Dell PowerScale (Isilon) Reviews

Our customers consist of banking sectors, financial sectors, infrastructure services, and service divisions, such as oil and gas-based customers. We recommend Dell PowerScale to our customers based on their business demands and data management needs. Primarily, it is used for handling large-scale data, including real-time data generation from remote locations, particularly in industries like automobile manufacturing, where vast amounts of unstructured data are gathered and processed.

Dell PowerScale helps our customers by providing a highly scalable and efficient data management solution that supports their operations effectively. It allows for the seamless addition of nodes to the cluster as needed, ensuring the organization's data storage can grow proportionately with their demands. PowerScale supports various use cases, from real-time data processing to maintaining data integrity and availability, which is crucial for sectors generating large volumes of data daily.

One of the most valuable features is erasure coding, which prevents data loss even if a single node fails. The OneFS OS provides a single namespace, improving data storage efficiency and management. 

Features like ransomware protection, file lock retention, and third-party integrations (e.g., Superna for ransomware protection) are significant benefits. 

Additionally, the scalability and capability to handle large amounts of unstructured data, real-time data processing, and integration with AI workloads make it a robust solution for enterprises.

Improvements could be made on the object storage side. PowerScale offers object storage capabilities, but not in a fully integrated way. If customers have workloads requiring both file and object storage, PowerScale can provide up to 20% object storage, which might not be sufficient for all needs. A unified solution combining NAS and object storage, similar to other solutions that combine block and NAS, would be beneficial.

I have worked with Dell PowerScale for almost a year. Previously, I worked with the Isilon model before transitioning to PowerScale.

Dell PowerScale is very stable, with a stability rating of nine out of ten. In terms of availability and stability, I would give it a ten.

Dell PowerScale is extremely scalable. You can start with a minimum of three nodes and expand based on capacity demands. This feature allows for significant flexibility in managing storage needs. The scalability is further enhanced by its ability to integrate new nodes automatically without manual effort.

Support for Dell PowerScale is never a challenge. There is twenty-four-seven-three-sixty-five support available, including four-hour on-site support for high-priority issues. The on-site engineer will reach the location, review the issue, and work on it within four hours. Hence, I would rate technical support a ten.

Positive

The initial setup for PowerScale is straightforward and easy. It just requires initial configuration, followed by automated processes to complete the setup. Therefore, I would give it a rating of ten for ease of setup.

The price of Dell PowerScale depends on the customer's specific requirements and capacity needs. It is generally considered a costly solution, but its features and capabilities justify the price. It's essential to align the pricing with the business needs and future scalability requirements.

If your business demands a highly scalable data solution, including handling multiple edge locations and large amounts of data effectively, Dell PowerScale is a suitable option. It is particularly advantageous for enterprises with specific AI workloads. However, due to its cost, it may not be the best option for mid-range customers or those looking for general-purpose file services.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.

We primarily use Dell PowerScale for storage in our data management operations.

Dell PowerScale has provided us with a single space of storage, which is beneficial for our needs.

The most valuable feature is its single space of storage.

The analytics could be improved.

I have about fifteen years of experience with this solution under different names.

The stability of Dell PowerScale is very good.

The scalability of this solution is good. I would rate it ten on a scale from one to ten.

The technical support is excellent. I would rate it ten on a scale from one to ten.

Positive

We used Quantum before switching to Dell. Quantum was not as reliable as we wanted, and it was more difficult to use.

The initial setup was easy. I would rate it ten on a scale from one to ten.

Our deployment was done in-house.

There has been no massive ROI in the storage. That said, it met our expectations.

The pricing of Dell PowerScale is reasonable. However, it is on the pricier side. There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees.

Check out what's on the market and make sure it's right for you. I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.

I've worked on multiple cases, like cache, performance, and application cases.

Dell PowerScale has the SmartConnect and SmartConnect Pro features. That's why I like the product.

Dell is an expansive product. Everyone has a Dell product.

The improvement should be in AI. Everything is going towards AI. If they improved the AI features, it would be easier for customers to handle.

If some customers have expired products and cannot renew them, Dell should provide knowledge-based articles to help them handle issues like replication, node issues, or hardware issues. They have storage admin engineers who can handle it.

AI could also help with things like searching.  For example, if I want Anil's profile, I should be able to see everything on the screen. AI could also help with common issues like performance issues. If you type "performance issues" into their portal, it should tell you what needs to be checked, what shouldn't be checked, and where to check it, whether the issue is from the storage end, the host end, or the switch end.

Dell can improve in terms of support. Dell hires freshers who don't have much experience. They should resolve issues faster. At Accenture, we reach out to customers within 15 minutes if they have any issues.

I worked with it for five years. In 2019, Isilon was changed to PowerScale.

Scalability is very good in terms of Dell products.

The tech support is good.

Neutral

It requires more manpower for the installation. More than two people are needed for the process. 

It takes around four hours for a full deployment. It is easy to integrate with other systems.

It will require some maintenance. It depends on the hardware.

Users can save time and money with PowerScale. There is around 15% to 20% time savings.

Dell products are expensive. They are more expensive than other competitors.

Overall, I would rate it an eight out of ten. If you have a small environment, I can recommend Isilon PowerScale.

I would recommend it to others because Dell is a very good company, and we can blindly trust Dell products. It's number five, I think, or six in a global ranking.

Dell PowerScale helps us manage a variety of unstructured data for healthcare and manufacturing clients. This allows the data to be stored and accessed by different types of systems like system-to-system access and user-to-system access. Dell PowerScale helps the data make sense in environments where we are also managing the data engine portion for our customers. We are able to use different Dell technologies for moving and saving data. Dell PowerScale is the best option for cost based on the environment.

We initially deployed PowerScale on-prem and then started to take advantage of the cloud but the cost became a factor. The customers feel more confident with the on-prem deployment.

Our customers have seen improvement in performance, space, and flexibility for growth and management of data protection through snapshots and other systems.

The AI models are something we are looking forward to trying but are not there yet. The algorithms are specific to each company and their industry. One of the most important things is the data localization. Many scenarios require the project data traffic to be close to where it is generated and read. A lot of interaction is between users and systems. So data localization is one of the most important things in terms of using the data algorithm.

We don't need to manage our PowerScale and run its storage from any location yet but it is something that is coming for sure because several customers have centralized data in main data centers. But in different locations across the globe. So this is going to be a topic. I think that through the different functionalities that the Dell platform can grant, it will be a great player.

When it comes to the flexibility for supporting various data workloads while protecting them, the combination of PowerScale and PPDM and all the other components of the data protection solution right now is key. So the automatic integration between the products is one of the killer features of the solution itself.

PowerScale helped us to reduce data silos. This has simplified the management of large data environments in terms of scalability and management instead of having a different solution for the right reports to see how the data evolves and how to better manage them. PowerScale can do that in combination with the other components of the ecosystem.

In terms of risk reduction, We need to mention the data management and the recovery part, So of course, the integration with the data domain is key. The fact that we can rely on these functions, and the fact that we also manage different customers, and possess the recovery plans and tests that can prove the solution is working.

Dell PowerScale includes a wealth of features that are important from a security and recovery perspective. 

Dell PowerScale can improve on its multi-tenant part because as a service provider, we have bigger clusters in data centers where we can serve multiple customers and grant them dedicated management points and automation features that can be managed in a multi-tenant environment.

I have been using Dell PowerScale for a few years.

Dell PowerScale is stable.

The scalability depends on the policy and data retention plan that is in place. The fact that we can easily upgrade the platform by moving to different versions is key.

One of the key points for our partnership with Dell is the great support and human interaction. Not only for the setup but also the visibility into the vulnerabilities, new features, and the ease of access to data and information about how the platform is evolving.

Positive

We use multi-vendor storage but Dell is one of our key partners. The pros are the fact that all the different technologies in the Dell ecosystem are integrated using themselves, and the fact that we can have the server resiliency integrated, the CAB solution that is integrated, and that, of course, is working very well in terms of performance. The other vendors propose similar solutions but in terms of integration and liability, they are not the same as Dell. We have different solutions because there are different needs of different customers, and we consider that they may have previously purchased different hardware.

PowerScale falls behind some of the competition in terms of automation. There are new players like VAST Data who started a company with an API-first approach which facilitates better automation.   

We use the TNA approach which is a great opportunity for us to better manage the licenses based on how much consumption is available for the different customers so we can use that approach and scalability. Overall, the experience is good, and this is why we are progressing in our partnership. 

I would rate Dell PowerScale nine out of ten.

We manage 40 petabytes of data in different customer environments.

Just like with AI, we are adopting containerized solutions, the fact that we are a managed service provider, of course. This is a different scenario from other customers because there are customers who are not yet into containerized applications. they are slowly transforming their platform and their support. Of course, containers are coming and in those scenarios, PowerFlex is a better option.

I believe in a hybrid approach, mainly because we've seen several customers that have workloads where data flows to user protection centers. So the data needs to be analyzed on proximity infrastructure. This is the reason why I strongly believe that hybrid will progress. For some companies, a full cloud approach may work but not for all of them.

The key factors for driving our decision-making process when it comes to selecting a cloud, on-prem, or hybrid environment for our enterprise applications are, where the data needs to be accessed, and scalability to adapt to different demands we may have. It depends on the different types of industries that we are serving. We will have our own data centers. But we will have to scale using the hyperscaler in order to be flexible in terms of data movement and also flexible in terms of preparation of the infrastructure. The speed we can achieve on hyperscalers is different than the speed we can achieve on-premises.

I use the solution in my company for large files. With Dell PowerScale (Isilon), the amount of files my company deals with is humungous in size.

My company has only four people working on the Dell PowerScale (Isilon) platform, which has around 300 TB. With the number of people necessary to run the tool, I am not sure if it can be considered an effective product.

The most valuable features are high density and scalability. The high density and scalability features are important for my company since we are trying to have low electricity and power consumption, considering that the amount of data that we have to use is limited.

My company uses an on-premises deployment model for Dell PowerScale (Isilon).

No one is required to maintain the product, but since it is a huge platform in our company's environment, some things need to be replaced constantly. The aforementioned issues with the tool are not because the product or hardware is bad but something that happens since it functions in a large environment.

If I consider my assessment of Dell PowerScale's ability to interface with AI models and algorithms, I would say that my company has just started using AI after connecting it to the tool. I use the AI part a lot currently. So far, my company has only been using NFS to connect to our computers.

It can be difficult to assess the ability of Dell PowerScale to help our company manage and run its storage from any location since it is a huge platform. You can put the product anywhere, but I would say that it needs to be in big data centers. You can have one location or ten locations, but all of them need to be big locations. You can't put the product into a small office area. It is easy to manage the product from multiple locations. Generally, one can manage all locations using the product from a single point.

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) has helped a little to reduce or eliminate data silos, but all the silos we use in our company are huge, making it a hard process. My company needs to deal with silos anyways.

In terms of the flexibility of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) for supporting various data workloads, while keeping them protected, I would say everything is good since they can scale up very fast with NVMe technology and disks and also with the archive data in disks along with the performance it offers. For protection, we use snapshots along with mirroring.

The tool's support team and the way the cases are handled by the product's technical support team are both areas of concern where improvements are required.

When replacing hardware parts of the tool, there are about 15 steps to follow before our company gets the parts sent over to us by Dell, making it an area that we feel consists of a lot of unnecessary work for our employees. Dell should streamline the aforementioned process and make it just one or two steps instead of making users go through 15 steps.

The support offered after installing the tool to deal with the problems associated with the tool could be a little bit better. After the installation phase, the tool's support services have certain shortcomings because our company is not allowed to use or send the automated error reports back to Dell. The aforementioned process needs to be manually handled by Dell and us, which is why it takes so long, even though we are eligible to get help from a dedicated support engineer. Processing logs and other stuff takes time.

I have been using Dell PowerScale (Isilon) for seven years. My company is a customer of Dell.

The stability and reliability of the product are good. My company has only faced two big errors stopping the production in our organization over a span of seven years.

During the installation phase, Dell's support services are top-notch. I rate the technical support a six or seven out of ten. The support services during the tool's installation phase can be rated as ten out of ten.

Positive

My experience with the product's deployment phase has been good.

The installation took two days for three racks, and going from zero to one hundred, it took two days. It is a simple step-by-step process that includes the physical installation and configuration. Our company is able to be up and running within two or three days.

Compared to the other vendors in the market, the setup phase of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is fast. Other products are difficult to handle when it comes to the setup process. It is actually the technology like SAN and other related technologies that make it harder for a person to deal with the setup process.

My company opts for a 50-50 approach, meaning we take help from Dell's experts and from our own employees.

Considering my position at the company, I would say that we do not indulge in backtracking of anything associated with Dell PowerScale (Isilon).

It is easy for my company to deal with product costs and licensing. Dealing with the product costs and licensing areas is getting easier since Dell is simplifying the licensing process and licensing packages offered to users.

My company uses products from multiple vendors all the time. My company is required to deal with multiple vendors, so sometimes we use Dell and others.

If I compare Dell PowerScale (Isilon) to other vendors in terms of both pros and cons, I would say that its pros are associated with the high scalability, where it is possible for one to build it in a very huge and large manner, but that has been so from ten years ago. Now, other vendors are coming out with good scalability features. I am soon going to have a one-on-one session later this week with Dell's experts.

I don't envision the future of our company's containerized solutions in terms of cloud integration since it is not applicable as we don't use the cloud, but we do use containers.

Based on key factors and the decision-making process, my company only uses the on-premises environment for our containerized applications.

I rate the solution a nine to ten out of ten.

We had to move metadata from standard disks to SSDs because we had issues with how the cluster handled metadata operations. With a lot of IO, the data lookup wasn't fast enough, causing performance problems. This setup resolved those issues.

We no longer had the performance issues with Dell PowerScale. 

The platform performs really well. We're a media company with 14 TV stations. This solution is very capable of meeting our demands well. We use the SMB protocol for storage access, and it performs really well. 

The best thing is that it works. We don't have to maintain it too much;  we usually upgrade once a year.

We can get more than gigabit throughput from it. 

The disk failure handling could be better. We had a few issues because one disk failed, which slightly impacted the whole node, but overall, the performance is stable.

We had to expand and increase the storage capacity, but it turned out we needed a totally new cluster because we couldn't expand the current one due to software incompatibilities. We think the backend network should be upgraded from InfiniBand to Ethernet networking, and we had to buy a new cluster. Dell has significantly increased the prices of new nodes, by a lot. As a result, we're considering new vendors because if prices increase by 300%, then the clients will look elsewhere.

The disc server handling is not the best. Maybe the tiering logic could be improved. It's based on our age or some other logic but not on disk usage. If you have a tier one, you don’t want to load it completely; it deserves some free space for new data, and you can’t manage that with the current tiering logic. That’s where this software or this solution could be improved.

I have been using it for six years. 

PowerScale, which used to be known as Isilon, was developed by EMC before EMC became part of Dell.

I would rate the stability an eight out of ten. 

I would rate the scalability a six out of ten because the new nodes are not compatible with the overall brand. So, we don’t have the option to scale an old cluster. This is a limitation because I could increase the node numbers with the same version, and then it works seamlessly. However, maintaining different versions is not the best solution.

We had some issues with level 1 support. We had to fight with them on repeated issues. 

We asked them if they could escalate the support to a higher level. There is room for improvement in level 1 support. 

Neutral

I used an IBM storage solution with an IBM GPFS file system and Samba.

We switched to Dell because of performance issues we had with this setup, which were caused primarily by the Samba NAS solution. IBM now offers licensing for commercial SMB protocol implementation, and they are capable of providing a good solution for us.

I would rate my experience with the initial setup an eight out of ten, with ten being easy to set up. 

The deployment process took a couple of days. It’s an on-premise solution.

We had to integrate it with our Active Directory system, and we had to implement some additional schemas, but apart from that, it was a standard process.

It is a really expensive solution. I would rate the pricing a nine out of ten, with one being low price and ten being high price. 

From a technical point of view, I would rate it an eight out of ten.

I would recommend using it. However, it's important to consider the high price point. Evaluate if you can get the same feature set from other vendors at a lower cost.

We use Dell PowerScale for SMB-based storage and NFS-based storage.

Dell PowerScale allows us to consolidate multiple storage units into a single storage unit.

The most valuable feature of the solution is its performance.

The solution’s interface and pricing could be improved.

I have been using Dell PowerScale (Isilon) for six months.

I rate Dell PowerScale a nine out of ten for stability.

I rate Dell PowerScale an eight out of ten for scalability.

We previously used NetApp. We switched to Dell PowerScale because NetApp's support was expensive, and we were looking for something more powerful and flexible. Dell PowerScale is the solution that meets our needs.

The solution’s initial setup is straightforward.

The solution's performance allowed us to shrink our workflow by about two times. We are a media and payment business. A lot of our workflows are video-based, and we store backups to a second system. With Dell PowerScale, we already see performance increases by almost twofold.

Dell PowerScale is an expensive solution compared to other products like Qumulo.

Before choosing Dell PowerScale, we evaluated Qumulo and a new version of NetApp.

I suggest users talk to someone who has actually used Dell PowerScale and has experience with it. Dell PowerScale has a more integrated interface. Compared to the interfaces of the newer generations of storage like Qumulo, Dell PowerScale has a comparatively older-looking interface. Apart from that, the solution is fine.

Overall, I rate Dell PowerScale an eight out of ten.

We use Dell PowerScale to share data between our Windows, Linux, and Azure systems.

Before Dell PowerScale, we had safe clusters for Linux systems and Windows file servers with separate item storage. Now, we have centralized storage together.

If we have an AI extension, data can be reordered from unstructured to structured. Scientists travel with a lot of data and ask to put the data in storage and forget about it. So there is a lot of unused data left in the storage.

PowerScale is flexible in supporting various data workloads while keeping them protected. It includes a lot of security snapshots so if a user accidentally deletes data, we can provide the snapshot for them to restore their lost data.

PowerScale helps reduce our organizational risk. We have additional security running on PowerScale for added protection. Before PowerScale, we had no security.

The most valuable feature of Dell PowerScale is its scalability. If we need more storage, we can add more nodes without the need to install anything else. Also, the data compression and deduplication are valuable. The SFA recovery site sync is good.

We believed that we could share all the data between Windows RTS and Linux RTS but that is not true because we can break the RTS as a system so we must separate the data. This means we have one system but we still have two data paths.

PowerScale is not suitable for virtual environments. So we use a different solution for our hybrid environments like our VMware clusters. 

I have been using Dell PowerScale for one year.

Dell PowerScale is stable.

Dell PowerScale is easily scalable.

We are supposed to have technical support from Europe, but until now we have only received support from India.

We previously used Pure Storage. We wanted PowerStore but our other partner offered us PowerScale faster.

We ran into an issue deploying PowerScale F900 because of some bugs but with the support, it worked out. 

We used a reseller for the implementation. T-Systems from Telecom. Their engineer installed the wrong cable that was not hard enough and we had to break down the switch to replace it. 

PowerScale hardware is expensive but it consumes less energy making it more efficient. In five years we will see a return on investment compared to other solutions.

I would rate Dell PowerScale eight out of ten. We have scalability and one file system for most use cases but the GUI is terrible. If we are searching for a file we must know the full path. Also, the alerts are not clear enough.