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Dell Unity XT Unified Storage vs. IBM Storage FlashSystem

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Dell Unity XT Unified Storage

    Score8.5 out of 10
    N/ADell Unity XT hybrid flash arrays are storage systems for running general purpose workloads that do not require the low latencies and speed of all flash/NVMe architectures. Unity XT hybrid flash arrays balance performance, efficiency, features or outcomes.N/A

    IBM Storage FlashSystem

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/AIBM Storage FlashSystem, an all-flash storage array, delivers ~2 PB of effective capacity per single rack unit. Engineered with unique FlashCore Modules, it offloads data services including compression, encryption, deduplication, and ransomware threat detection ensuring optimum performance and resiliency.N/A
    Pricing
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Considered Both Products
    Dell Technologies
    Chose Dell Unity XT Unified Storage
    From my experience, Dell EMC belongs to the second class of storage arrays due to less popularity and performance compared to "the big heads".
    Incentivized
    Chose Dell Unity XT Unified Storage
    I was instructed to buy these arrays, but I was not given the opportunity to evaluate other arrays. We evaluated other products in the market that competed with Unity and found that the younger array built from scratch had far better features, software, and ease of use. The …
    Incentivized
    IBM
    Chose IBM Storage FlashSystem
    Like I already commented before. IBM Storage FlashSystems are more reliable, much easier to setup and operate and available at a much better price point as the competitor. So our experience is that the competition is going to "no bid" if IBM Storage FlashSystems are entering …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Storage FlashSystem
    IBM Storage FlashSystem outperformed all the other storage systems we tested.
    It also needs less rack space, and uses much less power.
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    82%
    Would buy again
    14 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    54 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    94%
    Delivers good value for the price
    15 Answers
    98%
    Delivers good value for the price
    51 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    17 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    54 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    12 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    45 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    14 Answers
    96%
    Implementation went as expected
    46 Answers
    Features
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Enterprise Flash Array Storage
    Comparison of Enterprise Flash Array Storage features of Dell Unity XT Unified Storage and IBM Storage FlashSystem
    Feature
    Dell Unity XT Unified Storage
    9.3
    16 Ratings
    5% above category average
    IBM Storage FlashSystem
    8.1
    157 Ratings
    9% below category average
    Flash Array Performance10.014 Ratings9.0152 Ratings
    Flash Array Integration10.014 Ratings8.1148 Ratings
    Data Compression9.013 Ratings7.7152 Ratings
    Non-Intrusive Upgrades9.016 Ratings9.1144 Ratings
    Simplicity9.016 Ratings8.4154 Ratings
    Power Savings9.015 Ratings6.2147 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Small Businesses
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    Dell Compellent (discontinued)
    Score8 out of 10
    Dell Compellent (discontinued)
    Score8 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Everpure FlashArray
    Score8.2 out of 10
    Everpure FlashArray
    Score8.2 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.0
    (21 ratings)
    8.5
    (157 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.6
    (6 ratings)
    Usability
    10.0
    (4 ratings)
    8.8
    (23 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.3
    (21 ratings)
    Support Rating
    9.0
    (6 ratings)
    9.1
    (6 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    Configurability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    5.1
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.8
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Dell Unity XT Unified StorageIBM Storage FlashSystem
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Dell Technologies
    Dell EMC Unity is an easy system and very flexible component and very easy to navigate while providing effective services and management of multiple project information management and the data pulling from the supported third-party platform is easy and quick. Excellent reporting features and easy to use and the analytics tools are amazing.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    IBM Storage FlashSystem is the only good option. It is possible to do with other brands but not with the same compatibility and support. So in the IBM i world, there is not that much options if you want reliable products, performance and compatibility with overall system: IBM Storage FlashSystem product is the one. You may need to adjust performance to your needs and IBM has a complete range of systems for entry (FS5X00), mid-range (FS7X00) or high-end (FS9X00). In IBM i world, IBM Storage FlashSystem is the best, but knowing the product, I would probably recommend it for other platforms. And many of my customers are using it as a cross-technology platform (mainly virtualization on x86 like VMWare).
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Dell Technologies
    • Enables you to create multiple copies of any database.
    • Data savings feature with compression.
    • Integrity with VMWare, RHEL, Oracle.
    • The best option is a midrange unified storage array in a customer environment.
    • Some models support NMMe.
    • Copy Data Management (iCDM), Data-At-Rest-Encryption (D@RE).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    • Extremely fast storage
    • Scales up as needed. Add flash core modules easily and increase volumes very quickly.
    • Applying firmware updates to IBM Storage FlashSystem is very easy to do and can be done without any downtime.
    • Replication policies are very versatile and also easy to setup.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Dell Technologies
    • Alerting: receiving an alert when an issue occurs. That is good to know. However, if the alert is cleared, or somehow no longer in alarm, no email is received. At times I will receive the email alert on weekends, not knowing if the issue is resolved or not until Monday when I can access the unit. I have learned in most instances, the alert is a false alarm, which could be a problem.
    • The alerting itself is sometimes not clear. For example, it tells me the link is down, we reset the connection, the link is still down, a tech was dispatched, he troubleshot, and finally the alarm cleared. This incident took almost a week. It went back into alarm after he left, then suddenly it cleared on its own.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    • Definitely we need to be able to extend a volume that is part of a mirror pair or Policy-Based Replication(PBO) on the fly.
    • Expansion of mirrored volumes/volume groups should resynchronise only the changed data (Almost like making use of change-volumes) and not trigger a full resync.
    • Please allow us to select downloading drive microcode also from Fix Central directly onto the flashsystem like with updates.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    As flash technology evolves rapidly, vendors should [adapt] to the changes and onboard them in their products. IBM is a bit slow in adopting advanced technology in [its] portfolio. Even though the current product is good, my decision is purely based on how the transformation of the product [is] being produced and supplied to [the] end-user.
    Incentivized
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    Usability
    Dell Technologies
    The Unity was easy to connect, set up and maintain
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    The integration into our SVC and the midrange systems are very well working. We do use cross site replication and global mirror which in turn is easy setup and the consistency groups are well maintained. The storage does global mirroring but also internal cross room replication as well. The integration of cloud object storage also helps in tiering the overall system.
    Incentivized
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    Reliability and Availability
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    Yes. The last really issues I've seen in the environments of my customers were back in the "Storwize" era of systems. Issues with code updates or sometimes rarely failing critical components. BUT: since every component is at least dual redundant even back in that day real outages were very rare. And today in the "FlashSystem Era" the systems are so reliable and available even during code updates there are no complaints. I think the 5 or 6 9s are completely achieved.
    Incentivized
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    Performance
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    Latency and throughput have been excellent. The compression is done natively on the NVME modules so we do not see an impact there. the distributed parity does not seem to impact write speeds at all. We have found database performace has increased quite a bit over our old hybrid storage solution.
    Having a single tier of performance makes it easy to set up SLAs for workloads.
    Incentivized
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    Support Rating
    Dell Technologies
    Dell EMC Unity, in my honest opinion, is basically an all-flash VNX with a better interface. There is ZERO innovation coming out of EMC. If you want a company that's going to give you good support and be proud of their product instead of their profit margin, I strongly urge you to look elsewhere as there are better and more innovative products in the marketplace.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    I would rate the overall support for IBM Storage FlashSystem with a 10. The response times have consistently been fast, and the support engineers always come prepared with relevant questions and practical solutions. They demonstrate a deep understanding of the product and our use case, which means issues are typically resolved quickly and without unnecessary back-and-forth. This level of support has been especially valuable for our SAP environment, where uptime and quick resolution are critical.
    Incentivized
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    In-Person Training
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    Very good traning by experienced personnel. I attend instructor led sessions on IBM TechExchange and STUs before as well as IBM workshops for FlashSystems at IBM Böblingen which I helped to prepare and improve after piloting them. Absolutely nothing to complain about FlashSystem training in Germany or USA. So: all good here!
    Incentivized
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    Online Training
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    THe training is often selfpaced and easy to follow if you have worked previously with other storage products. The content is clear and contains all the information needed for an admin to learn. However the troubleshooting part is not always included and this is dependent on forums or other sources where the information is not accessible very easily.
    Incentivized
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    Implementation Rating
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    I was amazed by the way IBM Flash storage provides a huge amount of storage within the limited footprint, it helped us to replace big fat storage arrays, which aided in the process of moving towards lower hardware, carbon, and energy consumption footprint. We can comfortably say that Flash helped us to host applications fast with a blazing speed and user transactions are quite quick.
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    Dell Technologies
    I was instructed to buy these arrays, but I was not given the opportunity to evaluate other arrays. We evaluated other products in the market that competed with Unity and found that the younger array built from scratch had far better features, software, and ease of use. The Unity system has a unique way of storing the data when compared with other systems.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    For the past six months, we have been utilizing this technology in our projects to manage a massive workload and produce swift business outcomes on a crucial production database. The IBM FlashSystem 7200, which offers high performance and compression, has so far been a great experience for us. The results and functionality of this product have delighted our consumers.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Dell Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    I'm using cognos - especially cognos reports - as a part of IBMs Storage Intelligence software to manage datacenters and report storage and overall resource consumption to my customers. The software is reliable and - my customers who are using cognos in their businesses - say that they are very satisfied about the scalability of cognos. I can give it only an 8 rating because of the quite heavy resource footprint...
    Incentivized
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    Return on Investment
    Dell Technologies
    • Less business downtime and reliability is a major business concern. DELL EMC UNITY addresses this concern well and provides robust storage.
    • Investing in UNITY system is less expensive than all-flash storage systems.
    • Managing and provisioning VMware disks became simpler from a single interface in the Vcenter
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    • Easy of use is a key aspect, as we do not have dedicated storage staff.
    • Our RPO has lowered near to Zero, using PBR as replication and this is key for us.
    • DR plan testing has become easier and less time-consuming, allowing us to conduct tests more frequently.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    IBM Storage FlashSystem Screenshots

    Screenshot of Flash Core Module 5th GenScreenshot of IBM FlashSystem 5600Screenshot of IBM FlashSystem 5600 (rear)Screenshot of IBM FlashSystem 7600 and 9600Screenshot of IBM FlashSystem 7600 and 9600 (rear)