The Cisco UCS Series is a modular, high-density, high-availability, dual-node storage- optimized server suited for service providers, enterprises, and industry-specific environments. It provides dense, cost-effective storage to address your ever-growing data needs. Designed for a new class of data-intensive workloads, it is simple to deploy and excellent for applications for big data, data protection, software-defined storage environments, scale-out unstructured data repositories, media…
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HPE BladeSystem
Score 9.5 out of 10
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HPE BladeSystem is a brand of blade server, from Hewlett-Packard Enterprise. HPE blades include the ProLiant BL series and the ProLiant WS series.
It integrates perfectly with Cisco NEXUS switches, which we use on our infrastructure, giving us a seamless experience on the implementation and configuration.
They are very comparable. To be honest, I don't think you can go wrong with any of the major manufacturers. What it always comes down to me is ease of use, reliability, and most of all cost. If I can put a server in production and the end of life is 7 to 10 years down the road …
It's been said that BladeSystem is very similar to the UCS B-Series. While the network fabric features of the UCS B-Series outshine those of the BladeSystem, HPE has created extensive orchestration within HPE OneView to provide feature parity with and even surpass those of the …
Within our organization, HPE BladeSystem enjoyed widespread recognition. Also, HPE Apollo can't make advantage of Virtual Connect, so every Apollo server needs to be hardwired into the LAN. That has far-reaching consequences for the network portal. We would then need to install …
Within our organization, the HPE BladeSystem was a widely
recognized brand. We're a customer/end-user. Working with the blade server is
fun, and it's easy to keep track of everything. On a scale from one to
We tested Cisco UCS in its early days, so this might be a bit of an old comparison, but UCS had the promise of being very configurable, with templates for everything and automatable for just about every task. However, even working with a Cisco engineer for weeks, we could not …
We have used these servers as edge servers as well as core servers. They always perform extremely well and have very few hardware issues. If they do experience a hardware issue it is easy to find the replacement part and fix it without any issues. They are great performers and overall a great buy.
All nodes can be managed centrally through the ILO interface. Users and services alike benefit from the lightning-fast response time. Enable service continuity during VM migration between nodes. The purchase of a blade system is something we endorse as a viable alternative for your business. In order for the convergent system to work, the architecture can be adapted to accommodate new devices, and by applying new modules, both the technology and the system's responsiveness to demands for high availability can be enhanced.
It's very customizable. It's customizable as in you have a chassis, but you could pick and choose the size of your blades puff with full width depending on what your workloads are. So in a way, you're not locked in. It's not like you buy a chassis and you're stuck into one thing could go and put, you need something that's storage intensive or maybe you've got more graphics intensive workload. You could choose and mix and match in the same.
Continue on development of platform management. Cisco has been notorious for terrible web applications but the functionality of this product is getting to where it is expected to be.
Recognition of this being a product in a competitive market. When I think of servers I do not think of Cisco. Cisco = Networking Dell,HP=Servers
3rd party interoperability. I love Cisco but being tied to proprietary hardware/software is not a functionality that the end user or customer benefits from.
The small form factor of a blade server cannot accommodate expansion cards.
Shared infrastructure, like the interconnects, means a larger fault domain.
Firmware updates can be disruptive and administrators should pay close attention to firmware recipes and bundles to ensure compatibility between components.
Cisco UCS has been a highly reliable compute platform for our workloads, handling MSSQL, SSIS, virtualization (VMware vSphere), and analytics workloads with low latency and high efficiency. UCS Service Profiles and centralized management (UCS Manager, Intersight) make it easy to provision, scale, and manage compute resources efficiently across production and non-production environments. Our UCS setup integrates well with Pure Storage and Nimble HF40, delivering high IOPS, low latency, and fast throughput for data-intensive workloads. Cisco UCS hardware and licensing can be expensive compared to some alternative compute platforms, especially when considering cloud-based or hyperconverged options. While UCS can work in a hybrid cloud setup, it doesn’t natively integrate as seamlessly with public cloud providers like Azure or AWS compared to some newer solutions. We may need to evaluate Azure Stack HCI or AWS Outposts for future flexibility.
We do not intend to make new investments in HPE BladeSystem as it is in the end-of-life phase and we have continued with the new HPE Synergy environment. It is therefore not a process of discarding, but of evolution. This environment will possibly continue to be used in the institution, but for less critical purposes and more related to the development of new solutions.
While Cisco's hardware is solid and long running, their software is usually the weak point. I will say that they are getting better with each release but if I had to find a problem with usability that would be it. Overall usability is good when you can work around software issues.
While the system generally provides high availability, we did experience a few hardware-related issues with the B200 M6 blades, especially compared to the older B420 M3 blades. These issues, while not frequent, did require attention and some downtime for troubleshooting and replacements. However, the overall uptime of the UCS platform has been solid, and the availability during most periods has been reliable. The hardware-related issues were isolated and manageable, but they impacted the overall availability score slightly.
The system performs exceptionally well in terms of speed and efficiency, with pages loading quickly, and reports completing in a reasonable time frame, even with complex configurations. The integration of UCS with other systems, such as VMware vSphere and storage solutions, has generally not caused noticeable performance degradation. The scalability of UCS allows it to handle growing workloads without significant slowdowns. However, the performance could be slightly impacted during hardware or firmware upgrades, but these instances have been rare and well-managed. Overall, the performance has met our expectations and continues to provide reliable results.
Cisco TAC is simply unbeatable and that goes for Cisco UCS server support just as well as it does for Cisco CUCM software. TAC has a well-deserved, excellent reputation and I do not hesitate to call them or open a ticket online, because I always know that I will get the help that I need and get it quickly
The training materials provided were generally informative and covered the essential aspects of the UCS platform, such as UCS Manager, Service Profiles, and integration with other systems. However, some of the training modules could benefit from being more hands-on and interactive. Additionally, certain advanced topics, like complex network configurations or troubleshooting hardware issues, were not covered in as much depth. Overall, while the training was useful, there’s room for improvement in terms of depth and practical application for more advanced users.
While there were some challenges, particularly with driver compatibility, network configuration, and hardware integration, the overall process was well-managed. The implementation team worked effectively to resolve issues, and we received great support from Cisco throughout the process. The training and knowledge gaps were addressed, and once the system was up and running, the UCS Series has significantly improved our infrastructure. The experience was generally positive, and any difficulties encountered were ultimately overcome with careful planning and support.
The scalability with the use of adding more server chassis and profiling them to be quickly deployable and manageable on one website. The communication that are linked to each servers and with the Cisco UCS Series. In chassis particularly, it's more convenient because we have less wires and less port to connect. So it's ease of use. Again, the Cisco UCS Series service profile and the chassis profile. That's awesome to use for scalability and to deploy new servers.
It's been said that BladeSystem is very similar to the UCS B-Series. While the network fabric features of the UCS B-Series outshine those of the BladeSystem, HPE has created extensive orchestration within HPE OneView to provide feature parity with and even surpass those of the UCS B-Series. The fundamental distinction between the two is whether the focus is on the computing (BladeSystem) or the fabric (UCS). In contrast to UCS's tight fabric integration, BladeSystem's centralized focus on servers simplifies administration.
The system is highly scalable, allowing us to easily expand resources as needed, whether by adding compute blades, storage, or networking components. The centralized management provided by UCS Manager and Intersight makes scaling seamless, enabling us to manage growing workloads across multiple sites and departments without significant overhead. The cloud integration capabilities also help in extending UCS resources into hybrid environments, offering even more flexibility. However, scaling in very large environments might require careful planning to optimize performance and manage resources effectively
