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Pivot3 vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

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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

Pivot3
Ranking in HCI
25th
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
StarWind Virtual SAN
Ranking in HCI
4th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
213
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Pivot3 is 1.7%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind Virtual SAN is 2.4%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
StarWind Virtual SAN2.4%
Pivot31.7%
Other95.9%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1124199 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior IT Manager at a healthcare company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Stable, good technical support, and the the visual encoding works well
The most valuable feature is the visual encoding I would like to see better video compression. Snapshot notification would be a good addition. The price of this solution is high compared to the competitors, so it should be lowered. I have been using Pivot3 for between four and five years. This…
Jccerong Heron - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Support team has guided us through deploying virtual storage on legacy hardware and reducing operational costs
The reason I chose StarWind Virtual SAN for this particular scenario is really the features, the ease of use, and most importantly, the price. In my opinion, the best features StarWind Virtual SAN offers are easy integration with the system installed in the data center. The integration with my existing systems in the data center works well, especially with VMware, as we already have a big cluster in VMware, and the easy integration with that is helpful to solve some problems with the platform. StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted my organization by reducing OPEX costs. My OPEX costs have gone down as we reutilize some old servers, and this reduces the CAPEX of hardware in the data center.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The technical support is very good."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of implementation."
"The most valuable feature is the visual encoding."
"One feature we found useful was the product's complete ability to integrate with vCenter."
"It greatly streamlined the time it took to scale out the enterprise and it completely eliminated the need for a SAN/Storage engineer, with the simplicity the Pivot3 Stack Manager brought with it for managing storage."
"The support has been amazing and quick to reply."
"StarWind Virtual SAN has helped us save considerable costs as we do not need a very large storage device such as a SAN as we had to purchase before."
"The ROI is great on this product."
"The Price/Performance ratio for this solution is outstanding!"
"It enables us to provide more solution options for our clients, with the reassurance that, when implemented, they will be efficient and stable."
"StarWind Virtual SAN has positively impacted my organization as we are not having to worry about licensing costs; it is paid for, and we have the license perpetually."
"StarWind Virtual SAN has made it easy to work with backups and save server data by mirroring two servers."
"The ease of reaching the support team and their promptness for support is great."
 

Cons

"Marketing needs improvement."
"In the next release, I would like to see compatibility and support for critical applications, like SAP."
"Snapshot notification would be a good addition."
"One of the biggest problems with HCI vendors was the lack of flexibility for adding resources."
"The price of this solution is high compared to the competitors, so it should be lowered."
"It runs until it does not - and disaster recovery documentation is sparse and mostly unclear."
"With data verification, I would like to know how does the solution perform validation of data being synced between two VSANs."
"We would like the documentation to be more complete. Most items are covered, but if you don't know something, you may need to contact their support."
"Server-side snapshots are one thing the Linux appliance can't do yet."
"StarWind Virtual SAN could be improved, and I wish the management GUI worked better."
"The console is something that I feel could be improved."
"Proper training sessions should be included with the licensing."
"Lastly, I think the severity two response time incidents could be improved upon; it's eight hours, and if that could be better, I'd like that."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our fees are approximately $100,000 yearly."
"StarWind is a low-cost, full-featured alternative to the traditional SAN environment, and their support will guide you every step of the setup."
"The licensing is straightforward, with free and trial versions available."
"Cost is affordable and licensing is smooth."
"Licensing is easy and the whole package is cost-effective."
"Licensing is based on nodes rather than TBs, which means that the users are free to increase storage capacity without putting thought into licensing."
"If you are looking at a traditional SAN for a small cluster, give StarWind vSAN because you will save thousands without any compromise."
"StarWind is best price/performance for SMB."
"We evaluated other options and this one was the most cost-effective."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business170
Midsize Enterprise57
Large Enterprise34
 

Questions from the Community

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for StarWind Virtual SAN is very simple; that is another good thing about it, as the pricing is really straightforward. I got a quote, and it w...
What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?
StarWind Virtual SAN has latency that is not as good versus VMware vSAN, but I believe it is more of a Hyper-V limitation than it is StarWind Virtual SAN; it is not bad enough to be an issue, but i...
What is your primary use case for StarWind Virtual SAN?
My main use case for StarWind Virtual SAN is that it replaced our VMware vSAN. I transitioned from VMware vSAN to StarWind Virtual SAN due to the dramatic increase in VMware licensing costs followi...
 

Also Known As

No data available
StarWind SAN & NAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SNHMC, HPD Software, The Hurlingham Club, NHS, Rochester Police Department, The Doe Run Company, 101 Casino, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport
Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School
Find out what your peers are saying about Pivot3 vs. StarWind Virtual SAN and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,683 professionals have used our research since 2012.