Dell PowerEdge R-Series Reviews

We are using these servers for our production. We are basically a distance learning university where we have a learning management system, websites, online exams, and a campus management system. All these portals are running on these clusters.

We didn't face many hardware failures. Hardware is very reliable. The performance has been good, with only one or two pieces of equipment failing during the period from 2018 to 2025. Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers helped reduce unplanned production downtime significantly. We have deployed our clusters. In the case of any failure, our virtual machines migrate automatically. We didn't face any major disaster during this period. We faced downtime twice in five to six years, but it was because our cluster was under capacity. We had deployed many VMs on the cluster.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are good in terms of energy consumption.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are reliable with good hardware quality. During our 5 to 6 years of deployment, we experienced minimal hardware failures. 

In Pakistan, the vendors or the partners of Dell are not providing a good environment. They need to improve their support and hire partners that have certified support sources. Currently, we are not getting good deployment experience. However, after deployment, Dell solutions perform very well.

We have been using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers since 2018. We deployed the cluster of Dell and VMware in 2018, but we are going to replace this equipment with HPE and VMware.

We're using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers R730. For the backup appliance, we're using Quest. We have also used R410 servers which were replaced with R730 in 2018.

They are very reliable. One or two modules being faulty in five to six years is negligible. The warranty of that equipment expired in 2023, but we are still using it, and we are comfortable with it. The cluster is performing well.

It is scalable as we can add nodes and hard drives to increase space.

Currently, the Dell and VMware solution is in our production, and we are going to replace it with HPE. HPE is a competitor and will hopefully provide us a comfort level.

The deployment of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers was easy.

We are just running a VMware cluster. There is no cloud environment. We are going to deploy a full vCloud foundation environment in our data center on HPE equipment.

I have also received a demo on VxRail, which is an excellent product of Dell. When we deploy VMware on VxRail, those two products are really excellent, and I hope HPE will provide us with the same environment.

These deployments are provided by local partners.

They are affordable. Even during our recent procurement, the cost of Dell servers was lower than that of HPE. However, there were some certificates and vendor issues. We have a partner in Pakistan. The partner didn't have the certifications to meet our requirements. That's why they are out of this tender. Otherwise, the price quoted by Dell was lower than the price quoted by HPE.

It deserves a rating of ten out of ten. It's an excellent product. We are hoping to get a similar experience from our HPE servers.

My use case includes all the production and development workloads, both prod and development workloads.

The most valuable feature, when I compare Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers with other brands available, is the price versus performance, as I get more for what I pay, and mostly, we use this for our CAD workloads. In terms of price-to-performance ratio, I can see at least a 10 to 12% difference when I choose a little cheaper option with Dell compared to others. 

The benefits to my organization are huge because we are a big company, around 100 billion, so that small amount multiplies into something significant. Every year, we buy at least 30 to 70 rack mount servers, and over three to five years, if I calculate it, we save at least 12 to 15X compared to others.

I would improve Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers by making their firmware upgrades easier. 

They do have Dell OpenManage Enterprise, which is easy, but when I am at remote sites, I have to download it locally to apply updates. From that perspective, I want an enhancement for an easier way to download and fix issues.

I have been using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for almost 12 years.

When it comes to the stability and reliability of the product, we have had a couple of blackouts once or twice, but nothing significant because we operate 24/7 and have a four-hour parsing time. From that perspective, there are no issues.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers scale to my company's needs. Earlier, we used other blade server products, which had much higher prices and power usage. When we switched to rack mount servers, even with multiple cables and increased network connections, we reduced our power utilization. Any outages or blackouts are limited to particular servers, not affecting the whole chassis or enclosures.

I have used customer service or support for Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. My impressions working with customer support are positive; whenever issues occur, we follow our company policy to fix them, but we still raise them with customer support, and they provide exactly what we need without any problems, especially for Dell servers.

Positive

Besides the price-to-performance ratio, I have not seen any other ROI metrics.

If I had to give advice to someone at another company considering implementing Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, I would say go for it. 

On a scale of one to ten, I would rate the overall Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers product as a nine.

We have VMware with 2 node servers and almost 20 virtual machines. We have in-house software and an HR and finance application running on it. It works fine for handling diverse applications.

We are using the FX2 chassis, which is a small setup. We have a small environment with very few servers.

Our environment is small, and it fits our environment. For our requirements, it is working fine.

We have protection with secure firmware of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. We have not experienced any security incidents or vulnerabilities with our PowerEdge servers.

It reduces our downtime because it has been working fine. There has never been any failure. I have used HPE servers previously, and we had issues related to rebooting, power supply failure, etc. Our Dell PowerEdge Server is working fine. There is no failure.

We use OpenManage Enterprise software. It gives us an advantage in rebuilding a new server. We can build templates and use the same templates to deploy new servers. There is no manual work.

It is a stable server. I have never faced any failure with these servers.  They keep running for at least five to seven years without any issues.

They should reduce its size. Because the CPU power is more now, they can reduce the size of the servers. Currently, we have a 2U server. If possible, they can make a 1U server.

If they can provide more disk slots in one server, that would be good for the environment. Sometimes a BIOS upgrade fails, or something unexpected can happen.

I have used Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for the last 15 years.

I never faced any failure in the last four to five years. It is a reliable product. Not even one server has failed so far.

We are using the FX2 chassis with two node servers. Two slots are still free. We can add new servers at any time, so the scale-out option is there. The RAM increment option is also there. We can add a lot of RAM there. 

I encountered issues a few times, and they resolved them within the time frame.

Positive

We were HPE customers for ten years. We switched to Dell EMC products about ten years ago. We have VNX storage, xUnity, data domains, tape libraries, and PowerEdge Servers. About 90% of my existing infrastructure is from Dell EMC.

We chose Dell PowerEdge Servers because they are well-known servers. They are the core products of Dell. I love EMC products. They were acquired by Dell. It is almost a similar technology.

Due to built-in software, it is easy to deploy and easy to manage.

When we purchase new servers, partners are responsible for deployment. However, after the initial deployment, it is our responsibility to manage them.

I have tier-one partners like Condo Protego, Cloudbox, GPM, and GBM. We are working with these partners. They have the capability to design the solution, but not all partners are equal.

We did not work with Dell's Professional Services because our environment is not a very big environment. It is an expensive service and not required for our business.

It keeps running and does not create any problems. There are no hardware or power supply failures. It has been good for our business.

We are at an initial stage in our AI journey. We have not tried to run any AI workloads on our PowerEdge Servers. Our business environment is a bit different, and at the moment, we do not require much AI for our business.

I would rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers an eight out of ten.

My main use case for Dell PowerEdge R-Series is to deploy a cybersecurity solution for a customer. A quick specific example of how I use Dell PowerEdge R-Series for deploying cybersecurity for my customer is through threat intelligence. Dell PowerEdge R-Series supports intelligence-related cybersecurity by helping to detect cyber threats and react accordingly.

The best features Dell PowerEdge R-Series offers include iDRAC, which allows me to remote in and perform administration. The remote access controller helps me to remote to the server even when the connection is lost.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series has impacted my organization positively as we have been getting more and more contracts from customers because of its reliability. I have noticed improvements in uptime since using Dell PowerEdge R-Series, as the uptime has been reliable, helping us to meet service availability.

The RMA process could be enhanced. There have been circumstances where the heat generated caused the hard disk to fail. I would like to add about the needed improvements, specifically regarding heat management.

I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for more than 10 years.

Regarding Dell PowerEdge R-Series' AI capabilities, I have had no issues with its governance and security. The accuracy and reliability of output have been good so far and have met my expectations.

Using Dell PowerEdge R-Series servers did not affect the overall flexibility of my operations or business.

I rate customer service as a 4 out of 10.

I have nothing else to add about my main use case or how I use Dell PowerEdge R-Series. That is all regarding additional features. I assess Dell PowerEdge R-Series servers for energy consumption as having no issues. I have noticed that Dell PowerEdge R-Series servers are energy efficient. I am currently running cybersecurity workloads on Dell PowerEdge R-Series servers specifically for threat prevention because I need them for threat prevention.

As a network engineer, I am not very involved with the servers, but I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for three years.

My main focus is on the network side, and those servers are used by different teams for virtualization or cloud computing.

The feature I like the most about Dell PowerEdge R-Series is the graphical interface of iDRAC.

It helps to speed up the process because the servers are very reliable, which has significantly reduced unplanned production downtime.

The most important feedback I have to improve is regarding the prices.

My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing has been positive until recently, but the prices increased significantly.

I have been in the industry for almost nine years.

The sustainability goals depend on what we are doing.

The energy consumption of Dell PowerEdge servers depends on the workload, and we monitor them via OpenManage and via different tools from the data center side.

My evaluation of customer service and the tech support side depends on the service requests; some go very smoothly and are finished quite fast, while others take more time.

Before we got Dell PowerEdge R-Series servers, we used multiple servers from different vendors, including Dell, but it is not the only one.

I use HPE as an example of another server that I am using.

My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing has been positive until recently, but the prices increased significantly.

We did use Dell PowerEdge R-Series to run AI workloads.

I am not very sure about the benefits of the AI workloads because another team is more AI-based.

I would rate this product 9 out of 10.

The main use case for Dell PowerEdge R-Series is for my tech company where people use it for various purposes, including the tech team and marketing people, so it is not specifically just for day-to-day operations. Marketing people use it, and customer support uses it as well, with no specific limitations.

Our marketing team uses Dell PowerEdge R-Series primarily because the reliability is greater compared to other brands. Being a startup with an entrepreneurship model, the systems we use are Dell only, whether on Mac or Windows. If Windows is used, we use Dell only.

Regarding the main use case and how my teams are using Dell PowerEdge R-Series, it works well and everything is perfect.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series has positively impacted my organization, and everything is fine. It works well with no concerns. As a company, any complaints only come to me, but there are no complaints. It works perfectly and is good.

The reliability of Dell PowerEdge R-Series has made maintenance easier since I have not faced any errors or challenges. Regarding battery life, that is the main focus. Typically in a company, we do not specifically check it, and the compliance is zero.

Using Dell PowerEdge R-Series rack servers has affected the overall flexibility of our operations positively. If any challenges arise, discomfort will only come to me. Nothing so far has been problematic. I am actually using Mac and other things as well, and the experience is good.

In terms of energy consumption, Dell PowerEdge R-Series is good with no issues. The energy power is really good.

For improvements on Dell PowerEdge R-Series, I have no comments since there is no issue.

Regarding what could make my experience with Dell PowerEdge R-Series even better, it currently works well. We have close to 120 units, out of which 30 are Dell, while the remaining are Mac. There are no complaints or concerns. People are working well and the performance is good, and the rest is fine.

I have been using Dell PowerEdge R-Series for the past six to eight months.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series has positively impacted my organization, and everything is fine. It works well with no concerns. As a company, any complaints only come to me, but there are no complaints. It works perfectly and is good.

The reliability of Dell PowerEdge R-Series has made maintenance easier since I have not faced any errors or challenges. Regarding battery life, that is the main focus. Typically in a company, we do not specifically check it, and the compliance is zero. If Windows is used, we strongly go with Dell.

For improvements on Dell PowerEdge R-Series, I have no comments since there is no issue.

As a procurement manager, I can say we had a lot of Windows prior to my tenure, but after it came to me, we completely shifted to Windows that is Dell. The reason is reliability, and that is the main reason.

I purchased Dell PowerEdge R-Series through a different direct system procurement process.

For deployment, we have a reseller, and we basically have everything vendor-wise. If anything needs to arise, then we will search for the vendor. There is nothing specific about this arrangement.

Dell PowerEdge R-Series is deployed in my organization in a hybrid setup, where it is both on-site and in the cloud. Eighty percent is on-site while twenty percent is based on need.

In the hybrid setup, we rarely use the cloud. We work primarily from here, but we might use it once or twice a month, and everything is done with Google.

For improvements on Dell PowerEdge R-Series, I have no comments since there is no issue.

I would rate this product and my overall experience with Dell PowerEdge R-Series a nine out of ten.

The main use case for the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is SAP hosting, as we are using it for SAP under Linux. This is specifically within the pharmacy sector, as we work in the pharma industry.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers have helped to reduce unplanned downtimes, as our downtime is nearly zero, with approximately 99.5% availability in a five-year period.

The best features of the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are the service, the availability of the equipment, and the relational price quality. 

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are very useful for our organization's sustainability goals, as the system is running flawlessly. We have experienced trouble with the memory unit and a hard disk, but this occurs in all servers at the end of their useful life. In the five years, we had a few minor problems, but they were always addressed by Dell in Argentina.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers offer good flexibility and expandability to our business. The migration was very easy since the SAP consultants handled the migration of the databases and the ERP, SAP. We contracted them, and it was flawless, managing to conduct the migration of the two servers over a weekend.

They need improvement in spare part availability in Argentina, but the servers are very good from a hardware point of view.

I have overall eight to ten years of experience with the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. I have used the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers within the last 12 months.

We have experienced trouble with the memory unit and a hard disk, but this occurs in all servers at the end of their useful life. 

It offers good flexibility and expandability.

We do not utilize cloud solutions. We run everything on-premise and work with specific software for the pharma industry. We operate only client-server within our facilities.

We have a support contract with a Dell distributor in Cordoba. I would rate them a seven out of ten due to the unavailability of spare parts readily in Argentina.

We conducted internal research on servers within the company. We evaluate offers in Argentina and consider Dell a good option due to the price and availability of the equipment.

The initial setup of the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers was contracted to an external company for the migration of data from the old servers to the new servers. We needed to install SAP on the new servers. This was flawless due to the fact that we bought the servers with pre-installed Linux.

We have not formally calculated the ROI with the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. A new manager has indicated we need to calculate it. We performed a crude calculation of ROI comparing IBM and Dell and found that the cost of support and extended warranty of IBM is too costly compared to Dell. Thus, in this instance, our crude ROI calculation shows that Dell is the better option.

We have a contract with the OEM of the equipment for licenses, so we possess all OEM licenses for the Dell software. We have licenses for Linux and VMware software, with a special price and an annual contract for updates of Linux and VMware. Additionally, we have an Oracle database on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers.

We have received an offer from IBM to replace the servers with new IBM servers. We received a very good offer from IBM for some amount of money for the servers, but we prefer to stay with Dell. IBM's service contract is very costly.

We have not run any AI workloads on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers locally. We have a test drive in the cloud. The principal reason we haven't run AI workloads yet is that we are trying to find the right direction to incorporate AI into our business model. Currently, we focus on the distribution of medical and pharma products to pharmacies, meaning the only way to incorporate AI is possibly in the management of the warehouse. I believe the demand for medicine is inelastic, making forecasting sales very difficult in the market. This reflects the market in Argentina, not other global markets. However, I personally see the only way to incorporate AI in our business is through warehouse management, considering the market's seasonality. Medicine deliveries vary in summer versus winter, as more medications are needed for influenza in winter, while summer requires more medication for sun exposure complications.

I would rate the Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers an eight out of ten.

Currently, we have some database loads on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. I can name the database as Sequel. We are just getting into running AI workloads on Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers.

The feature I appreciate the most about Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is their reliability; they are very reliable servers. In terms of customization, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are very highly customizable and we appreciate that feature.My impression of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers' impact on our organization's sustainability goals is good; they are helping out. Using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers has helped me to reduce unplanned production downtime by 100%. We used to use Lenovo and IBM servers, and with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, I would say we have at least 20% better reliability and more uptime.In terms of stability, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are very stable, with no lagging or crashing.

I don't have any dislikes about the solution. The pricing for Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers would be absolutely better. Regarding energy consumption, we haven't really focused on that; it's not our primary goal, so I can't provide any information on that.

We use Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for our server infrastructure, and I have been using them over the last 20 years.

Regarding scalability, it's excellent with 100% effectiveness.

The quality of support from IBM and Lenovo is good; they are helpful, easy to reach, and providing value, so it's worth getting extra support.

Positive

We used to use Lenovo and IBM servers.

The initial deployment of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers was easy from my point of view; I've been doing this for 20 years. The first time I deployed it, it took me a few hours to put it in working condition.

I handled this deployment myself; it was just me.

To be honest, we're more concerned about providing the right solution for the organization rather than controlling costs associated with technology lifecycle management, so cost isn't as important.

I have tried using alternatives to Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers in my career overall. I can name IBM and Lenovo as the solutions I have used.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are usually reasonably priced; they're not the cheapest, but I think it's worth a shot and worth checking out. To my colleagues considering purchasing a Dell PowerEdge Rack Server instead of a hyperscaler, I'd say that even though the hyperscaler is trendier and a lot of people go there, Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers still offer a lot of work and can provide significant value to the organization. I rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers nine out of ten.

Our use case for Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is that we sell to customers depending on the solution they need. For customers that want typical three-tier architecture, who don't want the FX or VXR rail, they just want to be able to get two, three, five, or ten nodes. Whatever is sold, we go out, install it, and configure it to get it ready for the customer.

I consider iDRAC to be the most valuable feature in Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, which is available everywhere in all Dell products. I prefer iDRAC compared to competitors' solutions, including HP solutions. 

A feature that would enhance Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers is the ability to get multiple servers up and running quickly versus having to do one at a time. Unless I use OpenManage, most customers don't want us to do that. It would be beneficial to have an easier way to get these updated quickly out of the box, even if that means having a tool that lets us run it on our laptops or that I can quickly spin up in a customer environment to push firmware for multiple nodes simultaneously.

When asked about improvements, I find it difficult to suggest changes since the system functions so effectively.

I have been working with Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for three years.

The organizations that install Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers generally have anywhere between 500 to 2,000 people, so it's usually smaller companies I deal with.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers scale with customer needs effectively. 

They're usually used for three-tier, where customers already have either substantial storage or they have other storage platforms that they're bringing in and connecting. Whenever they need to, they can just add more nodes. 

Since it doesn't have to be in a particular rack or even on the same floor in a multi-floor customer environment, they can always place it wherever needed. The ability to put a node wherever they need it is advantageous.

Customer service response for break/fix issues and support documentation for Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers has been good thus far. I have concerns with other products, specifically PowerFlex. That said, in general, PowerEdge support has been excellent. My experience with customer service has been positive. When we had a power supply failure out of the box, we called support, and they delivered the replacement within four hours as promised.

Positive

The deployment time for Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers varies depending on the customer environment and factors such as cabling requirements and switch proximity. 

After the equipment is racked, stacked, cabled, and powered on, I can typically get ESXi up and running with vCenter and basic operational functionality for up to ten nodes in an eight-hour day.

While I'm not on the sales side and don't necessarily follow up afterwards, I observe that customers who have had Dell products previously often return to Dell for refreshes, which indicates they are seeing return on investment.

I evaluate the price-to-performance of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers as good.

They are not very expensive.

The competitors I have used include Supermicro equipment, HP equipment, and some Lenovo equipment many years ago.

At this time, we're not using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for any AI-based initiatives. 

Our partnership with Dell and what we're able to provide to the customer is valuable. 

On a scale of one to ten, I rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers a nine.

Everything from bare metal to ESXi host, any kind of hypervisor is what I've used Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for. 

Currently, we are using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for AI initiatives; one of our projects I cannot discuss, however, it has been really good. Everything about it, including the Redfish hooks and the automation, is very easy and streamlined for the AIs regarding Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers.

The iDRAC is the most valuable feature of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers; the out-of-band management is absolutely fantastic, especially when you institute roles that prevent access to the data center, and being able to do it remotely is fantastic. 

Initial setup, troubleshooting, repair, and maintenance have benefited the organizations I work with since everything has been more streamlined, especially when you add OME into it. Whether it's connected to the internet or not, the on-prem versions still function fantastically.

For the internal SD card of Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers, I would add driver packs so that when you're trying to image bare metal, you don't have to worry about trying to find all the drivers you need to install whatever OS it could be, specifically in our environments in the fed space, since trying to use USB devices is difficult, so adding things on the USB stick and plugging them in for drivers is most of the time not possible.

I've been using Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers for probably eight years now.

The resiliency and stability of the products are fantastic. We have devices that have been around until end-of-life, but we're still using them for things, so stability has been great with very minimal issues. When issues occur, it's usually a hard drive failure, which is expected, so I think it's excellent.

Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers are very flexible, whether you're doing a vSAN ready node or whatever may be your hyperscale of choice, because they scale easily, and adding them into whatever environment you have is straightforward.

Customer support is usually really good for Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers. My only complaint would be if you're calling the specific fed line, sometimes they don't transfer you, and they want to get information that you can't give them before they do, even if you call the dedicated fed line, which is not always consistent, depending on the time of day.

The support is actually a big part of it when evaluating other solutions. The warranty support and keeping your hard drive for the fed space is key. Typically, the contacts we have on-site are very knowledgeable, they come in within a day and usually have it fixed and taken care of if there are issues. Even when they don't need something replaced, they usually suggest helpful troubleshooting steps, and it's usually really good support.

Positive

It's really easy to deploy. It's pretty straightforward. Whether you're having it automated through OME and it's pushing your configs or you're doing it just directly connecting into your iDRAC. Out of all the devices I've used in the industry, it's probably the easiest I've used. 

I actually work for a value-added reseller, and I support many federal customers, which means my organization is a giant. On a scale of one to ten, I rate Dell PowerEdge Rack Servers a nine out of ten.