StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs StarWind Virtual SAN comparison

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance vs. StarWind Virtual SAN

May 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score

8.4

Pure Storage FlashBlade delivers cost savings, efficiency gains, and increased VM density, with returns seen within four years.

Sentiment score

6.8

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance reduced costs, improved stability, and streamlined operations, quickly achieving substantial ROI and enhancing management efficiency.

Sentiment score

7.4

StarWind Virtual SAN offers high ROI by reducing costs, downtime, and using existing servers for efficient deployment.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

We don't sell a lot of redundant servers, so it's not a massive ROI, but the ability to rely on their technical support and the software's ease of setup allows us to reduce labor costs and go to market competitively.

Manager, Field Support at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees

The cost benefits, as far as we consider, are much better with a StarWind VSAN solution, and the training requirements with the ease of administration simplify and reduce our administrator and professional services costs.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Customer Service

Sentiment score

8.2

Pure Storage FlashBlade's customer service is praised for expertise but sometimes experiences slower responses due to growth challenges.

Sentiment score

8.5

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance's 24/7 customer service is praised for quick responses, proactive monitoring, and expertise despite language barriers.

Sentiment score

8.4

StarWind Virtual SAN excels in customer service with quick, professional support, seamless integration, and clear communication, ensuring satisfaction.

I would rate them an eight out of ten.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

I would rate the customer support for StarWind Virtual SAN a ten, as they are responsive and competent.

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

When we set it up, they validate our settings and configurations to ensure we don't miss anything.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Manager, Field Support at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score

8.9

Pure Storage FlashBlade is praised for its scalability and ease of expansion, satisfying various industries like banking and media.

Sentiment score

7.9

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance offers scalable options for SMBs, supporting expansion through nodes, RAM, or storage to align with cloud strategies.

Sentiment score

7.8

StarWind Virtual SAN offers scalable, flexible storage solutions, easily adapting to infrastructure growth with minimal reconfiguration, despite some licensing limitations.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

I believe that scalability should be further improved, especially considering the possibility that environments may grow exponentially.

Soporte IT at Sildan Security

I have never needed to scale up or add additional nodes with StarWind Virtual SAN, but we have had to expand, and customer support has been excellent.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Stability Issues

Sentiment score

8.8

Pure Storage FlashBlade is highly rated for stability, reliability, and performance, with minimal downtime and swift recovery.

Sentiment score

8.7

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance offers exceptional stability, zero downtime, excellent support, and ease of use, ensuring reliable performance.

Sentiment score

8.6

StarWind Virtual SAN is highly reliable with minimal maintenance, offering seamless, dependable operations across diverse environments, and earning user trust.

In case there is any issue with any blade, the data is moved to another.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

In my experience, StarWind Virtual SAN is very stable, and I have never had a single instability issue.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Room For Improvement

Users want better cloud integration, support, pricing, efficiency, and improvements in analytics, configuration, and backup for FlashBlade.

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance needs hardware, software, and management improvements, with focus on Linux support and streamlined scalability.

StarWind Virtual SAN users seek better documentation, management tools, and integration features, while appreciating its affordability and high availability.

Its configuration should be easier.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

A more intuitive interface or an improved dashboard for monitoring the cluster would also be helpful, as it would facilitate performance tracking and help identify potential issues before they affect services.

Soporte IT at Sildan Security

Limited feedback in the management GUI is the main area where I would like to see StarWind Virtual SAN get better.

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Having more visibility on what's actually happening when an error occurs would be beneficial.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Manager, Field Support at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees

Setup Cost

Pure Storage FlashBlade is costlier but valued for performance, ease, and reliability, justifying its comprehensive licensing with included software.

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance offers competitive, cost-effective pricing, significantly cheaper than competitors like Nutanix, with transparent, all-inclusive fees.

StarWind Virtual SAN is cost-effective, easy to set up, offers flexible scalability, and has responsive support with perpetual licenses.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

The costs are acceptable and very competitive compared to other hardware-only HCI solutions.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

The pricing can be a bit complex depending on the features you need.

JohnPerez

IT Administrator at Panoptic Services, Inc.

Valuable Features

Pure Storage FlashBlade offers high performance, scalability, and ease of use with excellent data protection and seamless integration for large storage needs.

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance provides ease of use, high availability, flexible deployment, and cost-effective, reliable performance with excellent support.

StarWind Virtual SAN offers robust features, simplicity, and reliability with seamless integration and automation for enhanced data redundancy and resilience.

We can plug in many blades, and we can have data up to one terabyte.

For more quotes and insights, download the Pure Storage FlashBlade report

IT Field Support Engineer at Unisys

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

StarWind's storage virtualization and failover capabilities have made a difference for my clusters through uptime improvements, with zero downtime specific to server host maintenance or even maintenance of the StarWind software itself.

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Thanks to its seamless integration with Proxmox, the implementation of high availability servers has drastically reduced downtime, which is crucial for our security-focused company.

Soporte IT at Sildan Security

StarWind Virtual SAN helps us keep customer satisfaction and provides the solutions we need without having to hire many IT specialists.

For more quotes and insights, download the StarWind Virtual SAN report

Manager, Field Support at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees

Categories and Ranking

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 4.2%, down from 4.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind HyperConverged Appliance is 2.0%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StarWind Virtual SAN is 7.2%, down from 8.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Software Defined Storage (SDS)

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

Read full review

Russ Le Puill

IT Manager at St Peter's Church of England Aided School

Proactive support with improved speed and resilience

There was a long delay with shipping, which we weren't expecting, but we were kept updated throughout. It wasn't made clear to us that we needed to provide our own SFP modules to connect to our infrastructure, so that could have been a bit clearer. It would be amazing if there was, perhaps, a more automated process for updating the hosts themselves, although the maintenance mode works well. Our StarWind command center doesn't seem to have all the options available currently, which support is investigating for us.

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Seamless integrations, high availability, and offers a free version

Soporte IT at Sildan Security

Although I am generally satisfied with VSAN and its performance, there are some areas that could be improved to enhance its effectiveness even further. One area that could benefit from improvement is scalability. While the tool works well in its current configuration, allowing for greater ease and flexibility in adding new nodes to the cluster without complications would be very beneficial, especially in growing environments. Additionally, I would like to see additional features in the next version, such as better support for automated resource management. This could include proactive suggestions for optimizing storage and memory usage, as well as preventive alerts about the health status of the servers. A more intuitive interface or an improved dashboard for monitoring the cluster would also be helpful, as it would facilitate performance tracking and help identify potential issues before they affect services.

Read full review

See which vendors are best for you

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851,491 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

27%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

16%

Educational Organization

14%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

17%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

It's not the cheapest, however, the solution works incredibly well and is so simple to licence and maintain.

What needs improvement with StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

There was a long delay with shipping, which we weren't expecting, but we were kept updated throughout. It wasn't made...

What is your primary use case for StarWind HyperConverged Appliance?

We desperately needed to update yet downsize our data centre. We had six hosts for only approximately 14 or so Virtua...

What do you like most about StarWind Virtual SAN?

It is easy to use and can monitor system synchronization and check Storage status. StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN) combin...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StarWind Virtual SAN?

Also, the pricing can be a bit complex depending on the features you need.

What needs improvement with StarWind Virtual SAN?

Initially, there was a bit of a learning curve for some of our users, but Microsoft's documentation was helpful. Also...

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Compared 24% of the time

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Compared 17% of the time

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Compared 16% of the time

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Compared 13% of the time

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Product Reports

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Pure Storage FlashBlade

May 2025

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance

April 2025

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance report

Download StarWind HyperConverged Appliance product report

Download StarWind Virtual SAN product report

StarWind Virtual SAN

April 2025

Also Known As

No data available

StarWind SAN & NAS

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

For SMB, ROBO and Enterprises, who look to bring in quick deployment and operation simplicity to virtualization workloads and reduce related expenses, our solution is StarWind HyperConverged Appliance (HCA). It unifies commodity servers, disks and flash, hypervisor of choice, StarWind Virtual SAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct or VMware Virtual SAN and associated software into a single manageable layer. The HCA supports scale-up by adding disks and flash, and scale-out by adding extra nodes.

StarWind HyperConverged Appliance consists of StarWind Virtual SAN, Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct or VMware Virtual SAN “Ready Nodes”, targeting those, who are building their virtualization infrastructure from scratch. In case there is an existing set of servers, we offer a “software only version”, which is essentially our years proven StarWind Virtual SAN. Basically, it’s the fuel powering StarWind HCA.

StarWind

StarWind Virtual SAN provides high availability and fault tolerance for virtualized environments without the need for dedicated SAN hardware. It allows for real-time replication between servers, shared storage for Hyper-V clusters, and enables vMotion and High Availability features for VMware vSphere. The solution reduces costs and leverages existing hardware while providing a scalable and reliable infrastructure. Valuable features include ease of use, scalability, top-tier support, hardware agnosticism, and the ability to use off-the-shelf standard servers to increase storage space. StarWind VSAN has helped organizations improve performance, data availability, and data security while reducing downtime and providing cost-saving storage options.

StarWind

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Sears Home and Franchise Business

Baker Tilly BVI, CMS Internet, Board Harpeth Hall School