Dell PowerScale (Isilon) Reviews

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.

I rely on Dell PowerScale to manage and store manufacturing data from NES systems. It is great for handling big data, offers scalability, and ensures data security, simplifying the storage and retrieval of manufacturing information.

The most valuable features of Dell PowerScale for its reliable performance and stability. The guaranteed performance, combined with the scalability through its scale-out capability, makes it an excellent choice. It is a top pick for my customers due to these qualities.

There is room for improvement in its handling of object storage. While it excels in managing file systems, enhancing features for more efficient handling of objects could make it even better, ensuring faster and smoother operations.

I have been working with Dell PowerScale for ten years.

The technical support is very good. They are quite helpful.

The installation is quite simple and the deployment takes only a few hours. In my organization, we have a total of 26 system engineers, and among them, 11 are trained to handle Dell PowerScale. These engineers are responsible for installing, maintaining, and providing support for the product. We conduct maintenance regularly, typically with a focus on remote support, offering 24/7 assistance. For on-site support, our goal is to respond within four hours.

While customers often perceive it as expensive, I find that considering its functions and performance, Dell PowerScale is reasonably priced. I would rate it as a five out of ten in terms of costliness. In addition to the standard licensing fee, there are extra costs for services and additional solutions with Dell PowerScale. Services like maintenance and support may incur charges. Sub-solutions such as CloudIQ are also additional and may be charged based on usage or quota.

I would highly recommend Dell PowerScale to others. Overall, I would rate it as a nine out of ten.

We use the solution for unstructured data storage.

The solution has centralized file storage at the scale it does that.

The solution is a complete package, but its most valuable feature is the DR capabilities replication.

I would like to see PowerScale become a multi-site active-active solution. I would like to see increased reporting and statistics functionalities.

I've used the solution for at least six years now.

Based on the last three years, I rate the solution's stability a nine out of ten. The stability has been very good.

I rate PowerScale's scalability an eight out of ten.

Before PowerScale, I more or less just used Windows file servers.

The initial setup is moderately easy.

I have seen a return on investment.

Our company finds the pricing high, but it decreases over time.

We looked at NetApp.

My advice before choosing PowerScale is to take training up front on it because it has a lot of capabilities. Do some good training before you try to deploy it. I rate PowerScale an eight out of ten.

It was a good fit for the system that we put in, as far as the amount of secondary data that was going to be generated on our system. Not only did it have the capacity for everything, but it also had the scale-up and scale-out features. We needed expansion without having to reimage the system. The larger we scaled it out, the better IOP and the bandwidth. It checked all of the boxes in terms of what we really wanted to hit for a tier-two storage system.

I just heard my SME today say OneFS is the best feature of the whole solution. The continuum improvements that OneFS has kept within the industry and kept up with standards, the ease at which it can be deployed, and the ease at which it can be upgraded, all are key features of this system. 

A key feature that I love is scalability. I don't have to rebuild the cluster to add a node. It can be scaled up and out without taking my system down.

PowerScale helps consolidate data storage and multiple applications into a single platform for easier manageability. As an example, I’d probably use the scenario of when I ingest data from a partner, and then I use the capabilities within Isilon to distribute the data across the other clusters in my enterprise. While we like to think that we're running an enterprise environment, their definition of enterprise and my definition of an enterprise are not the same. The idea here is, that I'm able to take in data from one organization at one cluster, and then use the smart features and the other features of Isilon, one of the best-operating systems, to redistribute that data to any other cluster that needs it.

The impact PowerScale had on our company's storage efficiency has been really good. I just recently saw a report on this a few weeks ago. We're actually doing really well as far as compression and deduplication go. We've over-bought compared to capacity based on the deduplication and compression that we're getting out of the system right now.

We really overbought on capacity. We have sites that are only 20% used. Then again, that goes back to the de-duplication and compression we're getting out of Isilon. They should be at 45% to 50% consumption at this point. The deduplication and compression, however, are working well. We're only using 20% of the capacity. I'll have a hard time when I go on a life cycle lease and I will have a very hard time convincing leadership that I still need the capacity. When they start reading and seeing these reports, it'll create a problem for me as I’ll have to justify it. However, to be clear, it's a good problem to have.

PowerScale has helped free up our employees' time to focus on other business priorities. We were able to do things like due diligence and research on InsightIQ and DataIQ and were able to do product comparisons while not having to worry about Isilon. It's freed up the cycles on those guys really well. I've got them to a point now where I'm cross-training them into Avamar.

PowerScale has helped reduce our overall risk in that it's dependable. The data is always going to be there. I don't have to worry about my end users. It has reduced risk across the entire enterprise.

In terms of PowerScale's cybersecurity, including its ransomware protection, considering the environment that we're in, I don't have to really worry about ransomware. That said, for the other security features, it would be helpful if Tenable had Isilon-specific plugins. That's what I'm looking for. If Tenable had specific Isilon plugins, when they do compliance scans, that would be ideal. Right now, the only plugins being used are the BSD plugins. When they scan across Isilon, they come back with all kinds of security findings which are false positives that my team then has to go and chase down. As far as Isilon security is concerned, it’s lovely. As far as being able to prove it, it’s not so lovely. I don't know if there's a partnership between Tenable and Dell that maybe we can bridge the gap on that one.

A recent development is, that there's a key feature coming out in OneFS 9.3, however, when you then try to get to 9.3 or 9.4 of the OneFS, it's been pulled from the download of the Dell website and we're referring back to 9.2.1 as the target code. The feature I'm looking for is in 9.3. If it's not going to be available to download, they should stop telling me about it.

We've used the solution for six years.

The stability is awesome. There are a few drives every now and again, however, with the product itself, we haven't had any issues with it.

Dell's support for PowerScale is awesome. It's probably, one of the best SEs that I've had in recent history is my PowerScale SE. If there's something I need or information that I'm looking for, I know exactly who to go to. They're really responsive. It's really cool.

Positive

This was a greenfield build. Isilon and PowerScale are what we put in from the very beginning.

I was not involved in the initial setup or deployment of this solution. My understanding is that it was pretty straightforward. We had a little bit of a rough spot when we went to do a OneFS upgrade, however, that's due to putting in hardening. When we had to back it off to do the upgrade, the hardening didn't back out as easily as it went in. That created some snafu and we ended up undoing all of the hardenings across the board. We created our own scripts to do it and it was much easier to manage.

When we deployed just PowerScale. Every PowerScale installment went with a complete stack, that included the switching, the server-side, the VMware, and everything that went along with building a stack. Isilon only occupied about three or four days' worth of a six-week installment period. It was pretty easy on a per-installation basis.

We've seen ROI in terms of time. We're also implementing the new version of vROps in which we can see the cost of our different applications, and how they use the different features.

From a time perspective, I have seen a return on investment in just the fact that I can take people now and redirect them to other products. I'm not going to reduce staff, however, I am going to redirect to other product lines. I have one guy that went from being our storage SME to probably one of my top guys, as far as VMware is concerned as well. It's worked out nicely.

The licensing is great. I'm not aware of the price point. As I was just telling my crew today that our job is to come up with solutions, not worry about the price. That's the management's problem to worry about the cost. If they don't like the cost, they'll come back and tell us to find another solution. Up to this point, I'd say the price point is okay.

We did evaluate other options. I couldn't say exactly which ones. I wasn't necessarily on the program when they did the evaluation, and therefore, I don't know what products were evaluated. That said, there was an evaluation period done.

In terms of versions, we have a mix of X410 and H500.

I’m not sure of the solution's flexibility for supporting various data workflows while keeping them protected. I would have to refer to my SME on that one. I don't really have feedback on that.

Speaking from a point where I don't know how much money we have invested, from productivity, stability, and ease of management perspective, I would absolutely 100% back it up every time. It's never provided a hiccup. Of all the components in our IT system, it's probably the least troublesome. It has been a workhorse and solid since the day we put it in.

I'd rate it eight out of ten.

We use the solution for NFS. 

Dell PowerScale's performance is good. 

The product needs to improve CLI since commands are complex. The search option is also difficult since you must give the full path. 

I have been using the product for more than three years. 

Dell PowerScale is stable. 

My company has more than 1000 users for the solution, and it is scalable. 

Dell PowerScale's support is good. 

Positive

Dell PowerScale's deployment is complex. 

I rate Dell PowerScale a nine out of ten. 

We're using 95% of data for user access and 5% percent for the NFS mount point. We're a startup and customer of Dell. 

It's helpful that we're able to scale the number of nodes without having to build additional clusters. We started with a very small footprint and now we have 30 nodes and recently expanded an additional eight nodes on the cluster. We can create multiple storage pools from this if we decide to add a location within the cluster itself.

We're struggling to find the NIXI protocol. It's for people needing to access using Windows and Linux. We're struggling with the UID mapping and how to configure mapping-related things. I'm looking at how to map those GIDs and UIDs. 

I've been using this solution for four years. 

The solution is stable. If it's being used for the NAS protocol, it's very stable.

The solution is very scalable. 

We have direct Dell support only.

The initial setup is straightforward. We have 4,000 users in the company who are accessing the shared drive without any problems. Maintenance can be done by one person. 

We have a five-year contract with Dell. We get new hardware each time we renew the contract and the cost is calculated on a percentage-wise and scalability basis. Every five years, we replace the tech nodes. 

If you're looking for a product to use for an assembly protocol, this is the best solution on the market.

I rate this product nine out of 10. 

The most valuable feature of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) integration with other solutions because of the standard file system protocol.

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) could improve the load distribution capability. For example, in some cases, the system load is not distributed automatically on all the nodes but is concentrated only on one. You have a peak request on only one node and the others don't do anything.

In an upcoming release, the solution should have security features embedded, not external software.

I have been using Dell PowerScale (Isilon) for approximately nine years.

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is a reliable solution.

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is scalable. It is easy to expand capacity.

Most of our customers are enterprise-sized companies and the solution is suitable only for companies with a lot of data. For example, you can have a start-up company dealing with a large amount of data, but only have 10 people working on it. In this case, you will need a solution with this capability.

I am satisfied with the support.

If you have used the solution previously then the initial setup of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is easy, if not then it is difficult. If you have good planning and preparation then the implementation can take two to three days.

We do the implementation of this solution for our customers.

The price of Dell PowerScale (Isilon) is reasonable.

My advice to others is they should work with a provider that knows the solution well and the features in order to implement it correctly.

This is a good solution but it is not always the best choice, it depends on the use case.

I rate Dell PowerScale (Isilon) an eight out of ten.

We have massive unstructured data. It's only used to keep up with our data growth.

Its scalability has been huge for us. Before that, we were using Windows File Servers and there were a lot of labor-intensive log-on activities to build all those servers. With Isilon, we just add nodes and grow capacity. We realized those benefits as soon as we had Isilon online.

We love the scalability with OneFS. It is a one-file system that just grows. It is able to keep up with our massive data and ingestion.

We don't use applications on Isilon, however, it manages the growth of our data and structured data.

The solution's flexibility for supporting various data workloads while keeping them protected is okay. It does the job. I didn't really think about it in terms of protection with its resiliency and its ability to grow.

It's important that PowerScale helps us secure data from cyber attacks, however, budgets control everything we do, so we can only use it as far as what our budget allows.

We lost our technical sales reps about two years ago. We haven't gotten one assigned to us and we'd love to have one.

We would like to see both performance and security improvements which are in all of the releases. We haven't leveraged S3 yet, however, at some point we're going to leverage S3. We're working towards the 9.0 releases. Therefore, we'd like to see some improvements in the protocols. 

I've been using the solution for five or six years.

OneFS seems very stable. I just wish support would get a little better. I realize with COVID 19 it's been hard to keep people.

The scalability is awesome, this is why we have it. 

There are challenges when providing economies of scale for a large cluster, however, it's nothing. It's hard to quantify that because it is just a cluster, but we've been pleased with the scalability overall.

In the past year, it hasn't been as great. They seem to just follow KBS. Prior to that, they were awesome. I'm hoping they get it together.

Negative

We just used Windows File Servers before Isilon. We didn't have any NAS to speak of. We might have used NetApp, however, that's not a scalable solution. We evaluated others and we chose Isilon.

It is very straightforward. It's a little complicated setting up, however, other than that, you just allocate file shares and maintain security patches, and management is easy. It's pretty similar to other systems. It's very straightforward once it's set up.

I deployed it myself. My implementation strategy was to just do it. I have a template that I modify for every deployment and I rack it a certain way so that we can manage the backend cabling, which is a really big deal. I rack it, set it up, and configure it.

We have it in our major data centers, including Seattle, San Francisco, and Phoenix. I do all the maintenance which includes dealing with failed hard drives. There are always errors popping up. I'm just keeping ahead of all the little things that come up, engaging with support, and so forth.

I did not use an integrator, reseller, or consultant for the deployment. I did it myself. 

We have seen an ROI. For example, we don't build Windows File Servers anymore and that eliminates that labor. We have massive data growth and it helps us keep up with adding nodes. However, we have no quantitative numbers for that to share.

The pricing seems reasonable to me. We always evaluate new storage platforms and we've stuck with Isilon.

The costs involved purchasing the hardware licensing and extending maintenance. However, that's with every product.

We haven't really looked into PowerScale's cybersecurity, including its ransomware protection.

We have some Gen 5 and Gen 6 nodes, and we have five clusters. We just purchased the newer Gen 6, A3000, and H700 nodes in our Phoenix data center.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten. If there was better support I'd give it ten out of ten.

It's an awesome product. I'd advise others to evaluate all the products and just pick the one that's best for them.

Things are in the details and I've always paid attention to that, however, you have got to handle deployment carefully and think ahead to what could go wrong. If you do that, everything will be fine.