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Scale Computing Platform vs VMware vSAN comparison

 

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

Scale Computing Platform
Ranking in HCI
15th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
Edge Computing Platforms (1st)
VMware vSAN
Ranking in HCI
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
230
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Scale Computing Platform is 1.3%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSAN is 15.6%, down from 18.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

Benjamin Bodenehim - PeerSpot reviewer
The solution is user-friendly, stable, and easy to deploy
The snapshot technology takes up 500 times more space compared to other solutions. The snapshots are working on the byte level and not the bit level. The solution has three detriments, there is no performance, we can't see how much CPU each node is using, and we have no technical data on anything that happened on the server. Additionally, replication is also lacking and does not work well, partially to the fact of the snapshot technology.
Yves Sandfort - PeerSpot reviewer
Gives us a lot of advantages when we need to expand resources
Stability can be improved. Adding all these new features is nice, but we are now at the level where most of the features you need in production are there. The stability is not from a day-to-day operations perspective, but more from a supportability perspective, because currently some of the support scenarios require you to completely evacuate hosts or the complete cluster. That sometimes can be a stretch. This would clearly be an improvement if the support teams were given additional tools to make that easier. Upgradability could be a bit easier sometimes. We are now where vSAN can be updated without ESXi, but there is still enough dependency. So that would be good if that actually would be uncoupled even more. Dashboards are there, and we use vROps as well. So, we have all the beauty of capacity planning and everything over there. That's not really something where we need a lot of other things.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution is the nice GUI."
"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"The product's initial setup phase is too easy."
"I rate Scale Computing support 10 out of 10. They're accessible and responsive."
"The most valuable feature of Scale Computing HC3 is if one of the devices fails, you won't even notice, the service maintains operation. The customers don't have to waste two, or three days on delays. Additionally, you do not have to waste time with recovery software, it is a lot easier."
"The most valuable features are the appliance-type feel and that you don't need additional licenses as everything is built-in."
"It gives the ease of management for a small IT department."
"The solution is scalable."
"The high availability is very good."
"vSAN can help customers save on storage system costs, and also save on the human cost."
"The solution has high performance."
"It allows us to put our infrastructure in remote locations and still get the same performance we get from our onsite SAN solutions."
"The vSAN features we've found most helpful are live application migrations and storage policies. It has storage, policies, application, and DRS policies. Automation is there."
"The ability to have an HA cluster in the absence of a shared storage device or SAN."
"Storage is expandable with no extra cost."
"VMware vSAN is easy to configure, with basic functionality and the customer can maintain the solution."
 

Cons

"Scale Computing HC3 said in an announcement they were going to integrate with a backup service which would be good. If they could do this it would be beneficial."
"There could be an easier way to see which servers are on each node"
"The product could use a better control center."
"The snapshot technology takes up 500 times more space compared to other solutions."
"Scale HC3 improvements would involve literally fixing up the replication."
"I've had so many issues with the sales team when I was looking to make some improvements, and improve the performance. They would create so many excuses to force me to buy new nodes all the time and not let me add more memory to each node."
"On the fly, you cannot do anything on Scale Computing HC3, though it is a very rarely needed area."
"I would like bigger clusters with more than eight nodes."
"It doesn't seem like it gives the performance that an actual SAN would give for heavy IOPS, read/writes."
"One thing in vSAN that I would like to improve is using vSAN as a repository for files or other things. For example, with Horizon, maybe we can save profiles with UEM on there. That would be a good feature that I would like."
"The vSan product uses a software system called Vsphere to monitor the system. It is sometimes difficult to manage the PCs within the systems."
"When we talk about improvements for vSAN, there is some way to go from a at least stability perspective. Adding all these new features is nice, but we are now at the level that most of the features you need in production are there."
"The customer service is good but there is a cost for it. It does not come free."
"vSAN does not have online dedup. When opening the inline dedupe, the performance will be lower than off inline."
"Lacks sufficient storage terabytes."
"Customers who are using Essentials Plus or even Essentials have to pay for technical support. However, they should not have to pay for support."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is worth the money, but I would not say it's very cheap or very expensive."
"I give the pricing a nine out of ten."
"I pay for Scale Computing HC3 and it includes customer service for one year. We paid for an additional year for customer service but that includes the updates and everything for the software. Additionally, the licensing is for Windows, which is the same for everybody."
"rate HC3's pricing a five out of ten since it is affordable."
"The only problem I have with VMware is the price. It is a good product, but it is expensive."
"This is a cost-effective product. It's a bit cheaper than the other solutions."
"It is an expensive solution. There should be more flexible with licensing to allow small businesses the essentials of the solution's features."
"The cost of the solution is high and if it could be reduced the customers would be very happy."
"The product is quite expensive, regarding the open source solution."
"It is not that expensive, and it is not even cheap. If it is designed in a proper way, it has good pricing, but if you do oversizing, the price will be high. There are different licensing models."
"We have increased our user productivity."
"My customers have found VMware vSAN to be a little expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
35%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
53%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Scale Computing HC3?
The product's initial setup phase is too easy.
What needs improvement with Scale Computing HC3?
There could be an easier way to see which servers are on each node. It shows you a small graphical interface, but you have to see them all, and you have to really struggle to figure out which nodes...
What Is The Biggest Difference Between vSAN And VxRail?
While both run on the vSAN technology from VMware, vSAN needs to be deployed on vSAN ready nodes while VxRail is an engineered system. The choice to choose which technology depends on two major fac...
Which would you choose - Nutanix Acropolis AOS or VMware vSAN?
We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We fou...
How does HPE Simplivity compare with VMware vSAN?
HPE SimpliVity is a hyper-converged infrastructure solution that is primarily geared to mid-sized companies. We researched VMware vSAN but found HPE was a better option for us. HPE SimpliVity has ...
 

Also Known As

Scale Computing HC3
vSAN
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Resorts World Las Vegas, Stena, Telford Offshore, Goodwill, Sandals, Jerry's Enterprises, Mendard's Royal Farms, Delhaize, Benchmark Electronics, Classic Hotels, Genting Casino, Lindt, Sainsbury's, Landmark Cinemas, Golden Queen Mining, Coca Cola. Holiday Inn, Iron County School District, Sevier County Bank, City of St. Cloud Minnesota, Presbyterian Mo-Ranch Assembly, KIB Electronics, Brake Masters, Lincoln County Hospital, Ohio Summit County Board of Elections
Read Some Case Studies At Home Cloud CaribCINgroupDiscovery Check out the Rest of our Customer Stories Here
Find out what your peers are saying about Scale Computing Platform vs. VMware vSAN and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.