Dell EMC Unity XT reviews

We use the Unity to back-end our VMware virtual stack. We run VMware vSphere on it. It's a hypervisor, and that is what we are required to run all our VMs for both Horizon and our internal services.

We were having significant latency with our old storage arrays. With Unity's flexibility of block and file storage, we were able to start with file storage, then plan eventually moving to block storage. So, it has sped up our entire architecture.

Speed and ease of use of the interface are its most valuable features.

The Unity interface is much more advanced than some of the older ones that we had, or that I've experienced. It has made deployment, configuration, and maintenance a lot simpler.

For private cloud, it works very well.

There were a couple features that came out a little later than we originally believed, but they did come pretty much on time and met our schedule.

Like any other storage array, SAN, or NAS, it is very reliable. We haven't had any issues with it.

We know that we can add another whole tray or two of disks if we need to. We started with a high-density to begin with, but we knew we had significant space to expand when we needed it.

It has exceeded our performance expectations. We were expecting an improvement, but we were expecting to eventually in the short term come close to hitting capacity on it, and we haven't. Performance-wise, it's held up very well.

The support that we get for Dell EMC storage has been fantastic.

We were previously using NetApp, and we were at the limit of our old equipment. We were running older file storage, which was causing us a bunch of latency issues, and the Unity solved most of those problems.

The initial setup is not so straightforward if you don't have experience with storage arrays.

We used a Dell EMC consultant for the deployment. The experience was good.

The return on the investment was simply speeding up our entire vSphere stack, which allowed our developers and engineers to get their workloads done faster and simpler. We were experiencing VM snapshot times of 45 minutes to two or three hours, and it shrunk it down to under five minutes.

Based on the cost and performance the we needed, Unity was the best price. NetApp was not being price competitive.

If you're looking for a cost-effective, easy to use solution, which has scalability on a small-to-medium deployment, Unity is a very good solution for this.

We are planning to use replication very soon, and we do use snapshots.

We've been very happy.

We were looking for an option for an all-flash array with a lower cost than the XTremIO.

It's easier to administer than some of the alternatives that we had. The teams find it easy to manage. We're a big EMC shop anyway, so for us it was just a lower-tier alternative at a good performance point for the price.

We are leveraging its integration with other applications and there were no significant costs to do so.

The most valuable feature is the performance. It's still an all-flash array at a good price point.

It needs deduplication. We'd like to have the dedupe capabilities in the Unity.

It's very stable. No issues with it.

It's been acceptable in terms of scalability as well. We've found that it's easy to expand and not too expensive.

Dell EMC, generally, is good from a technical support perspective. We really never have issues.

It's hard to say what our ROI is. We don't do a lot of hard ROI.

The pricing is competitive. We miss some of the feature functionality that we had with the XtremeIOs but it's certainly suitable for the purpose.

Weigh your options. The landscape has changed a lot since we bought it, it's been a couple of years. It's a good product but you will certainly want to survey the landscape.

The most important criteria when choosing a vendor include the longevity of the product, certainly ongoing support as well. I've got a good relationship with Dell EMC, we like the product. If I'm not mistaken it was based on the VNX platform; it's basically an all-flash version. We had some familiarity with it and the all-flash piece was very compelling.

I would rate it at eight out of ten. There are just a few features that we'd like to see at that price point. But generally, it has been pretty stable.

We added it to our Vblock 740 as a storage extension, basically a tech extension for a capacity upgrade. We set it up about three weeks ago. I haven't seen any issues so far.

What we noticed was that the SP utilization is quite high, although the main load is on a VMAX. We'll need to dig into it with EMC and see if there are any issues that might pop up.

The setup was quite easy, straightforward.

Compression, it's an all-flash Unity, so with that compression feature, it's comparable to a hybrid. That is one thing that we definitely like.

It runs. No stability issues.

If those SP utilization things, noted above, get to be an issue, I think scalability might be an issue too. But we need to confirm that. I don't know yet.

We had a licensing issue to do with encryption but, other than that, we have not had to use tech support. It took a little bit, support had to get it into our ELA. It worked out in the end.

Obviously, it is the successor of the VNX. We wanted to add some mid-range capabilities to that Vblock 740 and it was the logical choice.

In terms of selecting a vendor, we're a big EMC partner, so we don't usually look at other vendors. We have very good experiences with EMC support so far. We are currently not looking at other vendors.

It is definitely worth having a look at. The price-point for all-flash is certainly quite interesting. It has NAS capabilities too, if you need it. It's an interesting product, at least for mid-range.

The biggest improvement is the data reduction for the organization. That is where they see the better TCO and improved ROI for their existing footprint. That's the biggest advantage for the businesses that are using the Unity platform.

The features that customers are looking for, because I do a lot of architecture work, is the management simplicity. The provisioning is very simple in the Unity platform, as well as the reporting structure back to the customer. They get to know end-to-end visibility in the system environment.

Inline dedup compression security is coming up as an issue, encryption is key for our customers. If we could have more ways to do software-based encryption, those are the features customers are asking us for, as well as replication.

The maturity level of the Unity is getting better and better as we speak. The latest and greatest cores are becoming more stable than the previous one. EMC is doing a lot of investment in research and development. They're getting better and better.

It is scalable. Customers are going more into distributed architecture, so the Unity definitely  has a scalable architecture built into that. Scale-out architecture, scale-up architecture.

There is a lot of room for improvement on the support side, because of the response time. I'm giving the customer feedback. Customers are coming to me as their architect, as a level-1, level-2, they're asking me. The response from the EMC is not there yet. We are sending the same feedback back to EMC, to improve the support line.

We started with the VNX platform. I have a very good understanding of the EMC portfolio from Centera, from NS, VNX, VNXE, and then VMAX.

Setup is very easy. Absolutely. It's easy to build the environment. That has improved a lot.

At the end of the day, the licensing cost is key, because every customer has a pain point, that the cost of each piece is high. So if we can bundle everything in a package, that is how the competitors are selling their footprint. For example, Pure, if you buy a box, everything comes with the box. So, in a similar fashion, if we can do anything along those lines, it will be better for the customer.

I give it an eight out of 10, because there is definitely room for improvement, for EMC to invest in it.

It has increased the reliability in our organization and it is cost effective.

• Replication and reporting
• Replication of the communication object (COB) scenarios

The EMC VNX Virtual Data Mover (VDM) software needs more improvement.

There were no stability issues.

We did not encounter any scalability issues.

I would give technical support a rating of 9/10.

Previously, we were using the EMC VNX solution and I am still using it.

The setup was straightforward. It is just simple clicks. You just need to follow the manuals and the instructions.

This product is cheaper than the EMC VNX solution. It is good for small businesses.

We evaluated other solutions, namely Nutanix and NetApp.

• EMC is known for its reliability
• This product is good
• It is easy to install and maintain
• It operates with low maintenance and manpower costs

The product is stable. Its most valuable feature is the storage alarm.

Dell Unity XT’s price needs improvement.

We have been using Dell Unity XT for five to six years. We are using version 380.

I rate the product’s stability nine out of ten.

We have 8000 Dell Unity XT users. I rate the product’s scalability an eight out of ten.

The product has an easy setup process. It requires two people to execute it and takes a day to complete.

I rate Dell Unity XT’s pricing a nine out of ten.

We evaluated HP and NetApp.

I rate Dell Unity XT an eight out of ten.

We propose this solution when customers need to expand their workload or storage.

It is great because it can work as a SAN and net storage.

It is expensive, and the pricing could be better.

We have been using this solution for three years, and most companies in Egypt partner with Dell EMC. It is the main storage solution that we sell to customers. It is deployed on-premises.

I rate the stability a nine out of ten.

I rate the scalability a nine out of ten, and we have more than 80 customers in Egypt.

There is a good ROI if the customer has critical applications and file storage.

The licensing is included in the appliance, and I rate the licensing costs an eight out of ten.

I rate this solution an eight out of ten and recommend it to others.

One advantage was the ability to use different types of disks and different types of disk solutions to increase the speed, first of all, and to take advantage of different storage costs across the life cycle of the data.

• One of the most useful features for us was the deduplication. It had been challenging for us to store certain types of data and to use patterns of storage to reduce storage size.
• The IOPS and the speed were also an important part of the solution.
• In addition, there was a Unity machine that offers block-level and NAS, and we used the block-level storage.
• We also use the side-to-side storage verification for the recovery site.
  
• Finally, the device was flexible and we could change the configuration to meet our needs.

Our request to Dell EMC for improvement was in the reporting and monitoring areas. Dell EMC built up a cloud ID so that we could see the overall storage numbers. We needed to have the proper KPIs to be able to see and manage things.

I worked with Dell EMC Unity XT for two to three months. My last role was IT director so I didn't do a lot of hands-on with the devices. I was overseeing the IT staff and doing project management for these kinds of solutions. At that time I was working for a manufacturing company for pharmaceutical life cycle products, and we were a customer of Dell EMC.

There was no problem with the stability. It was, as expected, very strong.

You can grow as much as you like. There is no limit. It's easy to scale.

We had about 1,000 users of the Unity XT.

We did not need to contact their technical support.

The initial setup for Unity XT was pretty straightforward. We knew exactly what we needed and our requirements were very easily applied to the box. With one day of hands-on training, my colleagues were able to manage things.

Maintenance required one person.

We used an integrator for the deployment. They had great knowledge of the product. We also did some additional integration with them in other parts of the storage, including backup and data domain devices, because we were very fond of the work they did.

The main factors to consider are space, availability, business continuity, performance, and IOPS. The Unity XT box is very strong. It doesn't break. The MTBF time is very large so you don't have to worry about faults or outages in your operations.

It is a very complete platform. Dell EMC wrote a new OS for storage, but I haven't seen it yet.

We looked at HPE Nimble but the price of the Unity XT was very good compared to the competition.