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NetApp FAS Series vs Panasas ActiveStor comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 7, 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

NetApp FAS Series
Ranking in NAS
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
111
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (4th), Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) (1st)
Panasas ActiveStor
Ranking in NAS
22nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the NAS category, the mindshare of NetApp FAS Series is 9.8%, down from 10.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Panasas ActiveStor is 1.8%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NAS Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
NetApp FAS Series9.8%
Panasas ActiveStor1.8%
Other88.4%
NAS
 

Featured Reviews

Srikanth Purushothaman - PeerSpot reviewer
DIRECTOR at Vellore Online Systems
Has supported long-term data protection and backup while requiring better part availability and pricing options
For monitoring purposes, we normally use flash access storage exclusively. We utilize a hybrid system because we need performance, combining NL-SAS for the volume and SAS flash to use as a fast cache system that provides more IOPS. We normally implement RAID 10, which we prefer over RAID 6's n plus 2 combinations. We utilize it for data redundancy, even with write intensity on. Regarding the unified storage architecture for NetApp FAS Series, we normally opt for exclusivity unless budget constraints exist. Our IOPS are very high, reaching somewhere about 50k to 150k or 1.150k. The high performance ensures minimal latency. An advantage we've seen with NetApp FAS Series is that snapshots provide very rapid backup and fast recovery. We basically use snapshots for data protection as first-level protection, with deduplication between the two storages serving as second-level protection.
MW
Project Manager at Realnux
A stable solution with good performance and bandwidth
The tool's setup is not difficult. The deployment is completed within two to three days and we would require three engineers to handle the process. First, we need to install the software which can take around two to three hours. Next, comes the configuration and connection to the central network which is complex. It can take about eight to ten hours to complete.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The migration of the volume on the cluster is very useful and easy to use."
"Adaptive balancing is a valuable feature."
"NetApp FAS Series is simple to set up."
"It has been many years since we have had an outage due to storage because of FAS."
"What impressed me the most about these systems are their excellent reliability, ease of administering (both in GUI and command line), and their very good documentation that is easy to access and understand."
"The tool is the best one in the market in terms of pricing and features."
"​NAS stability"
"Just do it. Chances are the functionality that comes with the ONTAP software will be better than other products at a similar price."
"I am impressed with the tool's performance and bandwidth."
"We've found the product to be quite flexible."
"The stability is excellent and we've found the product's performance to be very good."
 

Cons

"The user interface could be improved."
"Regarding its pricing, I believe it is high. I utilize both HDD and SSD, where SSDs are more cost-friendly, yet HDDs are higher in cost, making it not very affordable but still useful."
"Sometimes there are bugs with firmware upgrades."
"The main area for improvement for NetApp FAS Series is price. Unfortunately, in India, NetApp price clearance takes longer than EMC."
"NetApp FAS Series should improve its price, which is expensive."
"Its operating system is very cumbersome."
"We see a lot of bugs in roll outs, and sometimes I think the first GA are late-beta deployments."
"NetApp FAS Series should introduce an FTP application for the broadcast and post-production market."
"The solution is quite expensive."
"We have received complaints from customers that the tool is not easy to use. The tool's local technical service is slow. The solution is good for Linux customers and not for customers with other operating systems like Windows. The solution should provide storage without client software integration."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product's pricing is reasonable."
"The pricing of NetApp FAS Series is reasonable for its performance."
"The solution is more expensive than other vendors."
"The process for going to cluster mode is expensive."
"The scalability is pretty good, but it's too expensive."
"It is expensive."
"In general, I find NetApp to be very expensive. That's the main issue I have with them. So it's a drawback in terms of pricing."
"I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with ten being expensive. We pay a one-time purchase price."
"The solution's price is reasonable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise59
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which SAN product would you choose: IBM FlashSystem (FS9500) vs PureFlash Array/X NVMe vs PureFlash Array/XL NVMe?
Have you considered a NetApp FAS Storage for your NAS needs? I am sure it fits very well.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp FAS Series?
Regarding its pricing, I believe it is high. I utilize both HDD and SSD, where SSDs are more cost-friendly, yet HDDs are higher in cost, making it not very affordable but still useful. For general ...
What needs improvement with NetApp FAS Series?
Regarding improvements for NetApp FAS Series, I think everything is generally good. If there is a need to improve something, they can extend their support. Previously, in my company, I only saw Net...
Ask a question
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Also Known As

No data available
ActiveStor
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Children's Hospital Central California, Plex Systems, PDF PNI Digital Media, Denver Broncos, PDF KSM Legal, Clayton Companies, Virginia Community College
Advanced Mask Technology Center Airbus Argonne National Laboratory The University of Texas at Dallas School of Arts Technology and Emerging Communication Башнефть Boeing Bosch California Academy of Sciences Caltech Canon Case Western Reserve University Conoco Phillips Deluxe DirecTV Fairfield Technologies United States Federal Reserve Garvan Institute of Medical Research Goodyear Halliburton Harvard Medical School Honeywell In-Depth Geophysical Intel Kawasaki Lockheed Martin 3M Magseis Fairfield Mammal Studios The Man Group McLaren Mercedes-Benz MINES ParisTech NASA US Navy National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center NBCUniversal National Institutes of Health Nio National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Northrup Grumman Novartis Partners Healthcare Procter & Gamble PGS Pratt & Whitney Rutherford Appleton Lab Siemens Sim International Sinopec Solers Square Cnix TGS Toyota Motorsport GMBH Toppan Turner UMass Medical School United Technologies University of Georgia University of California Los Angeles University of Minnesota University of Notre Dame University of California San Diego Center for Microbiome Innovation Whiskytree
Find out what your peers are saying about NetApp FAS Series vs. Panasas ActiveStor and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,683 professionals have used our research since 2012.