Therefore, people cannot enjoy it. If I want to use it, I need to pay extra. There is a cost involved for everything, but it should reach everyone. It is similar to having a Rolls-Royce, but you need to pay extra for the key. If you want the key, you need to pay."
"NetApp could improve the speed of the rebuilding rate."
"It was difficult to implement and lacks some additional features that would be useful, but as a solution fits a particular need for our organization."
"Better integration with other brands is important so we would like to see it easier to integrate."
"Their problems are on the software and the controlling of the storage where they lack segmentation and federation."
"Some of the processes are difficult and others are simple."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of Pure Storage is subjective and determined by your environment. Pure Storage tends to be more expensive than NetApp, but it is cheaper than EMC. Performance varies with data workload, making cost considerations complex."
"Pure came in at a better price point than EMC and performed better than Compellent."
"The pricing of Pure Storage FlashArray is reasonable."
"The cost was initially high, but once more people were using it, the costs came down. This was because the University was reselling it to other departments."
"It is not the cheapest one out there. We're paying yearly, but I'm not 100% sure."
"Pure is typically more expensive than everyone else. You get what you pay for, but I have lost deals to similar solutions because of pricing. They include everything, and that's another positive about Pure Storage. They aren't trying to nickel and dime their customers for different features. It is all included in one price. The license is by capacity, and the price depends on the capacity and the discount we're getting from the vendor. You get the SKU of the physical appliance, support, and maintenance, and that's it. You're licensed for whatever feature they offer. It is all rolled up into the price of the appliance."
"The price is very reasonable when compared to other solutions."
"The pricing is an issue. However, being all-flash, it will always be sort of expensive."
"The solution's price could be better."
"The best thing about this solution is its price, which reduces our costs."
"The pricing for this solution is good compared to HP or Dell EMC."
"It is an expensive solution."
"The price of the Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is a one-time purchase. There is a global price list available to find the price of the solution."
"We have a five-year contract for providing support."
"All of the features are bundled together, and you can renew the bundle with all of the features included."
"The pricing is fair and low compared to other products in this category."
"They provide licenses upon purchase, so there's no need for additional licenses. Regarding additional expenses apart from the standard licensing fees, such as for support or maintenance, there aren't any. Updates take around twenty to thirty minutes, including rebooting the systems, and we haven't faced any problems with the NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. We utilize various other storages like Fujitsu, IBM, and Dalian SIP, but the NetApp EF-Series stands out as we've had no issues throughout the entire year of usage."
"The pricing of this solution is competitive with other vendors here in Egypt."
"Adding more capacity will increase the cost."
"This solution is not available to many users because the cost is very expensive."
"It's a way to get relatively low-cost, very high-performance, low-latency block storage as a point solution."
"Price-wise, NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is costlier than Dell. You have to buy a lot of licenses separately."
"The pricing is comparable with other competitors and similar in mid-range solutions, and for high range solutions, it would depend on our requirements or needs."
"Cheaper pricing is always good. NetApp has been doing everything the right way. They've been figuring out things really well, going in the right direction."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Construction Company
17%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Performing Arts
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business71
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise159
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise18
 

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?
I find the pricing of Everpure FlashArray to be quite high compared to other storage solutions; however, the reliabil...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
I believe we have covered the most important features; the architecture of Pure Storage is essential, and features su...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is very good because we are a Lenovo partner. For installation ...
What needs improvement with Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?
Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series can be improved with a 25 gigabyte connection or 100 gigabyte connection.
What is your primary use case for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series?
My main use case for Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series is storage for our infrastructure and replica with another data cen...
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Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
ThinkSystem DE Series
NetApp EF540, NetApp EF-Series
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Information Not Available
RP Data, Western Oregon University, Toei Animation
Find out what your peers are saying about Lenovo ThinkSystem DE Series vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
908,877 professionals have used our research since 2012.