What users are saying about
33 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 8.9 out of 100
Based on 33 reviews and ratings
5 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 9.4 out of 100
Based on 5 reviews and ratings
Attribute Ratings
- FlexPod is rated higher in 1 area: Likelihood to Recommend
Likelihood to Recommend
8.8
Cisco HyperFlex
88%
17 Ratings

9.5
FlexPod
95%
2 Ratings
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
Cisco HyperFlex
100%
1 Rating

FlexPod
N/A
0 Ratings
Usability
9.0
Cisco HyperFlex
90%
1 Rating

FlexPod
N/A
0 Ratings
Support Rating
8.7
Cisco HyperFlex
87%
19 Ratings

FlexPod
N/A
0 Ratings
Implementation Rating
10.0
Cisco HyperFlex
100%
1 Rating

FlexPod
N/A
0 Ratings
Likelihood to Recommend
Cisco HyperFlex
Hyperflex is best for customers who already have Cisco UCS because of its integration with UCS fabric interconnects. You can add UCS blades to your Hyperflex cluster to increase compute capacity without increasing storage--which is great depending on your needs--but it's still limited to UCS. Installations without fabric interconnects have been limited in scope and most importantly expandability. I like that it doesn't require data locality. While I've used Nutanix extensively and SimpliVity to a less extent, I'm not as sold on their use of it. On the one hand your reads are faster if they're all from the node currently running a VM, but it also means your data has to move around if you vmotion your VMs. I do feel that Cisco has been playing catchup for a few years now with Nutanix, but Hyperflex has become a decent product that I would recommend to my customers where it's a good fit. However, I recommend being careful to make sure that it has all the features you need.

Verified User
Professional in Professional Services
Computer Hardware Company, 201-500 employeesFlexPod
FlexPod is great for mid to large size companies, where the flexibility and depth of a traditional SAN and high performance servers is required. For smaller companies, it might make more sense to go with a hyper converged solution such as Hyperflex or Nutanix (both of which can still run on Cisco UCS servers, but would not be making use of Netapp storage), to meet the requirements in a smaller footprint.
Principal Systems Engineer
JWS ConsultInformation Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees
Pros
Cisco HyperFlex
- UCS manager in HX is truly helping us in doing one touch firmware upgrades. Scaling of HX cluster (in few minutes) is too seamlessly due to service profiles.
- HX does not hold you back by creating a single data store unlike other HCI products. With HX, you can create multiple data stores and allocate those to desired services. This help logically separate the install base on HX and removes confusion for the admins too.
- We run high IOPs workload on HX, and we never felt latency issues due to the Cisco backbone (as you get FI as a TOR switch and options to choose 10G or 40G speeds).
- With HX you truly enjoy a single window support from Cisco including for the top of the rack switch (FI in HX case). In other HCI infra, you certainly have to bank on to network switch vendor for support and bring HCI and switch vendor at one pane for troubleshooting latency related issues.
- While we increased our footprint on HX, we didn't added additional administrators to support the landscape. This was possible because of the simplicity in managing HX clusters.
- With HX we had setup stretched cluster between two near site data centres. This is a unique proposition in HX (we have 2 nodes in each data centre) and data centre failover works absolutely seamless.
Sr. Practice Manager - Cloud & Platform
KPITInformation Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees
FlexPod
- Single Pane of Glass Server Administration.
- Ease of firmware upgrades.
- Incredible support when you have an issue. The Cisco/NetApp/VMware FlexPod support teams work together and drive your issues down to the root cause.
Senior IT Systems Engineer
City of AvondaleGovernment Administration, 501-1000 employees
Cons
Cisco HyperFlex
- replication - as we need to use the same amount to storage to backup
- Cisco should come up with a strong hypervisor equal to vmware ESXi
- should come up with the repository of OS images and download automatically when a new OS version is released
- hybrid connectivity - missing

Verified User
Consultant in Information Technology
Financial Services Company, 1001-5000 employeesFlexPod
- KVM control of the blades still requires Java. Avocent is using HTML5 now, and it would be nice if the KVM console for these UCS blades could too.
- Price - Like any Cisco product, there are cheaper options. They aren't nearly as fully featured, but at times, it would be nice if UCS could be a bit cheaper.
Principal Systems Engineer
JWS ConsultInformation Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees
Pricing Details
Cisco HyperFlex
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
—FlexPod
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
—Likelihood to Renew
Cisco HyperFlex
Cisco HyperFlex 10.0
Based on 1 answer
We are doing it in the current moment. The platform expansion will be twofold.
IT Infastructure Team Lead
ArcelorMittal TemirtauMining & Metals, 10,001+ employees
FlexPod
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Usability
Cisco HyperFlex
Cisco HyperFlex 9.0
Based on 1 answer
Everything is fine if you work as a user of the system. Difficulties in fine tuning the system.
IT Infastructure Team Lead
ArcelorMittal TemirtauMining & Metals, 10,001+ employees
FlexPod
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Cisco HyperFlex
Cisco HyperFlex 8.7
Based on 19 answers
Nowadays being agile and efficient is most really important. Hyperflex has the ability to be agile and efficient. Cisco HyperFlex functions based on UCS technology, it includes built-in networking and integrated management with pre-configured software. Cisco HyperFlex has everything in one place as a data center, so there is no need to focus on extra things.
Application Development Associate
AccentureInformation Technology & Services, 5001-10,000 employees
FlexPod
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Cisco HyperFlex
Cisco HyperFlex 10.0
Based on 1 answer
Fast, powerful, flexible.
IT Infastructure Team Lead
ArcelorMittal TemirtauMining & Metals, 10,001+ employees
FlexPod
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
Cisco HyperFlex
HyperFlex is built on top of Cisco UCS infrastructure, which allows us to manage other non-HX servers attached to the same UCS environment. This allows us to tie everything together via Intersight and see all of the servers in our data centers. Other platforms don't really have a comparable offering.

Verified User
Professional in Information Technology
Airlines/Aviation Company, 1001-5000 employeesFlexPod
Being a Cisco shop already it was a natural fit to go with a solution based on their technology. Then add in VMware which we are were already using - that was two out of the three for the FlexPod. Then factor in NetApp's de-duplication technology and flexibility in configuration and options and it's a match made in heaven. Not to say we haven't had some stumbles and some issues but it works and it works well.
Senior IT Systems Engineer
City of AvondaleGovernment Administration, 501-1000 employees
Return on Investment
Cisco HyperFlex
- The simplified management makes it easier to operate and prevents mistakes.
- Guided installation using the installer VM means you don't have to configure every component by hand. Improves deployment speed and lowers the risk of configuration issues.
- Performance increase of 40-90% compared to our previous compute/storage cluster.
Technical Team Lead Network & Security
Missing Piece BVInformation Technology and Services, 11-50 employees
FlexPod
- FlexPod has allowed our team to be extremely quick to resopnd to new VM build requests. The amount of RAM, CPU and backplane offered by B series blades allows us to go with very high VM density. The quick deployment of service profile templates also means that when we have to add new hosts, it is done quicker.
- FlexPod and the service profile portability (along with VMware) has allowed for full upgrades and migrations from M1/M2 series hardware to M4 hardware without any downtime or outages to the clients. Blades can be moved into new chassis, or service profiles moved to new generation blades, with no impact to the customers' ability to work.
Principal Systems Engineer
JWS ConsultInformation Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees